The founder of the festival is Georgian director Georgi Kljain, a graduate of the Shota Rustaveli State University of Theatre and Cinema of Georgia. Since 2003, together with students from the same university, he has organized the event, which has become a platform for presenting shows from European art schools and exchanging theatrical perspectives developed within these institutions.

Students from theatre schools from Poland (Łódź and Krakow), Kazakhstan, Germany, Lithuania, Romania and Serbia have been invited to take part in this year's edition of the festival.

In Tbilisi, our representatives from the Acting Department will present the show ZERO, which has already been presented outside the school's Studio Theatre, at the 14th Documentary Theatre Festival and the Sopot Non-Fiction Artistic Residency.

ZERO
Text author/Direction: Kuba Zubrzycki
Costumes: The team

Cast:
Zuzanna Kłos – SERENA
Klaudia Kuźmińska – WIKIPEDIA
Zuzanna Markowska – SERENA
Julia Wojnowska – WIKIPEDIA
Mikołaj Lubera – PAW
Kuba Sirko – PAW
Dorian Zypper – ANIMATOR

Mental illnesses are the most common cause of suicide. There are over 5,000 of them in Poland every year, and the number of suicides among young people is constantly growing. According to data prepared by Eurostat, Poland occupies one of the inglorious top places in this respect. Of the 2,139 suicide attempts registered in 2023 by children and young people up to 18 years of age, 146 ended in death. The highest number of suicide attempts by children and adolescents was recorded in the Pomeranian, Silesian and Łódź provinces. In the years 2008-2016, sales of antidepressants prescribed by doctors increased by 30%. Thus, we were finally forced to see depression as a disease of civilization which began to affect younger and younger people.

A handful of facts:
- Around 1.6 million Poles receive psychiatric treatment.
- The waiting time for an appointment with a psychiatrist under the National Health Fund is three to six months.
- Only around 400 doctors specialize in child psychiatry, and around 600 thousand children need their help.

Kuba Zubrzycki - Lodz Film School directing graduate, screenwriter, film director. He worked as a theatre director at the Powszechny Theatre in Łódź and the Szaniawski Theatre in Wałbrzych. Semi-finalist of the 2021 Gdynia Drama Award for the text "Eighth. Third" about sexual abuse of minors in the Tri-City, and in 2023 for the text "DREAMS", which was created as part of theatre classes at the Juvenile Detention Facility. His text on the problems of Polish psychiatry in youth wards entitled (ZERO)"Silver" was published in the monthly Dialog 5/2021, and was included in the selection of the "EURODRAM" competition in 2022. Scholarship holder of the Minister of Culture. Student of the Ivan Vyrypaev Theatre School. He conducted theatre and film classes at the Addiction Treatment Centre, Juvenile Detention Centre, Children's Home, and the Shelter for the Homeless in Gdańsk. From 2022, a PhD student at the Doctoral School of the Lodz Film School.

In 2022, the text was selected as one of three Polish contemporary dramas in the „Eurodram” competition and received a recommendation for translation into foreign languages.

In 2022, a performative reading of the text ZERO took place as part of the Sopot Non Fiction documentary theatre festival.

The play explores the crisis in psychiatric care in youth wards. It includes scenes depicting sexual violence and suicidal behaviour.

The author of the show's poster: Zuzanna Kowalska
Production photos: Agnieszka Knocińska

More information on the Tbilisi International Student Theatre Festival at: facebook.com/TbsStudentTheaterFest

3-5 photos: Mikołaj Zacharow