Senegal – Teatro Gioco Vita for “Italia, Culture, Africa”
“Italia, Culture, Africa” is an integrated promotion program the MAECI – Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation - is carrying out in the Countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, based on exchange, mutual knowledge and enhancement of their cultural and social identities.
Thanks to this program and with the collaboration of the Office for Cultural Activities Abroad of Emilia-Romagna Region, the MAECI, the Italian Embassy and the Italian Cultural Institute in Dakar, for the first time Teatro Gioco Vita takes the magic of its shadow theatre in Senegal.
A magic that will be ‘put into practice' also with a workshop held by Nicoletta Garioni, in which some of this theatre peculiar themes are treated: the shadow on the ground and the standing shadow, the transparency and the silhouettes, the construction and the animation of the silhouettes.
At the end of the workshop, an exhibition open to the public will be set with the small theaters and silhouettes realized.
On July 26th the show Little Asmodeus -in the French version Le Petit Asmodée- will be on stage at the Centre culturel Blaise Senghor.
Little Asmodeus is a tale about good and evil based on Lilla Asmodeus by Ulf Stark, one of the best-known contemporary writers of children books. With subtle irony but also through delicate poetry, with moments of healthy humor as well as sharp complexity, the story tells about a new Mephistopheles in pursuit of his Faust.
Director Fabrizio Montecchi, who wrote the theatrical adaptation together with Nicola Lusuardi, tells that he chose to set up this text because, after having worked with children for many years, he understood that they want to hear about important issues.
«And they are mainly fascinated by the great questions of life, the kind of questions mankind has always struggled to answer to - questions about life, death, love. And what about the soul? That soul our Asmodeus wants insistently to barter away? What is it? Good question! A brain teaser for philosophers and thinkers of all times, but, ask the children: the soul is what makes us live, what we have inside, it is what is left alive when we die. The soul is us.
Little Asmodeus is a story like that. It deals with important issues. That’s why it stimulates the children’s interest and their consideration: because it is sometimes funny, sometimes moving and it makes them think a lot» .