Aleksandra Jelić, director, president and founder of ApsArt
Graduated on the Academy of Arts in Novi Sad in 1997, Drama Department, Major – Directing. She is the author of several award-winning documentaries, theatre performances, music videos and commercials. Over the past six years her professional engagement has been mainly focused on applied theatre i.e. the use of drama techniques in working with specific social groups for educational and development purposes. She has been constantly improving her education by numerous informal kinds of education through various workshops abroad and in the country by hosting experts in this field. She participated in several conferences in the field of applied theatre (IETM – Netherlands, Performing the World – NY, ASSITEJ – Belgrade, World Forum Theatre Festival – Graz/Austria, Congres „Theatre as an Art of Survival“ – Lingen/Germany…) and gave several master classes on applied theatre practice in working with prisoners and drug addicts. She worked in the Penitentiary and Correctional Institution for Women in Požarevac, Institute of Mental Health in Belgrade, Special Prison Hospital in Belgrade, Studentski grad Cultural Centre in Belgrade, with Roma women, Roma kids, with kids in kindergarden, with youth with disabilities…For her work in Special Prison Hospital she won the ERSTE Foundation Award for Social Integrationin 2009. among the 1300 projects in the region.
Aleksandra and Augusto Boal, Forum Festival, Pula 2008
Bogdan Španjević, dramatist and co-founder of ApsArt
He is a graduate dramaturge, playwright and screenwriter. Expert in media communication with 10 years of active experience in advertising. Worked on designing and developing communication for clients such as: Bambi, British American Tobacco, Carlsberg Group, Coca-Cola HBC, Credit Agricole Group, Doncafe, Serbian Lottery, Society for Renovation of St.Sava Temple, Erickson, Hellenic Petroleum, Nestle, NIS, Opel, Perno – Ricar, President of the Republic of Serbia, Tarkett, Telekom Srbija, T:com, Government of the Republic of Macedonia, Unicef… He received several awards in the field of communications.
Currently engaged in developing pervasive games in social contexts.
Vera Erac, psychologist, ApsArt associate
She graduated in the field of psychology in 1999. Completed two levels of education for Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy (REBT). Since 1997 actively involved in the non-governmental sector working on various assignments (psychologist-counsellor, assistant, consultant, free-lance training officer and facilitator, project manager, translator) working on educative and social programmes. Organizations she cooperated with are: IAN – International Aid Network, Quaker Peace and Service, American Friends Service Committee, World Vision, Amici dei Bambini, Italian Consortium of Solidarity, Zdravo Da Ste/Hi Neighbor, Association for Protection and Improvement of Mental Health in Children and Young People. Since 2004 after having participated in educational programme at East Side Institute for Human Development in New York, she started developing her own practice in working with various groups of people, based on using performance, move and applied theatre as a universal tool for personal and social development, often closely cooperating with director Aleksandra Jelić. Most often worked with the Romany population, troubled young people and young people at risk. Occasionally active as a performer.
Vesna Varićak, actress, ApsArt associate
She graduated from the Acting Department in 1999 in the class of Mirjana Karanović and Slobodan Beštić within the Academy of Arts in Belgrade. She acted in various plays from the classical repertoire, children’s plays to experimental theatre on stages in Belgrade and Italy. Currently employed with the National Theatre “Toša Jovanović” in Zrenjanin. She has been engaged in applied theatre and participatory drama for several years now, and she is boosting her practice by working as an associate in CEDEUM and the Cultural Centre “Stari Grad” (Školigrica – Play School) where she works with children, young people of various ethnic origin, the Romany people, educational workers…She acquired her knowledge from distinguished experts such as Ljubica Beljanski-Ristić, Таg М’Еntegart, Chrissie Tiller, Luc Opdebeeck and she is still working on her personal improvement by attending educational seminars, festivals and art workshops in the country and abroad.
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Paul Murray, actor, ApsArt project supervisor
Paul is an actor, PhD candidate in applied theatre and ex-lecuter on the University of Manchester. He is ApsArt supervisor of the project “Play as Breathing, Theatre as Life”.
Jelena Mićić, social worker, ApsArt associate
Jelena Mićić was born in 1983 in Belgrade. She graduated at the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade, social policy and social work major. She has been volunteering and working in the NGO sector for more than five years. Since the beginning of 2006 she has been actively engaged in applied theatre and creative workshops for children. She completed education on participatory drama in the Faculty of Political Sciences organized by In Stage Organization, after which she continued with her knowledge improvement in this field by attending various seminars in the country and abroad (specialist workshop for practitioners of Forum Theatre “Function of a Joker in FT” Adrian Jackson, Mostar 2007; international exchange with the topic of FT, Romania 2008). She was engaged as an implementor of creative workshops for children of various ages in Treehouse Storytelling Center, volunteered and worked as an associate in CARITAS Serbia and Montenegro. She works as an associate member on verious ApsArt’s projects.
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Mirko Stojkovic, dramatist, ApsArt associate
Mirko Stojković, dramatist and associate professor at the Belgrade University, is lecturer at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts and Faculty of Information Technologies in Belgrade. He was Creative Director of many successful political and commercial campaigns for leading Serbian advertising agencies and is author of first officially accepted curriculum for Dramaturgy of Video Games in the region. In ApsArt he works on pervasive game project and so far he co-designed games „The Feed“ (Brighton 2010) and „Serb.I.Am“ (London 2010)
