theatre minima

people

associated artists

Marilyn Nonken is recognized as "one of the greatest interpreters of new music" (American Record Guide) and "a pianist from music's leading edge" (New York Times). Dedicated to the contemporary repertoire, she performs as a soloist throughout the US, Europe, and Australia. She plays with Ensemble 21 and the Group for Contemporary Music (New York), and Elision (Melbourne/Brisbane), and also has recorded for New World, CRI, Tzadik, Innova, Mode, Lovely Music, Albany, and Metier. She attended the Eastman School and holds a Ph.D. from Columbia University. Currently Director of Piano Studies at New York University, Marilyn is a Steinway Artist.

artistic director

George Hunka graduated from Bard College in 1983 with a bachelors' degree in Languages and Literature, where he also wrote the texts and monologues that appear in Eric Saks' film Suddenly I Burst Into Another. In the mid-1980s he spent two years as the managing producer at the now-defunct Theatre Center Philadelphia, which also premiered his play Neurotica and his adaptation of Elmer Rice's The Adding Machine. His plays include Stupid (1999/2000), Light at Midnight (2004), Sustaining (2004), In Private (2005), In Public (2005/2006), Bridal Suite (2006) and States of Exception (2007). He has also reviewed and written about theatre on a freelance basis for The New York Times. He was also the recipient of a 2007 Albee Foundation Fellowship.

affiliated artists

Gabriele Schafer (performer) was born and raised in Germany, educated and trained in theater in the US. In 1981 she co-founded the Thieves Theatre, precursor to the International Culture Lab, which produced the world premiere of R.W. Fassbinder's controversial Trash, the City and Death in her translation. Further authors translated include Andreas Jungwirth, Heiner Mueller, Oliver Czeslik, and Ferdinand Bruckner, among others. In Germany she has acted at Hamburg's Thalia Theater, Theater Rampe and Theaterhaus Stuttgart. Other acting credits: New York's Public Theater, Seattle's Annex Theater, the Wellington, NZ, and Los Angeles fringe festivals, the Yale Repertory Theater, among others. In 2007-08, Gabriele originated the role of Kathleen in ICL's productions of Outside Inn. She has studied butoh since 2001 and until 2007 was producer of the CAVE New York Butoh Festival. She holds a BA in Theater from the University of Illinois at Chicago and an MFA in acting from the Yale School of Drama.

A native of Romania, Oana Botez-Ban (set and costume design) has designed for major theater and dance companies including The National Theater of Bucharest and has been involved in international theater festivals such as the Quadrennial Scenography Show in Prague. Oana is part of the first Romanian theater design catalogue, Scenografica. Since 1999, her New York costume collaborations in theater and dance include Richard Foreman, Richard Schechner, Brian Kulick, Zelda Fichlander, Karin Coonrod, Jay Scheib, Eduardo Machado, Gus Solomon Jr. & Paradigm, Carmen de Lavallade, Loy Arcenas, Gisela Cardenas, Erwin Maas, Veniamin Smekhov, Doris Mirescu, Erin Mee, Alva Rogers, Saviana Stanescu, Judith Ren-Lay, Michael Sexton, Pig Iron, Charles Moulton.

Travis Just (sound design), co-founder with Kara Feely of the music performance group Object Collection, comes from a background in improvised music and experimental composition. His work often uses texts, gesture, and unconventional technologies in addition to instruments and electronics. His music has been presented around the world at Performance Space 122, PRELUDE, The Stone, Le Poisson Rouge, Ontological Theater, Experimental Intermedia, Chez Bushwick/AMBUSH, Issue Project Room, Brooklyn College, Columbia University, Merce Cunningham Studio, NYC; Podewil, KuLe, Berlin; Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, UK; SuperDeluxe, LoopLine, Tokyo; Art Space Tetra, Fukuoka; Gallery Soap, Kokura; Art Basel Miami; CalArts, LA; Brown University; Galerie Mark Mller, Zrich; Kunst-Station Sankt Peter, Cologne; Kunstraum, Dsseldorf; Fruchthalle, Kaiserslautern; Ivan Franko National Theater, Kiev, Ukraine, among others. His music has been broadcast on WFMU, WKCR, WNYC (New York), SWR (Germany), Radio New Zealand, and JOFW (Japan). Travis received a BFA (composition/performance) in 1999 from the Mannes College of Music/New School University while studying with Andrew Cyrille. In 2002 he received an MFA (composition/performance) from California Institute of the Arts and studied with James Tenney, Wadada Leo Smith and Michael Pisaro. Travis was a 2003 DAAD Scholar at the Hochschule fur Musik Cologne and studied composition there with Johannes Fritsch.

Nick Fracaro (dramaturg) was born and raised on an Illinois farm. In 1981 he co-founded and became artistic director of the cross-disciplinary Thieves Theater for which he directed Peter Weiss' Marat/Sade at Toronto's Theatre Centre, Heiner Muller's Despoiled Shore Medeamaterial Landscape with Argonauts and the world premiere of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Trash, the City and Death in New York, among many others. He was a founding member of RAT, an international coalition of theater workers dedicated to sharing resources and ways of working, for which he organized conferences in New York, Philadelphia and Rosario, Argentina. He also served as dramaturg at Dallas' Undermain Theater. He holds a BA from Illinois Benedictine College and an MA in Literature and Creative Writing from The University of Illinois at Chicago.