• Duration Friday: 120 minutes
• Duration Saturday: 150 minutes
• Spoken language: English
• Following the programme on both days at 8 pm: The Bug is on Fire by Albert Garcia

With: Hà Nguyên Long, Đinh Nhung, Haifa Marwan, Riyadhus Shalihin, RAM Botero, Kyle Confesor, Edwin Quinsayas
Mentorship: Hans-Werner Kroesinger, Regine Dura

A project by Künstler*innenhaus Mousonturm and the Goethe-Institut, funded within the framework of the Alliance of International Production Houses by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, and as part of the anniversary programme “100 Years of Mousonturm” by the Cultural Office of the City of Frankfurt am Main and the Goethe-Institut.

Vietnam

Hà Nguyên Long is a painter, theatre director, and scenographer, and the founder and artistic director of XPLUSX STUDIO, an independent creative collective working across performing arts and scenography. His practice explores the human psyche, interpersonal relationships, and the role of cultural heritage in shaping contemporary Vietnamese identity. In 2020, he founded “Long Years in Theater”, a community-building initiative that cultivates shared space for practitioners and audiences to engage with theatre as a medium for the exchange of ideas and cultural values. Since 2024, he and XPLUSX STUDIO have co-initiated “TÂN HẬU TRƯỜNG” (New Backstage), a platform supporting emerging and experimental theatre in Vietnam.

Đinh Nhung is an artist based in Hà Nội working across filmmaking, photography, illustration, curating, and research. They describe themselves as a professional amateur – always learning and experimenting. Their practice centers on collecting stories, objects, artworks, and slang from women and queer communities, often shared through online LGBT archives, the Unstraight Museum, queer lexicons, and films. Since 2015, Nhung has developed projects such as Vagina Talks and A Queer Museum through participatory workshops and exhibitions. Recent projects include Chỉ Bàn Lộn 02: A Lexicon of Queer and Sexuality in Vietnam, alongside photography and performance works connected to the Red River’s middle lands beneath Hà Nội’s Long Biên Bridge.

Indonesien

Haifa Marwan (Ipeh) is an Indonesian theatre maker based in Jakarta whose practice focuses on documentary theatre, memory, identity, and the construction of social narratives through research-based performance. She works with Teater Ghanta, where she develops collaborative and process-oriented contemporary performances. Her recent work explores diaspora and the Arab-Indonesian experience through personal histories and broader cultural and political contexts. Through theatre, she examines how individual histories intersect with wider social and political realities, using performance as a space for critical reflection and dialogue.

Riyadhus Shalihin is a theatre-maker, performance artist, and visual artist based in Bandung, Indonesia. His practice explores capital, memory, and spatial transformation through site-specific research, archives, objects, and the lived experiences of communities and places. Working across theatre, performance, and visual art, he engages questions of permanence, materiality, and the relationship between bodies and environments. He has participated in international residencies and research platforms across Asia and Europe, including collaborations with PACT Zollverein, Goethe-Institut, and Berliner Festspiele.

Philippinen

RAM Botero is a feminist cultural worker and transdisciplinary artist from Nabunturan, Davao de Oro, Mindanao, in the Philippines. Her practice includes writing, film, and performance, reclaiming gender and mythology as forms of resistance. She works with themes of memory, decolonization, ecological justice, and state violence, often returning to Indigenous cosmologies to reimagine the present. Writing is not ancillary to her art practice but forms its ground, extending into cinema and performance. She is a member of RESBAK and the Progressive Democratic Futures Collective, where her work foregrounds queer histories, collective memory, and alternative futures.

Kyle Confesor is a Cavite-based theatre practitioner, educator, and independent performance maker from the Philippines. He currently teaches theatre at Colegio de San Juan de Letran. His practice focuses on contemporary, collaborative, and research-driven performance, with a particular interest in authorship and agency within collective theatre-making processes. As a playwright-director, his recent works include A Family-Oriented Show: A Theater Play? (Kapit Theater), Salinlahi: A “Puppet” Show? (Balay Tamawo), and The Strugglin’ Artists: A Concept Musical (Black Cat Productions). He is currently developing Macbeth on Slippers, a work exploring machismo and masculinity.

Edwin Quinsayas is a performance-maker and cultural worker. He heads Tanghalang Mulong Sandoval, a theatre and performance programme within SIKAD, an urban poor cultural organisation in the Philippines. His roots in theatre activism emerged through witnessing performances addressing social crises while at university, shaping a practice centered on dislocation, suppression, and resistance. His performance “Fours All”, presented at the Asiatopia Festival in 2018, explored labor migration, while “A Feather Duster Got Into the Zoo” addressed extrajudicial killings. His recent works include “Sa Digma ng Halimaw” (“The Monster’s War”), examining the Philippine government’s drug war, and “Gapok”, on forced evictions.

- Foyer Erdgeschoss -

Kyle Confesor:
A Family-Oriented Show: A Rehearsal.

- Probebühne 1 - 

Haifa Marwan
Indonesian Dreams

- Studio 2 -

Đinh Nhung & Hà Nguyên Long
Even Ghost Speak

- Studio 1 -

Riyadhus Shalihin
Power to Powder

- Probebühne 1 -

RAM Botero
Spellbound

“In 2025, we were invited by the Goethe Institutes in the Philippines, Vietnam and Indonesia, which sought to use documentary theater to create a space for artistic encounters, critical debate, dialogue and exchange.

We joined artists, performers, filmmakers, researchers, and community activists in local workshops, who collaboratively developed documentary projects that emerged from joint on-site research. The local workshops were followed by a regional workshop in Yog yakarta and now thanks to the invitation from Mousonturm the work could be continued in a Lab.

Working with artists from these countries was a privilege. It opens your eyes for things we don´t usually see. What does the war on drugs really mean for the Philippines?  What are the direct consequences of climate change for female street vendors in Vietnam? And as for the ongoing impact of colonial history in Indonesia: what are the realities of extractivism and mining?

One topic that keeps coming up is the family: what we experience within our own families, what we talk about and what is being silenced. What is hidden behind family pictures?

We spent time together in Loboc, Tagbilaran, Dalat, Jakarta, Yogyakarta and Manila. During our workshop in Jakarta protests against government politics were taking place in the streets, where an innocent grab driver was killed by the police. The next day, our workshop started with a minute in memory of this killed man, for his family, followed by discussions about what artists can do in situations like this. And then the work began. 

These artists have stories to tell that we should listen to.”

Regine Dura und Hans-Werner Kroesinger