Edwarda Gurrola, Faris Cuchi Gezahegn, Gin Müller, Johnny Mhanna, Selina Shirin Stritzel
JUSTITIA! IL*LEGAL MONSTERS
Is it people smuggling or aiding escape? The performance IL*LEGAL MONSTERS deals with forms of border transgressions. Passports and IDs make people legally identifiable – but how can a person be illegal?
In specific court settings and mythical worlds, Edwarda Gurrola, Johnny Mhanna, and Faris Cuchi Gezahegn in IL*LEGAL MONSTERS evoke places of boundaries and negotiations born sometimes out of fantasy, sometimes out of bureaucracy. They ask about migration policies and legal processes, nomad identities, and motives for aiding escape. The performers transform into coyotes, snakeheads, sharks: all terms signifying animals or mythological creatures, but also people smugglers and escape helpers. They signify smart, cunning monsters, courageous and transgressive trickster characters disobeying rights by occupying border spaces in different ways or even expanding them. This second research project in the JUSTITIA! Performative Formats on Law and Justice series deals with borders, escape, asylum and courts.
To complement the performance, there will be workshops on Fri, 6 and Sat, 7 October as well as a roundtable on Sun, 8 October.
Gin Müller is a director, theatre scholar, performer, and queer ar/ctivist. Gin’s works tackle activist and political topics as well as collective forms of collaboration both onstage and offstage.
Selina Shirin Stritzel is a freelance theatre-maker, political education worker, cultural scientist, and trans-medial artist. In her works, she deals with post-migrant perspectives and queer-feminist mindsets.
Edwarda Gurrola is a theater and film actress. She has been a part of various TV, film and performance formats since childhood. In 2020, Gurrola won the Mexican Film Award "Ariel" for Best Actress.
Johnny Mhanna was born in 1991 in Damascus, Syria. He has lived in Austria since 2015 and featured in numerous German-language productions, e.g., at Werk X, the Wiener Festwochen (in the celebrated production Traiskirchen. Das Musical) and with Theater im Bahnhof, Graz.
Faris Cuchi Gezahegn (they/them/she/her) is a femme non-binary and intersectional LGBTQIA*/Human Rights advocate/activist who uses multifaceted mediums as conduits in securing the sanctity of humanity that we all deserve. They are living archivists, Ethiopian ZEGA/QUEER knowledge and culture conjurors/summoners, multi-disciplinary artists, poets, style activists, and part of the PCCC (Politically Correct Comedy Club) ensemble and many-festation that will arise in their future selves.
Annemarie Arzberger lives and works in Vienna. She studied contextual painting at the Akademie der bildenden Künste, Vienna (2012–2021) and now works as a visual artist, in puppet-making and costume design. Her output includes numerous (group) exhibitions and performances at such venues as the Schubert-Theater in Vienna and brut Wien.
Katarina Csanyiova, born 1982 in Slovakia, works in the fields of performance, theatre, film, writing and spatial installation. Her focus is on texts and languages in action, which she applies in various performative contexts. katarinacs.org
Roxanne Szankovich combines electric violin with effect pedals, loop station and vocals in her instrumentation. After studying violin, she became deeply involved in music improvisation and knows how to blur genre boundaries. She is active as a studio musician, composer and live musician in bands as well as in interaction with performative arts.
Credits
JUSTITIA! team 2023: Edwarda Gurrola, Johnny Mhanna, Faris Cuchi Gezahegn, Annemarie Arzberger, Selina Shirin Stritzel, Jessica Cortina López, Ines Kaiser, Magdalena Fischer, Katarina Csanyiova, Myriel Meißner, Hicran Ergen, Katarzyna Winiecka, Jan Machacek, Lucas Gruber, Dario Stefanek, Noushin Redjaian, Gin Müller, Roxanne Szankovich (Toxic Violin), Lisa-Marie Holhaus, Maria Zimmermann and more
A co-production by Verein zur Förderung der Bewegungsfreiheit and brut Wien.
Funded by the City of Vienna’s Department of Cultural Affairs (Concept funding 2022–2025).
Dates & Tickets
Overview accompanying programme for the performance JUSTITIA! IL*LEGAL MONSTERS
Fri, 6 October, 2:00–6:00 pm
Countering Criminalisation of Migration – Solidarity Practices and Resistance at the Borders and at Courts
Collective Learning Workshop with prozess.report, Fluchthilfe & Du? and guests (tba)
Sat, 7 October, 2:00–6:00 pm
Found in Interpretation
Workshop hosted by Queerbase
Performing flight stories
Workshop hosted by Mariama Nzinga Diallo, Hamdi Abdullahi Hassan and Vivian Crespo Zurita
DJ sets with DJ Noushin & JOIE DE F:LLE after the premiere of JUSTITIA! IL*LEGAL MONSTERS
Sun, 8 October, 5:00–7:00 pm
Roundtable about borderpolitics, migrationpolicies and no border activism
with Petar Rosandić aka Kid Pex (SOS BALKANROUTE), Katarzyna Winiecka (Fluchthilfe & Du?), Mariama Nzinga Diallo (Aktivistin), Marty Huber (Queerbase), Laura Chalabi (Sea-Eye Gruppe Wien), moderated by Djamila Grandits
Tue, 10 October
Artist Talk im Anschluss an die Vorstellung von JUSTITIA! IL*LEGAL MONSTERS
Thu, 12 October
DJ set by Meshes to Meshes following the performance
October 2023
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11 / Followed by DJ sets with DJ Noushin & JOIE DE F:LLE
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11 / Followed by an artist talk
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11 / Followed by a DJ set by Meshes to Meshes
brut nordwest
Nordwestbahnstraße 8-10, 1200 Vienna
Event recommendations
Collective Learning Workshop with prozess.report, Fluchthilfe & Du? and guests (tba)
Countering Criminalisation of Migration – Solidarity Practices and Resistance at borders and courts
Accompanying programme JUSTITIA! IL*LEGAL MONSTERS
with Petar Rosandić aka Kid Pex (SOS BALKANROUTE), Katarzyna Winiecka (Fluchthilfe & Du?), Mariama Nzinga Diallo (Aktivistin), Marty Huber (Queerbase), Laura Chalabi (Sea-Eye Gruppe Wien), moderated by Djamila Grandits
Roundtable about border politics, migrationpolicies and no border activism
Accompanying programme JUSTITIA! IL*LEGAL MONSTERS
brut all over Vienna
brut nordwest
accessible
Nordwestbahnstraße 8-10, 1200 Vienna
Subway: U1, U2 (Praterstern), U4 (Friedensbrücke), U6 (Dresdnerstraße) Tram: 5 (Nordwestbahnstraße) Bus: 5A (Wasnergasse)
Meeting point brut nordwest
Nordwestbahnstraße 8–10, 1200 Vienna
Subway: U1, U2 (Praterstern), U4 (Friedensbrücke), U6 (Dresdnerstraße) Tram: 5 (Nordwestbahnstraße) Bus: 5A (Wasnergasse)
Meeting point: Museum Nordwestbahnhof
Nordwestbahnstraße 16, 1200 Vienna
Subway: U1, U2 (Praterstern), U4 (Friedensbrücke), U6 (Dresdnerstraße) Tram: 5 (Nordwestbahnstraße) Bus: 5A (Wasnergasse)
studio brut, Zieglergasse 25, 1070 Vienna
not accessible
Zieglergasse 25, 1070 Wien
Subway: U3 (Zieglergasse), Tram: 49 (Westbahnstraße / Zieglergasse)