Playing Memories is a residency project for the creation and production of multidisciplinary performances in an international setting. Unique in its kind, Playing Memories will foster intercultural, artistic, and human exchange, as well as the sharing of ideas, skills, and inspiration among young artists from different parts of the world.
Eight different artistic residencies will be produced, each lasting 15 days. Each residency will host 15 performers, including dancers, musicians, visual artists, photographers, set designers, and other artistic figures, selected from across Italy, for a total of 140 artists and performers.
During the two weeks of the residency, the team, hosted within one of the partner institutions, will engage in an intense creative process to design, set up, and stage their own original, multidisciplinary, and unreleased artistic performance. Each residency will have its own leader/creator, but the final performance will be the result of a team effort, with constant interaction and dialogue in a process of collective creation.
All the residencies and their related performances will be filmed by a television crew for the production of a docuseries – 2 seasons with a total of 24 episodes – which will be released on a prestigious international streaming platform.
The Playing Memories project is part of the PNRR – MISSION 4 COMPONENT 1 – Investment 3.4 ‘University Education and Advanced Skills’ – CUP Code B93B24000010001 and will take place from May 2025 to March 2026.
The residencies, unless changes are made following the publication of this Call for Artists, will be held at Saint Louis di Roma e Milano, Conservatorio di L’Aquila, Fondazione Accademia d’Arti e Mestieri dello spettacolo Teatro alla Scala, Scuola di arti di Cuba, Academy of Performing Arts Prague, Staffordshire University, Kazakh National Academy of Arts.
Playing Memories is not a talent show, but rather an individual and collective experience that, through the television docuseries, offers a unique insight into the world of artistic creation. It showcases the innovative visions of new generations as they revisit their cultural heritage (memories), filtering it through their own perspective, and then bringing it to life (playing) in their own way and style. The goal is to create an original synthesis across various artistic expressions—music, dance, visual arts, sculpture, performing arts, painting, and photography—allowing each to resonate with the audience in new and unexpected ways.
Docuseries
All activities of the project, from casting to residencies and performances, will be fully documented step by step by a film production team that will capture the various stages of the artistic residency.
The collected material will be used to produce a docuseries in 2 seasons with a total of 24 episodes, showcasing the making of each artistic performance: from casting to daily life during the 15-day residency, leading up to the backstage moments just before the performance, and finally the performance itself.
The release of the first season is scheduled for May-June 2025. The release of the second season is scheduled for January-February 2026.
Not all artistic residencies will necessarily be published, at the sole discretion of the Artistic Direction of Saint Louis, as the leading partner of the project and executive producer, based on the input of the project’s Artistic Committee.
