Estonian contemporary performing arts showcase 2025
The next Estonian contemporary performing arts showcase takes place September 1st–4th, 2025 in Tartu & Tallinn collaborating with Estonian biggest annual theatre festival DRAAMA. The festival is organized by the Estonian Theatre Agency.
Estonian Theatre Agency’s showcase is essentially a festival of contemporary performing arts that has been running annually since 2013. The festival program does not represent the mainstream of our theatrical art, and more classical examples of our word-based theater are generally excluded from the showcase format. The festival is mainly aimed at a few dozen guests, whose expectations and hopes for the festival are to find new contacts, partners, artists, and productions to invite to their festivals or theater houses.
In the 2025 edition, the Estonian Theater Agency is thrilled to present Tiit Ojasoo’s SELF-HELP BOOK, a play for adults that begins with actors drinking a box of champagne and concludes with an inevitable elegy; Hendrik Toompere jr’s BUSINESS AS USUAL, a grand production about money laundering that has become so popular among the Estonian theatre audience that thousands of people are searching for tickets on the black market; Mart Kangro’s PANTHEON, based on the original atlas created in the first half of the 20th century by German art historian Aby Warburg; Von Krahl Theatre’s new troupe’s dystopian EVERY DAY IS LIKE SUNDAY, which narrates the journey to promised Sunday Land; Netti Nüganen’s ice-manufacturing enterprise ASH, HORIZON, RIDING A HOUSE, which premiered in Tanzquartier Wien; Karl Saks’ SCHEMA, which explores the phenomenology of hearing and listening in theatre; Üüve-Lydia Toompere’s FLEX, that brings its audience to an unhinged gym; and last but not least, a debut by one of the most promising young performing artists in Estonia, Elle Viies, called ENIGMA.
PRELIMINARY SCHEDULE:
Monday, September 1st (Tallinn):
Arrival
18:00 performance – “ASH, HORIZON, RIDING A HOUSE”
Author, choreographer Netti Nüganen | Kanuti Gildi SAAL
20:00 performance – “PANTHEON”
Director Mart Kangro | Von Krahl Theatre & Kanuti Gildi SAAL
21:30 meet & mingle
Tuesday, September 2nd (Tallinn):
17:00 performance – “ENIGMA”
Author, choreographer Elle Viies | elektron.art & Von Krahl Theatre
19:00 performance – “BUSINESS AS USUAL”
Director Hendrik Toompere jr | Estonian Drama Theatre
22:30 meet & mingle
Wednesday, September 3rd (Tartu):
Traveling to Tartu
18:00 performance – “SCHEMA”
Author, director Karl Saks | Kanuti Gildi SAAL
20:30 performance – “FLEX”
Author, director, choreographer Üüve-Lydia Toompere | Sõltumatu Tantsu Lava
21:30 meet & mingle
Thursday, September 4th (Tartu/Tallinn):
12:00 performance – “EVERY DAY IS LIKE SUNDAY”
Von Krahl Theatre’s troupe | Von Krahl Theatre
Traveling to Tallinn
19:00 performance – “SELF-HELP BOOK”
Director Tiit Ojasoo | Eesti Draamateater
22:15 meet & mingle
Friday, September 5th:
Depature
The Estonian Theater Agency offers theatre tickets and accommodation for all the guests for four nights. If you are interested in participating in our festival, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We are always glad to meet old friends and get to know new ones!
For any inquiries please contact:
Liisi Aibel / [email protected] / +372 55 90 7002
Photos from the showcase performances in 2025:
