Helen Grassly has addressed the Theatre & Architecture conference at Sibiu International Theatre Festival 2018. The most important annual festival of performing arts in Romania, it brings participants from 70 countries into Sibiu and caters for 62,000 spectators a day. The theme of the conference was “Looking Ahead at the Way Architectural Design, Programming, Technology and the Evolution of Our Communities Will Shape the Theatres and Theatrical Experience of the Future”.
Sibiu, Romania
Considering the fact that the city of Sibiu wants to build a new theatre, a congress centre and a research institute for the performing arts and cultural management, this event will contribute to the formulation of aspirations and objectives related to this platform for "Radu Stanca" National Theatre of Sibiu and for the Sibiu International Theatre Festival in order to fulfil the community requirements and those of the architectural and urban environment as best as it can. The participants analysed the relationship between the act of creation and the theatre buildings in a multi-layered discussion, as well as the way in which this relationship is affected by and - in its turn - affects the community, the financial and social durability, but also the evolution of the arts.
Hall For Cornwall, one of the projects highlighted at the conference
Helen participated in the session “Performing Arts Spaces We Have Built” outlining how venues Burrell Foley Fischer have designed have stood the test of time, have been effective in meeting their original aspirations and how they have met evolving business models and artistic requirements. She explained how our experience demonstrates the possibility for performing art spaces to endure, to be sustainable as well as sustaining and indeed to be a driver for renewal. Helen outlined our philosophy that successful venues are tied to their regional, urban and cultural roots, engage with their city and community by being visible, widely accessible and supporting the next generation of talent and providing performance spaces that the wider artistic community wants to work, play and experiment in.
Fellow panellists included Joe Melillo, Executive Producer at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, USA; Jason Flanagan, Flanagan Lawrence Architects, UK; and Andrzej Kosendiak, Director of the National Forum of Music, Poland.
Read more on the festival's website.