Case studies

EMANAT

Case Study: Queer as Folk – From Artistic Research to Performance

Lead artist: Leon Marič
Collaborators: Davide Lafabiana, Filip Štepec, Nik Žnidaršič
Produced by: Emanat

This case study follows the development of a new performance by dancer, performer, and dance pedagogue Leon Marič. The work grows out of his artistic research project Queer as Folk, which was publicly presented on 24 May at 7 pm.

The initial research explored the formation and experience of queer communities within established social, cultural, and institutional structures. Through movement, performance, collective exchange, and personal reflection, Leon Marič examined how communities are created, represented, and experienced, as well as how individual identities are shaped through belonging, exclusion, visibility, and shared practices.

Building on the material and questions that emerged during the research process and its public presentation, Leon will continue developing Queer as Folk into a full-length performance. Together with collaborators Davide Lafabiana, Filip Štepec, and Nik Žnidaršič, he will explore how research material can be translated into a performative structure and how individual artistic perspectives can contribute to a shared creative process.

The case study will document the transition from artistic research to performance production. It will focus on the development of movement and performance material, methods of collaboration, dramaturgical decision-making, and the relationship between personal experience and collective creation.

Within the Brave Creative Producers project, the process will also serve as a practical example of how producers can support an emerging artistic work from its early research phase to its public presentation. It will offer insight into the producer’s role in creating the conditions for artistic experimentation, coordinating collaborators, supporting communication between the artistic and organisational teams, and developing a sustainable framework for the production.

About the artist

Leon Marič is a dancer, performer, and dance pedagogue. In his artistic practice, he explores the formation and experience of different communities within established and institutional structures.

He began developing his dance and artistic interests at the Contemporary Dance Arts Gymnasium at SVŠGUGL in Ljubljana and later graduated in Contemporary Dance and Movement/Performance Studies from Anton Bruckner Private University in Linz.

Since 2019, he has been teaching at the Secondary Preschool Education School, Gymnasium, and Arts Gymnasium Ljubljana. Since 2020, he has been a member of the collective The Feminalz, which creates techno-burlesque performances, including Tatovi podob. In 2024, he created his debut solo performance, Küšni me.

KULTURNANOVA

Art in Public Space: Our Novi Sad Case Study

As part of the Brave Creative Producers project, Kulturanova is developing a new artistic production that brings together public space, collaboration, and learning through practice. This case study looks beyond the final performance and focuses on the often invisible work that makes artistic creation possible.

Our focus is the development of a new artistic production created specifically for public space. Instead of staying within the walls of a theatre, we are exploring how streets and public squares can become places where art connects directly with people.

At the same time, this process serves as a learning experience for two emerging cultural producers. They are involved in every stage of the production, from the first ideas and planning to rehearsals, the premiere, and future touring opportunities. Rather than simply observing, they work as part of the creative team, gaining hands-on experience while contributing their own ideas and perspectives.

Through this case study, Kulturanova is also exploring more sustainable and collaborative ways of producing art. Inspired by the slower pace of life that characterises Novi Sad and the Vojvodina region, we believe that creative processes benefit from taking the time to build meaningful relationships, make thoughtful decisions, and work in harmony with our surroundings.

The outcome of this process will be a new artistic work presented in the public spaces of Novi Sad, inviting local audiences to experience art in their everyday environment.

Beyond the final performance, this case study highlights the creative role of cultural producers and demonstrates how the way we organise, collaborate, and create is just as important as the artwork itself.

INSTÁVEL

Case study: Palcos Instáveis

In Instável, the Brave Creative Producers will follow a number of production activities. From presentations of new works, to national touring of performances, the emerging producers will be involved in a variety of production activities which translate the range of activities developed by Instável. 

One of these projects will be Palcos Instáveis, a project directed for contemporary dance makers in Porto and the northern region of Portugal, which encourages the development and presentation of choreographic projects, selected by open call.

The creators integrated in this project have the possibility of being accommodated in a residency at Instável – Choreographic Centre. They will be given a grant for creative purposes, artistic counselling, production and advertising support, and they integrate a monthly cycle of presentations called “Palcos Instáveis/1as Obras” (which translates to “Unstable Stages/1st Works”) at the Municipal Theatre – Campo Alegre, who coproduces the project.

At the essence of Palcos Instáveis there was the will to provoke and promote emergent dance making. In 2026, the emerging producers will accompany the development of four artistic creations, gaining first‑hand experience with diverse production methodologies — from pre‑production to dissemination and communication — while adapting to the specific needs of each project in close collaboration with the Municipal Theatre’s teams.

Artists and works selected to be presented in october and november of 2026:

The Ruin is a Tail, Sancha Meca Castro
An archive is not as sterile as it seems. We wake before dawn to move from the memory of the very first cell. We discover that what disappeared from the old body still echoes within the new one. Ruin is a tail. In an archive of gestures, only movement can speak both of what has been lost and of what has been preserved as a fossil. We embodied this archive, but its forms took us by surprise. We tried to repeat its movements, yet in attempting to translate these fossilised gestures, we accidentally created something new. The objects taught us how to become sculpture, how to freeze movement. We destroyed them.

TAMBOR, Melissa Pérez Sousa
TAMBOR is a contemporary dance creation — a solo performance — rooted in autobiographical memories, cultural practices and experiences of migration. On stage, a body searches for states of physical intensity, drawing on the vocabularies of Venezuelan folk dance, street dance and clubbing cultures. Personal myths are evoked as symbolic forces that generate both movement and an embodied imaginary. Inspired by conversations with the artist’s mother, TAMBOR maps an intimate and social archive, exploring territories beyond binary logics and the tensions between belonging and not belonging.

Manual de Defesa, Júlio Cerdeira
Manual de Defesa is a lecture-performance that reflects on forms of protection, memory and the (re)affirmation of queer bodies, identities and corporealities. Drawing on a range of artistic discourses, it seeks to aesthetically reimagine how these bodies can be defended in times of crisis. Oscillating between theoretical essay (spoken and written) and embodied practices—including contact improvisation, jiu-jitsu and queer affectivity—the piece follows two bodies striving to protect and affirm their identities in a historical moment marked by repeated attempts at erasure.  In Manual de Defesa, there is no camouflage—only epistemological aposematism. Don’t kill them with kindness, teach them with knowledge and queerness!

MECHITA, Sol Garcia
MECHITA is a creation in which six women share a stage that becomes a mirror, invoking the body as a living archive, a territory of memory and a site of resistance. Drawing on fragments of childhood, freedom, voice and femininity, the piece intertwines the creator’s personal universe with those of the performers, exploring the Romani heritage passed down through her father’s family. Its title, inspired by affectionate diminutives used to name children in some cultures, invites reflection on an ancestry that endures within the body without asking permission. MECHITA is a poetic celebration of transformation, the collective body, and the fleeting beauty of being alive.

In 2027, new works will be selected and presented, offering emerging producers the opportunity to continue working with different artists, learn different creation and production processes and their specific challenges.