We are very proud to have been part of initiating a gathering we call RØSK – Reflections on the new Ecological Performing Arts – and as part of this to have written this wonderful vision together with some inspirering artists.

Please dig in and read it here

PERIOD: 25/9 – 8/10 2023

Laboratorium for new ecological performing arts around the Baltic Sea

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS 6/6-23

BIRCA BALTIC SEA is for 6 performing artists placed around the Baltic Sea (Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) with a joint residency of 2 weeks taking place 25/9-8/10. The residency seeks to expand your current practice with a focus on the health of the planet. We seek to create new solo, shared and collaborative performance works, with a focus on exchange and collaboration. 

We have received funding for residential visits from the Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme for Culture to establish BIRCA Baltic Sea residency.

Here is a link to the full call information.

We received 99 applications for the BIRCA Women call. It was truly invigorating for us to witness the richness and depth which were so clearly featured in all the applications. The reviewing and selection process were both inspiring but also challenging. The review was done by Moira Finucane and Susanne Danig.

In the process we considered the individual application, the individual artist and the broader context of their practice, the relevance of the proposed idea to the specificities of BIRCA Women and the foreseen dynamic between the selected cohort. With all of that being considered we chose the following artists to participate in BIRCA Women 23 under the facilitation of Australian artist Moira Finucane:

Daniela Pascal Esparza – Finland/Equardor

Elise Mollie Williams – USA

Katherina Radeva – UK/Bulgaria

Katrine Duka – Latvia

Nana-Francisca Schottländer – Denmark

The five artists who were selected vary in their experiences and background, their artistic practices, their context for work and creation.

We look forward to this edition of the BIRCA Women residency and we will make sure that the process, the exchange that it will encompass and its outcome will be shared publicly in some way – so if you are interested, you will be able to follow it. Just make sure to follow BIRCA’s facebook or sign up for our newsletter to stay updated.

The vast interest in this residency and the large number of applicants encourage us to ensure that BIRCA Women will continue next year so stay tuned.

Thank you to the Danish Arts Foundation for supporting this.

We received 99 applications for the BIRCA Women call. It was truly invigorating for us to witness the richness and depth which were so clearly featured in all the applications. The reviewing and selection process were both inspiring but also challenging. The review was done by Moira Finucane and Susanne Danig.

In the process we considered the individual application, the individual artist and the broader context of their practice, the relevance of the proposed idea to the specificities of BIRCA Women and the foreseen dynamic between the selected cohort. With all of that being considered we chose the following artists to participate in BIRCA Women 23 under the facilitation of Australian artist Moira Finucane:

Daniela Pascal Esparza – Finland/Equardor

Elise Mollie Williams – USA

Katherina Radeva – UK/Bulgaria

Katrine Duka – Latvia

Nana-Francisca Schottländer – Denmark

The five artists who were selected vary in their experiences and background, their artistic practices, their context for work and creation.

We look forward to this edition of the BIRCA Women residency and we will make sure that the process, the exchange that it will encompass and its outcome will be shared publicly in some way – so if you are interested, you will be able to follow it. Just make sure to follow BIRCA’s facebook or sign up for our newsletter to stay updated.

The vast interest in this residency and the large number of applicants encourage us to ensure that BIRCA Women will continue next year so stay tuned.

We received 80 applications for the BIRCA Queer call. It was truly invigorating for us to witness the richness and depth which were so clearly featured in all the applications. The reviewing and selection process were both inspiring but also challenging. The process has raised many nuanced questions about queerness, artistic practice and curation. We feel truly honoured to have read all the stories and ideas of these queer artists.

In the process we considered the individual application, the individual artist and the broader context of their practice, the relevance of the proposed idea to the specificities of BIRCA Queer and the foreseen dynamic between the selected cohort. With all of that being considered, we are happy to announce the five artists selected:

Kat Staub – Germany/Denmark

Phillip Adams – Australia

Priiya Prethora – India

Tizo All – Germany/Brazil

Viljar Irtun Moe – Denmark/Norway

The five artists who were selected vary in their queer experiences, their artistic practices, their usual context for work and creation, as well as age and life experience. 

We look forward to this first edition of the BIRCA Queer residency taking place on Bornholm 19/6-2/7-23, and we will make sure that the process, the exchange that it will encompass and its outcome will be shared publicly in some way – so everyone interested will be able to follow it. Just make sure to follow BIRCA’s facebook or sign up for our newsletter to stay updated.

The vast interest in this residency and the large number of applicants encourage us to ensure that BIRCA Queer will happen again next year so stay tuned. This year it is supported by The Danish Arts Foundation.

Much appreciation

Israel Aloni and Susanne Danig, who made the selection this year

Now we are ready to launch our 3 calls for residencies in 23 – BIRCA Kids, BIRCA Women and the new one BIRCA Queer. For all deadline for applications is 31/1-23.

Read more about BIRCA Kids – only for Danish-based performing arts families and text is in Danish

Read more about BIRCA Women – for Danish and international performing artists

Read more about BIRCA Queer – for Danish and international performing artists

All residencies are supported by the Danish Arts Council.

Some may miss Island Connect – we are still working on it as we await a final response from the EU on our application. Something will come out hopefully during January, but we want to do something because we love that network and have just got 3 new exciting partners in Sardinia, Corsica and Tenerife.

2022 has again been a busy year for BIRCA. The place has unfolded in many ways with exciting projects and artists who have used the place. We have received support from the Danish Arts Foundation for this year’s residencies under the title Radical Women of a total of 200,000 DKK for Island Connect, BIRCA Women and BIRCA Kids. In addition, we have received indirect support through Metropolis for the Talking Landscapes project, where we also had an exhibition at Bornholm’s Art Museum about Walking Landscapes and unfolding the first ideas for next year’s Performing Landscapes project. The projects have also been supported by Bornholm Regions Municipality, Fogs Fond and BUPL’s foundation. Island Connect is supported by Creative Europe and during the year we have worked to strengthen the project going forward with a large new EU application, where 3 new partners from Sardinia, Corsica and Tenerife have been added.

There have been fine self-organized residencies with the Queen of the Meadow project from Ireland, Second Hand Women from the Czech Republic, Golden Joint residency with Julie Rasmussen, Degenerate Art Ensemble from the USA, Delia Trice from Italy/DK, and we have welcomed two Russian stage artists through the organization Artists at Risk. In total, 68 performing artists with their 16 children have visited us in 2022. In addition, we have had a groove workshop and several other individual visits.

We have deepened and strengthened the 3 tracks we work with: The local/island identity, nature connections/climate considerations and gender identity. We have created space for a nuanced understanding of the concept of gender and for embracing parenthood. There have been children present at a many residencies as we work purposefully to create an environment where children are welcome.

You can read the full report with a lot of nice photoes here

2021 has been a super busy year for BIRCA. The place has unfolded in many ways with many exciting projects, record number of residencies and artists using the place. We have been awarded a grant for 4 projects in total DKK 300.000 by the Danish Arts Foundation: Island Connect, BIRCA Women, BIRCA Kids and The Climate Crucible. We have also beensupported indirectly by the Metropolis project Walking Landscapes. Island Connect has lifted through support from Creative Europe, so the partnership has become stronger while especially the international artists have been supported more consistently. There have been self-organized residencies by: Acting for Climate, LocationX and AniMaNi as well as several individual visits.

We have developed and strengthened the 3 tracks we are working with. The local island identity, nature connections and climate reflections as well as gender identity. In the process we have learned a lot of new things. BIRCA has buzzed with art, creativity, enjoying the nature, love, and children.

All in all, 102 adult artists with 8 children and 2 dogs used BIRCA professionally in 2021. 72 of these were women. It is a calculated strategy to as much possible to support female artists in their development. Almost half of the artists – 48 – had an international background.

Read the full report here

ISLAND CONNECT

BIRCA WOMEN

BIRCA KIDS

– three residency initiatives with a focus on island identity, gender and nature are supported by the Statens Kunstfond.

Island Connect also supported by Creative Europe

DEADLINE ON APPLICATIONS FOR ALL RESIDENCES IS 20 / 12-22

Notification will be given no later than 1 / 2-22

ISLAND CONNECT

1. 2-15/5  at BIRCA & 16-29/5 at C.IN.E, Mallorca
2. 12-25/9 at BIRCA & 1-14/10 at Cres, Kroatien

BIRCA WOMEN 23/5-5/6-22

BIRCA KIDS

1: 20-26/6

2: 27/6-3/7

Thursday den 9/12 kl. 16-17 you can meet Susanne on Zoom to hear more and ask questions use this link.

Read more here

2020 was our fourth year and it was unrolled in the shadow of the Corona epidemic.  The activities have consisted of: residences, both organized by participants and under the auspices of Island Connect and finally  a long row of free Corona residencies, we  lay out in the spring – most of the projects ended  with work-in-progress showings, most of these were intern for invited guests because of the restrictions Corona generated.  Upstart of the frame project Klemensker Terra and the performances during Bornholm Culture Week. In return we had to cancel Artistic Entrepreneurship workshops and the scheduled TOFIC festival in addition “The People’s democratic Festival” was cancelled this year e.g. Corona.

BIRCA  2020 was characterized by Corona, but we opened our doors for the artists who really needed a place to work. We gave out ree Corona residencies. 27 different artists / groups with 46 adults and 5 children visited BIRCA in the spring.  This meant more Danish based artists visited us – but with a considerable international tough. A lot of international actors live in Denmark, especially in Copenhagen. In this way the season meant we went deep -into performance art research and into the Danish performance art environment. At the same time, we created the first BIRCA Kids Residency, where we invited artist families with children to a special week – an initiative we are going to continue in the future.   

In total 91 people have used BIRCA in 2020, professionally.  64 of these were women. It is a deliberate strategy as far as possible to support female performers in their development. 32 of the artists  have had an international background and they came from the following countries: Sweden, Norway, Finland, Germany, Greece, Croatia, the Netherlands, Austria, Ireland, Hungary, England, Italy, Spain, France the United States and Canada.  This is quite a lot when you look at conditions this year when we have fought so much with Corona. It partly shows, how international a section we have because a lot of them live in Copenhagen. But we also have had artists travelling from abroad and extra work inviting them, so they were able to get into the country.  This is especially applying to Island Connect in connection to Greece and Croatia, but we also had people coming from England, Norway and Sweden. Finally, we had an artist who was caught in Denmark when we closed the country down in March- she stayed a good while.

 We had quite a lot of intern showings but also managed to show the performance SPOR, a train journey on foot four times with a total of 80 guests and a Bornholm Culture Week showing with in total 44 guests.

If you want to read the whole report to see what we did and who has been here – you can find the report here