ALL GREEKS FESTIVAL

At the beginning of election week, author Stefan Hertmans gives a speech in front of the beating heart of Ghent politics and of our polis: the city hall. From the perspective of Euripides' Suppliants, he takes stock of our democracy today.

In Suppliants, the mothers of the fallen besiegers of Thebes seek help from the Athenian king Theseus. The tyrannical Thebes refuses to hand over their bodies to the grieving mothers. Is Athens willing to intervene in the conflict, even if it drags the city into civil war? What sacrifices is the Athenian community willing to make to defend their democratic principles, human values and early form of international law?

In Sophocles' tragedy, the main character Elektra symbolises mourning. She is stranded outside the gates of the palace where her father Agamemnon was murdered by her mother, Clytaimnestra. Elektra refuses to resume her daily life in that tarnished house, as if the murder never took place.

In Peter De Graef's meditative experiment ZITTEN  in the Gent-Sint-Pieters station, he brings about a gentle refusal of the outside world during the morning rush hour, together with local Elektras. His live narration, listened to via headphones, creates space for inner reflection and silence, like a master of ceremonies leading us to a place where language and silence meet.

In the third part of the Oresteia, mother murderer Orestes stands trial in Athens. The play thematises the transition from tribal violence and retribution (the vengeance goddesses cry for Orestes' blood) to democratic justice. A stone's throw from Ghent's courthouse, artist Peter Aers sets up his own court with local residents to explore the role of justice in our city and society. They prepare for this by reading together, making sculptures and building an agora. Outsiders are invited to take on the role of spectator.

The elections on 9 June. Kinderrechtenplein (The Children's Rights Square). Kopergietery has carefully chosen its spot and day during ALL GREEKS FESTIVAL. In a musical event, it calls on all passers-by who have yet to vote not to forget the children, to check every decision they make in the voting booth against their future. Narrator Lindah Leah Nyirenda links that call to the story of Ifigeneia in Aulis. In Euripides' tragedy, Agamemnon sacrifices his own daughter to make the journey to Troy possible.

In the family performance RE:Dress, Ifigeneia symbolises all children who are sacrificed by adults for the glory of a particular ideology. Together with jazz musicians and young people from the theatre workshops, theatre house KOPERGIETERY points out how dependent children are on us voters, on our often disastrous choices regarding child poverty, climate and war.