As part of the discourse programme, two independent festivals come to the Documentary Platform to share their experiences, ideas and plans with the audience: "Lubimovka" from Moscow and "New Realities"  from Mumbai. The organizers will give two talks on ways of working, the particular conditions they face, and the question of what it means in their respective social and political contexts to focus a festival on something like reality.

Lubimovka is Moscow’s independent writers’ festival. Housed at the legendary fringe theatre teatr.doc, the festival has been experimenting with documentary practices for many years. One ever-present question concerns how theatre can respond to a Russian public sphere marked by political propaganda. Making use of the theatre’s decidedly spartan resources, the Lubimovka organizers seek to defend spaces for an alternative, critical public sphere, one that is always precariously positioned entirely outside the mainstream.
At the Documentary Platform they will report on their work, their struggles and their hopes.
Supported by Pro Helvetia Moscow

Staging Realities comes to Basel bearing a particular quality: the festival has yet to take place. The project, initiated by Indian director Anuja Ghosalkar and German dramaturge Kai Tuchmann, is still under construction and will first take to the stage in summer 2020 in Mumbai. With Staging Realities, Goshkalar and Tuchmann are seeking to link small independent theatre scenes in China and India with one another by means of the central question of what it means to present reality in a world of multiple realities.