Theatre festivals and its documentation

The Belgrade Theatre Festival BITEF is the oldest and most relevant theatre festival in the region of former Yugoslavia. Since 1967, it was not only a meeting ground for international directors and theatre makers such as Richard Schechner, Pina Bausch or Jerzy Grotowski, it was also an exchange place for theatre artists form the East and West, which influenced new theatrical tendencies. In 1989 BITEF Art theatre was founded in order to provide a platform for experimental theatre productions during the whole year. Focusing on theatre festivals allows us not only to examine how the theatrical avant-garde should always be examined within a global network; it also shows how the focus on institutions and its documentation opens the perspective on theatre history in a particular region. Hence, this paper will pose the following questions: firstly, what is the relationship between festival history as theatre history and particular socio-historical changes in the region? Second, what are the criteria and documentation materials, which allow theatre festivals to become a subject of historical research? Thus, the paper will provide a multiple perspective on the BITEF festival. Not only will it examine BITEF as established meeting ground for international theatre artists, which refers to Yugoslavia being an neutral zone for artist from the East and West; the paper will explore how the documentation of festivals (e.g. blogs, reviews and live screenings) provide new challenges for research in theatre history