"The Writer" receives award in Teheran

The Writer was granted the award for Best Foreign Production at the 16th Tehran-Mobarak International Puppet Theater Festival in Teheran, Iran. This puppet performance about the Norwegian Nobel prize winning author Knut Hamsun was the first co-production JSK made with Ulrike Quade Company, and it excites us that next year we will premiere our third collaboration, Coco, about the legendary Coco Chanel.

Ulrike Quade and Jo Strømgren are fascinated by the complex history of Coco Chanel. As a master of illusion Chanel consistently chose to mythologize herself. She controlled the way the world looked at her, while at the same time her fashion has become a symbol for emancipation. The performance Coco seeks to investigate the influence fashion has on our society. How a costume becomes a body and how a body becomes a puppet.

Coco is a sought-after continuation of the particular style these two companies have created together, featuring hyper-realistic puppets, portrayal of historical people, intriguing walks between documentaric facts and provocative insinuations, and a great dash of wild imaginative theatre. Previous productions have explored the lives and controversies of Vincent van Gogh and Edvard Munch, in addition to already mentioned Knut Hamsun.