AKA PERFORMANCE SQUAD


Maya Dunietz and Michal Oppenheim-Landau is AKA piece 'Gymnastics' (2004). Photo: Alona Rodeh
AKA Performance-Squad is the name given to the group Ariel Efraim Ashbel is working with in Tel-Aviv. It is a loosely-based format, built on a network of performers and artists who are interested in Ashbel's work as well as in the discourse about contemporary performance in general. 
It was formed as a proper Theater company in 2000, with the premier of “The Dybbuk – Between two worlds” at the Acco Fringe Festival (winner of honorary mention for young director). Since then, the group took part in various projects and events, and presented three other creations as part of the official competition of the Acco Festival: “Courage” (2001) after B. Brecht’s “Mother Courage”, “Garinim” (2003), winner of the first prize and the director award, as well as honorary mentions for music and stage design, and “Jawz” (2006), which was slaughtered passionately by mainstream critics (“horrible emptiness”) and made many people escape the space. All of which have placed Ashbel and his group at the forefront of the alternative Israeli theatrical creation, or as another critic wrote about the 2009 AKA creation Studies In Telekinesis: "...one of most fascinating, incredible and unpredictable pieces seen on an Israeli stage for years... A remarkable aesthetic experience... It places Ashbel at the top of the Israeli fringe theater".
The group includes actors, dancers, musicians, visual artists and geeks, collaborating with Ashbel as well as on various other projects, committed to the development of an artistic vocabulary that will further the discourse on theatre and performance, on both local and global levels. Music, dance, literature, visual arts, cinema and performance art are all assembled in the group’s definition of the theatrical site: Theatre not as a genre, but rather as a playground, an area where different terminologies and ideologies meet, confronts and collaborates. Therefore, throughout the years the company's shifted and is shifting constantly. It is now not a theater company but a format, an opportunity for artists to come together on productive grounds, whether it's a theatrical stage, an art gallery, a bar, a concert hall or a think tank. 

Here are some past, present and future AKA members, and their projects (sorry, some of the links are to Hebrew pages):


and these are some scenes from pieces made between 2003-2006: 


Osnat Kelner in AKA piece 'JAWZ' (2006) photo: Alona Rodeh

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