Kirill Serebrennikov
Theatre, opera, ballet, film and television director, comes from Rostov-on-Don. From 2012 until its closure 2022 he headed the Gogol-Center in Moscow, a cross-genre theatre laboratory and one of the few unofficial alternative venues in the Russian cultural landscape. He studied physics at the university of his hometown. Already during his studies he directed at a theater studio, from 1994 at the theaters of Rostov. In 2001 his first production in Moscow followed Plastilin by Vasily Sigarev, which was invited to European theatre festivals and recorded by arte. Since then she has performed at the theatres of the Russian capital, such as the Pushkin Theatre, the Sowremennik Theatre and the State Theatre of Nations. A close cooperation connects him with the Moscow Chekhov Art Theater, where he also temporarily led the acting and directing studies of the in-house theater school. Together with his students he founded the Seventh Studio, which later became part of the Gogol Centre founded in 2012. In 2011, he founded an experimental workshop project "Platform" in Moscow, which belonged to the Centre of Contemporary Art in Winzavod, and was its artistic director until 2014. His awards include the Russian National Television Award for Director (1999), the East of West Award at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival (2005 for his film Ragin) and the Russian Golden Mask Theatre Award (2012). His film Ismena (Infidelity) was nominated for the Golden Lion in 2012 at the Venice Film Festival, his film Der die Zeichen lesen was nominated in Cannes and was also shown in German cinemas. Serebrennikov has also received numerous awards for his film work, including The Student 2016 at the Cannes Film Festival, The Swallow, Mysteries of the Storm, Playing the Victim, The Diary of a Murderer at the Rome, Locarno and Venice Film Festivals and nominations for the Golden Lion and the Grand Prix of Kinotavr in Sochi. In 2017 he was awarded the European Theatre Prize for his production New Realities (Neue Realitäten). In August 2018, Kirill Serebrennikov became the commander of the French Order of Arts and Letters. In the same year, he made a guest appearance at the Deutsches Theater Berlin with his productions Machine Müller and Kafka. In the 2019/20 season Decamerone celebrated its premiere at the Deutsches Theater Berlin after Giovanni Boccaccio, a co-production with the Gogol-Center Moscow. In 2019, he staged the play Outside by request of the Avignon Festival.

Photo: Ira Polyarnaya