On women's theatre history in Cluj-Napoca

I am still at the Universitatea Babes-Bolyai (UBB) in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, where I had a privilege and pleasure to talk about feminism and theatre history in Central-Eastern Europe on the invitation of a brilliant colleague, prof. Cristina Modreanu.

Cristina and a group of amazing Romanian scholars at the UBB have just started an ambitious project 𝐀𝐫𝐡𝐢𝐯𝐚 𝐅𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐚̆ 𝐝𝐞 𝐓𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐫𝐮. 𝐅𝐄𝐌𝟏𝟎𝟎 – “an interdisciplinary research and education programme aimed at contributing to the recovery of the theatre’s intangible heritage, by giving priority to the histories of women artists not recorded in the official history of theatre from 1920-2020” in Romania.

My lecture, Researching Women’s Theatre History: A Feminist Scholar in the Archives opened the inauguration of the project at the historical site of the UBB Faculty of Theatre and Film at the heart of Cluj-Napoca. I presented challenges, opportunities, joys and disappointments experienced by the HyPaTia research team, which I am part of. Since 2012 HyPaTia, established by prof. Joanna Krakowska and consisting of more than dozen researchers, has been working on recovering women’s theatre history in Poland. In 2022 we launched the second edition of the project, this time led by dr. Katarzyna Kułakowska. (You can watch my lecture in Cluj-Napoca and those of other brilliant women here.)

After my lecture, professor Miruna Runcan presented an online exhibition she curated concerning women’s theatre critics in Romania. Be sure to follow the FEM100 research team – more online exhibition will be curated as part of their programme.