Vincent Roumagnac — Season 444. Site-Specific Installation

Vincent Roumagnac Season 444 Site-Specific Installation The installation will be on view: June 4–6 and 9–11, from 11:00 to 19:00. June 12, from 18:00 to 24:00. "Season 444" is a site-specific installation project created for the space of the Old Theatre of Vilnius, realised across several locations within the building — the main stage, rehearsal rooms, backstage corridors, basement, and the theatre's façade. It is structured as a constellation of installations and interactive spaces. The work invites visitors to move freely through the theatre, experiencing the environment at their own pace and in any order they choose. The viewer is not constrained by time or a prescribed sequence; they are encouraged to explore rather than simply observe. The project is built on two intertwining dramaturgical lines. The first responds to the theatre's current transformation and its ambition to open the institution to multifaceted dialogue, polyphony, and multilingualism. Through archaeological and poetic signs, the project reveals traces of the theatre's past — archival fragments, scenographic motifs from its history, and plant symbols. The second dramaturgical axis is the artist's ongoing research "Re-Ecologising the Theatre", which seeks to see the theatre as a whole encompassing not only human beings but also a non-human-centred environment. In "Season 444", seasonal elements — flowers, leaves, air currents, and meteorological phenomena — enter the theatre building and return as actors playing leading roles. Such "non-human" elements break entrenched stage conventions and renew the connection between theatre, the "non-human" element, and the rhythms of the living world. The project was developed from spring 2024 to spring 2025 through visits to Vilnius across different seasons. This enabled an experience of the city's changing landscape and a dialogue with the theatre's activities and archival data. Plant motifs found in the history of scenography at the Lithuanian Theatre, Music and Cinema Museum, the city's vegetation, and local cultural phenomena all became part of the work's vocabulary. "Season 444" is the first part of V. Roumagnac's four-year artistic research project "Stages of Flower Power", which reflects on how theatre can contribute to the historical legacy of the flower power movement and its renewal in Europe — a Europe marked by geopolitical upheaval. The title "Season 444" refers to the number of seasons that have, in one way or another, shaped the theatre since its founding in 1913. The premiere of the work was planned for June 2025, marking the 444th season experienced by the theatre. Vincent Roumagnac (Biarritz, Basque Country, France; based in Helsinki) began working in theatre — first as an actor, then as a director — but moved away from "conventional theatre", drawn to how theatricality evolves in response to climate change and technological advancement, building on what he has described as a disciplinarily drifted methodology. His works bring together visual arts, installation, and performance, grounded in ecology and environmentally sensitive intervention. Playing indirectly with the memory of Western theatre, its conventions and internal mechanisms, architecture and literature, V. Roumagnac transforms his practice as a director into what he himself calls "redirecting". The methods of redirecting, agencies, relationships, and temporary structures generate scenographic solutions that question the legacy of anthropocentrism embedded in the very mechanism of Western theatre. V. Roumagnac also participates in research and transdisciplinary projects linking art and scientific inquiry. Since 2010 he has collaborated with Finnish choreographer Simo Kellokumpu, and since 2012 with French visual artist Aurélie Pétrel, with whom he won the "Villa Kujoyama" residency award in 2020.

Adresas: Vilniaus senasis teatras