The Dubrovnik Museums' exhibition Women on the Stage and Behind the Scenes at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival aims to provide an overview of the participants, artists and theatre workers who contributed to the work and recognition of the Dubrovnik Summer Festival from its beginning in 1950 until the end of the 1970s. The Dubrovnik Summer Festival is a complex cultural and artistic event and, over the years, it has gone through different periods. These are traditionally determined by the work of the Festival’s important protagonists i.e. artistic directors of the theatre programme. Now, for the first time, this exhibition turns the spotlight on important, but less prominent female participants whose work also left an important mark on different periods of the Festival. Given the complexity of the topic, the authors’ desire was to reinterpret the history of the Dubrovnik Summer Festival, this time with an emphasis on the work and contribution of women – both on the stage and behind the scenes. Their work was not limited to the stage – as directors and artistic associates with strong personnalities, they created unforgettable theatrical moments full of high energy, luddism, protest and attitude, and at the same time, wandering around the City, they discovered new stage spaces. Some of them, as Festival directors, contributed to shaping the cultural policy of the Festival and thus significantly influenced its development and international recognition. In addition to prominent and recognized female theatre artists, directors, actresses, costume designers, choreographers, set designers, photographers and critics of the Festival, attention is also drawn to women who were involved in the work of the Festival and were important in the areas of organization and promotion. Along with all these prominent and important roles of women at the Festival, the "small", seemingly secondary, roles of stage managers, seamstresses and wardrobe attendants will also be presented. They all formed the fabric of the Festival and deserve to be recorded. The exhibition also aims to highlight the issue of the current position of women – artists and cultural workers, as well as the visibility and perception of women's work today. Unfortunately, the scope of this work does not allow us to mention the numerous and important female artists who have contributed to the music programme over many seasons. From its very beginning, the Festival was conceived as a platform for presenting art to local and foreign audiences, it has contributed to the affirmation of artistic work, which in turn enabled the recognition of female authors whose work is closely related to theatre, but was often neglected or only mentioned in passing, especially because some theatre professions were traditionally considered as "male".
This exhibition is dedicated to all those women who accomplished their best work at the Festival, by playing the role of the first Ophelia who climbed the stairs of Fort Lovrijenac, the first Tirena in the Music School Park, Držić's Petrunjela, Dobra or Laura on Gundulić Square, the unforgettable Jele from Equinox, Zlatarić's Electra in the Sorkočević Summer House, or the Nymph s in Držić’s Grižula in Gradac Park. It is also dedicated to those who have inscribed their name in the history of the Festival, be it by creating bold, imaginative and authentic costumes for Držić's The Miser and Uncle Maroje, Corneille’s Cid at Revelin, Christopher Columbus on the "Santa Maria" ship in the Old City Port and Hamlet at Fort Lovrijenac; or by having spent decades rehearsing dance segments or creating sets for site-specific performances in the City.
By showing short chapters from the rich history of the Festival over three decades, by using the memories and rich sources, short excerpts from the biographies of women whose destinies are intertwined with the City and the Festival will be presented.
Curators: Barbara Margaretić i Viktorija Žuvela