INTERCULTURAL THEATRE STORYTELLING LABORATORY

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The Gift of Diversity The Intercultural Theatre Storytelling Laboratory begins its journey exactly in November 2005 in Rome, created by Alessandro Ghebreigziabiher. A Laboratory designed with a dual meaning: An experiential training, led by Ghebreigziabiher, but also a laboratory in the sense of space in which people have the opportunity to work together and share personal resources. The storytelling was chosen as the main tool. However, the Intercultural term is what characterizes the whole, with the meaning that we clarify in our idea, like this abstract tells: the most powerful, significant and revolutionary way to have an intercultural point of view, in other words, to underline the importance of differences and richness inside our individuality, is to show the diversity of people that often think themselves as equal (not celebrating the equality of strangers...), to tell how much they are interesting to listen when they are speaking about themselves and how all become wonderful if they are so proud to mix each others. That is why we think that Interculture is much more related with the individual stories, rather than their original country. For this reason we believe that Italy itself, with all its dialects and its diverse people, is already a multicultural land, even before the arrival of the so-called immigrants, often discriminated and sometimes auto discriminating. In 2007 we had the number one edition of the Storytelling Festival in Rome, "The gift of diversity". The theme was the diversity of narrative languages and so we mixed Yvan Tetelbom’s poetry with Gabriella Ghermandi’s autobiographical stories, Cristina Ali Farah’s personal novels with the performance of the Laboratory students and so on. The main theme of the 2008 Edition was the diversity of storytellers and we have promoted the following notice in several languages, including English but also dialects of Naples, Rome and other Italian idioms, which are true languages: “The Intercultural Theatre Storytelling Laboratory is looking for performances to join the II edition of the festival "The gift of diversity". Dialects, English, slang, French, Italian, Spanish, Arab, every language will be accepted! You have only to tell us a story, a true story…” About seventy artists and companies from north to south Italy requested their participation, with very interesting and original shows, giving evidence that perhaps we are not so crazy to believe in a multicultural Italy, even before enriched by whom comes from far. The result was a festival of ten really amazing performances. The 2009 edition was dedicated to the diversity of stories and was in June, again in Rome. The invitation news was this: We’re looking for true stories. Did you live as protagonists or simple observers something that should be absolutely told? Send us your unique experiences. The chosen stories have been told on stage by the actors of the laboratory during the event. In late 2009, working for the fourth edition of the Festival, we published this Call for submission: We look for news. Do you know a fact that you think has been inadvertently or deliberately ignored by the media? This time too we have reached many interesting proposals and important news all worthy of being accepted, however, we have reluctantly had to make a choice. A sincere thank you to those who have considered us worthy of their trust. The fourth edition of the Intercultural Theatre Storytelling Festival, the diversity of news, will be on June 4 and 5 2010 in Rome. We’ll wait for you! ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ Last update: 2010/02/23