HELIX for Masca - cultural and community center
WHAT DOES HELIX MEAN FOR Masca Theatre?
HELIX for Masca Theatre – a cultural and community center is a participatory design initiative aimed at re-imagining, from an ecological and community perspective, the relationship between the theater’s exterior space and its citizens. As we are the only state-owned theater in Bucharest located in a block of flats and also the only one with a garden, we aim to transform the exterior of Masca into a public recreational space – both for the surrounding community and for the audience.
As part of HELIX for Masca Theatre, three participatory design workshops took place between August and September 2024, two of which were open to the general public, regardless of age or neighborhood affiliation, which we’ll tell you about below.
WHY?
In the long term, we aspire to become a true neighborhood node and an alternative hub (Masca Hub) for the progressive community in Bucharest, promoting concepts such as green theater, sustainable regeneration and ecosystemic development.
We reap the rewards of the project on the weekend of September 20-22, 2024, with the final event spanning three days and three evenings, just like in fairy tales. Join us for neighborhood mini-festival we’ve prepared. We listen to music (from silent disco to a quartet concert), stargaze on the roof of the theater, watch a movie screening and three theater performances, fill flower pots with poems and plant the last plants together.
PARTICIPATORY DESIGN WORKSHOPS
Street art - with and without mask
The “Street Art – with and without mask” workshop was an open invitation to discover street art and the hidden messages on the neighborhood walls, graffiti and street art concepts, but also your own style – under the guidance of LUX (multidisciplinary artist) and Cristi Neagoe (cultural manager and PR specialist).
The workshop culminated with a series of hands-on activities for participants to put their signature on various objects in the Masca garden and to volunteer to assist LUX in creating the mural on the theater surface.
Workshop held from September 7-11, 2024
Mural painting period with the voluntary support of workshop participants: September 7-11, 2024
NATURE EXPOSED
The “Nature Unmasked” workshop aims to engage the community around the theater in a communal activity of medium to long-term garden care, to develop gardening skills – both in the block and in green spaces – and to accumulate essential information for understanding the urban ecosystem and the relationships between plants, animals and people between city blocks.
Participants worked together with coordinator Bogdan Mihalache (freelance landscaper and environmental activist) to initiate a community greenhouse, to modify the Masca garden through planting, and to discover and understand the roof terrace, a secret green space of the theater.
Workshop from September 1-15, 2024
CONVERSION AND RECYCLING OF DECOR
The workshop on the reconversion of broken sets was the third workshop of the project, an approach to recover materials from broken sets, reused for the construction of urban furniture elements for the theater garden, coordinated by the architect and set designer Gabi Albu.
The workshop took place with closed circuit, and was dedicated to our technical staff, and a group of students from the scenography department of UNArte and UNATC Bucharest, in a collaborative work of reinvention and reuse.
Workshop held between September 12-16, 2024.
At the same time, HELIX for Masca Theatre aimed at implementing a selective waste collection procedure, creating an online map of the best routes for cyclists from the six sectors of Bucharest to the Masca Theatre, and organizing a community event to present the results of the workshops to the public and to experience together the newly created space.
The initiative is supported by a collaborative platform between public authorities, academia, the NGO sector, private actors and citizens, initiated by Masca Theater and the Association for Urban Transition (ATU), with funding from the National Cultural Fund Administration (AFCN).
For more information, Alina Apostu and Maria Drăghici have been documenting the project and have recorded the stages of work in a series of photo-video postings in Our Logbook.
HELIX for Masca
Organized by Masca Theatre and Association for Urban Transition
Partner: “I.L. Caragiale” National University of Theatrical Arts and Cinematography Bucharest
Media partners: Scena9, Bookhub, Revista Golan, Radio Romania Cultural, scena.ro, LiterNet.ro, Happ.ro
This project does not necessarily represent the position of the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. AFCN is not responsible for the content of the project or how its results may be used. These are entirely the responsibility of the grantee.
On the bike to Masca
Map made with the help of partners
