At the end of January 2023, a call for artists to submit application for FIAT in the field of experimental theater, literature, visual arts, music, film and creative industries was announced. The festival is planned to be held from September 8th to 17th, 2023 in Podgorica.
In the call it is noted that the Festival of International Alternative Theater (FIAT) has been successfully realized for almost four decades, reacting to the dynamics of social processes, giving a unique signature to the Montenegrin culture and arts scene.
In the turbulent dynamics of social changes during the past four decades, FIAT has truly left a memorable mark on the culture and the city, the state and citizens. In the early ‘90s, FIAT was a rare artistic light in the city and the country that was sinking into darkness.
Predecessor of FIAT is the alternative theater stage DODEST (Youth Center – Drama Experimental Studio Titograd), which was founded by Slobodan Milatović during the ‘70s. After the renovation of the Youth Center in 1982, the professional work of DODEST began. It brought together the legendary names of the Yugoslav theater: Slobodan Aligrudić, Petar Božović, Predrag Laković, Aleksandar Berček, Gorica Popović, Žarko Laušević, Milutin Karadžić, Stela Ćetković, Ljiljana Dragutinović, Branimir Brstina, Marko Baćović, Josif Tatić… At that time, in addition to DODEST, there were also other independent groups gathered around Jagoš Marković, Branko Kovačević, Miško Đukić, Radisav Jevrić and Branko Babović.
“DODEST started as a Students’ Experimental Stage at ACAA (Academic Cultural Artistic Association) Mirko Srzentić. The beginning of the work on a theater play Prometheus Bound in November, 1974 can be considered as actual establishment of this theater. The play was premiered in January 1975, in the auditorium of the Faculty of Economics and it immediately provoked conflicting and stormy reactions – from complete negation to unpleasant glorification. These types of reactions and the apparent successes achieved at various festivals contributed to the great interest of young and talented people, who later joined the group. The play Prometheus Bound was in fact the manifesto of this theater group. Inhibition-demystification-conceptualism – were the main determinants in the plays that followed,” recalls Slobodan Milatović in the article published in the monography FIAT 35 – Good Spirit of Alternative.
The idea of FJAT (Festival of Yugoslav Alternative Theatre) was born in 1984, when the tenth anniversary of DODEST was celebrated. The following year, then under the name DODEST Days, the festival began and existed until 1991, as the last cultural manifestation in SFRY, without cancellation.
The first FJAT was held from December 17th to 21st, 1985 in Titograd. “Alternative theater is a tool for self-preservation (and self-reflexivity) for the art of contemporary theatre,” wrote then festival selectors Ljubomir Đurković and Slobodan Milatović.
“The Montenegrin festival has become the most radical selection of everything new on the territory of the former state. In 1989, Jovan Čirilov and I inaugurated an innovative Yugoslav postmodern theater trend at FJAT! Slobodan Milatović invited the best young critics and theater experts of our country to Titograd. Such a gathering has never been seen anywhere! Simply: Slobodan Milatović was the champion of the Montenegrin cultural alternative”, states Niko Goršič in his text in FIAT monography.
In the aforementioned text, Milatović lists the names of those who created and guided the festival: Ljubomir Đurković, Mihailo Banjević, Džoni Hodžić, Jovan Ćirilov, Borka Pavićević, Rahim Burhan, Niko Goršič and Slobodan Milatović, as well as the directors who participated: Tomaž Pandur, Vito Taufer, Janez Pipan, Branko Brezovec, Dušan Jovanović, Ljubiša Ristić, Kaća Čelan, Mladen Materić, Boris Bakal, Mira Erceg, Vladimir Milčin, Branko Stavrev, Agim Sopi, Naum Panovski…
Boris Bakal, an artist who participated five times at the festival, recalls its last edition in the then dying country: “At the height of the political crisis in 1991 in Yugoslavia, he (Milatović) and Dubravka Knežević called us ‘Croats’ to play a song-dance-drama Bossa Nova for the already quite tension-full Montenegrins. The tension was noticeable in Hotel Crna Gora, on the streets, but also through micro-incidents and outbursts by hooligans”.
Director Petar Pejaković told us that he met with “FIAT in person as a student in the early ‘90s. It was really strange. On one side there was, the heavy darkness of war, embargo and suffering, and on the other, a wild celebration of theatre, life and creativity. I remember lively the performance of Museum of the Bicycle Uprising. That was my first encounter with, and instant appreciation of Slobo Milatović. His passion for theater, constant questioning of the theater itself and sense of the absurd were the qualities that inevitably attracted me to this special and important theater person”.
Even when things were not going well, Bakal remembers that ,,Slobodan Milatović’s smile and the twisting of his mustache and beard always cheered him up. If that didn’t work out, then his eternal friend Džoni Hodžić was there to somehow, in his crazy way, smooth things over. Now I guess they are drinking or playing cards together somewhere in the sky. They entrusted us to a better past and a worse future… FIAT will never be the same for me without Slobodan. It’s crazy to think that it could be. But I know, and I am convinced of this, that Slobodan and Džoni are cheering for FIAT to last forever. So let them be!”.
War, madness, sanctions only temporarily stopped the festival. The Festival of International Alternative Theater (FIAT) replaced the Yugoslav one. Ranko Vuković, director of Youth Center “Budo Tomović” from 1994 to 2001, and director of FIAT from 1996 to 1999, recalling the festival states that “Slobodan Milatović, Džoni Hodžić, Ljubo, Ćento, Sajo and other theater lovers initiated the idea of expanding the festival. In the ‘90s, (i.e. 1994), the idea about international alternative theater festival was shaped”.
Vuković invited BITEF (Belgrade International Theatre Festival) art director Ivana Vujić, to create FIAT concept.” Vujić established relations with one of the most important alternative theaters in the world at that time, New York based theater La MaMa. Already the second edition of FIAT was opened by the famous Ellen Stewart, the founder and leader of that theater. During the festival time, Podgorica was a different city and the Youth Center was a bright spot in a gloomy time, which failed to find and constitute itself into something with a hint of freedom. New, progressive young people were discovered and the whole city became a stage,” Vuković writes.
Podgorica has connected itself with the world art scene through the festival. Famous Volcano Theatre from Cardiff appeared at FIAT in 1996. The Italian director Pippo Delbono, one of the best directors and choreographers, presented himself to audience in Podgorica in 1998. The Colored People of the French group ILOTOPIE walked through Podgorica streets that same year. They were among the first who addressed the issue of racism in the theater. They walked naked, painted in various colors, and attracted the attention of people in Podgorica. Oleg Kulik, one of the most important performers of the contemporary art scene, gave a performance in Podgorica…
In the article published in FIAT monography, writer Balša Brković writes about images which he connects with the festival. “From Slobo’s The Ray of the Microcosm with excavators and machines in Radoje Dakić factory area (announcement of the ‘new’ status of Njegoš), through the spotlights that silenced the darkness of the nineties in Podgorica – Marcel lí Antúnez Roca, the Scots with their night performance, the dynamic Ivana Vujić, then the brilliant Welsh Volcano Theatre… Rambo’s concert at KIC (Cultural Information Center) terrace… Those guests convincingly reminded Podgorica of that time that it belongs to the world, a different world…”.
That the importance of FIAT was recognized outside Montenegrin borders was confirmed in 1999 during bombing. Performances in honor of this festival were organized in Skopje, Sarajevo, Belgrade, Tirana, Sofia, Bucharest, Athens, Paris. Internet conference DeBalkanization of the Balkans was held from these cities on May 12 at noon, as a sign of solidarity with FIAT.
After the break, FIAT returned in 2005. Pejaković, who was in the organization of the festival in those years, told us that his first associations related to that period were joy and easiness that the word festival carried. “Watching exceptional world performances in the city where you live and hanging out with important theater creators such as Rodrigo Garcia, Eugenio Barba, Jan Fabre, Oliver Frljić, Arpad Schilling and many others are experiences which become my integral part, and moreover, they tangibly changed me, both in the theater and personal life. Experiencing FIAT was, first of all, pushing boundaries towards freedom, broadness and understanding”.
This revival of FIAT lasted until 2009 and managed to confirm its brand, promote culture, network institutions and artists in Montenegro and the region. Once again it brought the world’s greatest artists to domestic audience. Among the guests were Slovenian troupe Via Negativa, the theater troupe Akhe from St. Petersburg, the internationally famous Belgian director Jan Fabre, Spanish artist Rodrigo Garcia, the Wierszalin Theater from Warsaw, Tony Bulandra Theater from Romania, Guillotine Theatre from Stockholm…
FIAT returned again in 2013 and it still lasts. Director Ana Vukotić managed to restore and sustain the festival that has been for a long time one of the most important artistic traditions in this country.
In his article in FIAT monography, Božo Koprivica emphasizes that the audience that comes to FIAT is fair, strict and proletarian. While Brković underlines the difference between the expansion of “state” art and the tradition of FIAT: “Such ‘production’ is a shame, but also a ‘true picture’ of the situation in Montenegro. The spirit of FIAT is on a completely opposite side. It is a medicine that society needs to take. The sooner, the better”.
“FIAT is an ongoing revolution. It will never stop. It will always find a new form to happen, a new form to appear. Like water, and like the partisans during Sutjeska battle – FIAT must break through. Alternative artists all over the world know that until now artists have only interpreted the world differently, and the thing is to change it. Thanks to Marx and Slobo Milatović, FIAT has long been a fact one cannot ignore…” concludes Brković.
On the festival’s website one can find information that the spiritual mission of the Festival of International Alternative Theater has been carried out for thirty years, regardless of the fact that there have been sometimes multi-year breaks, mainly due to difficult financial situations.
In anticipation of this year’s FIAT, it was emphasized that due to the tense geopolitical situation, as well as turbulent socio-economic conditions at the local level, festival faces challenges in the form of financial uncertainty. That is why FIAT invites all socially responsible and other interested companies, organizations and associations, as well as institutions, to support this year’s festival. Organizers explain, in the current circumstances art is particularly important, if not necessary dose of humanity.
Hardly any festival in Montenegro has the significance, tradition and reach as FIAT. Unfortunately, even after almost half a century, state is not yet ready to recognize and properly support and nurture this festival.
Predrag Nikolić
The article is part of the project “Gaining Freedom – Cultural corrective from an individual to a collective action” supported through small-grants program. The program is part of the national project “Diagnosis and therapy on freedom of expression, hate speech and ethnic tensions” which is a joint initiative of Montenegro Media Institute, Center for Democracy and Human Rights and Portal UL Info aimed at strengthening and advocating for freedom of expression, combating hate speech and reducing ethnic tensions in Montenegro. The project is financed by the European Union through the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) and co-financed by the Ministry of Public Administration of Montenegro. The content of this article is sole responsibility of the author and in no way reflects the views of the donors.