May I Stay?
A participatory performance exploring migration and belonging through visits to temporary homes, personal encounters and the imagined protocols of contact with extraterrestrial life.
Theatre director · Participatory performance artist Salzburg, Austria
Theatre happens
between us.
I research people, places and social situations, transforming encounters and lived experience into performance.
Selected projectsSelected
projects
Explore all 40 projects Vosmiklassnitsa (8th Grade Girl)
A forum theatre production about sexual harassment and abuse of power, inviting audiences to step into the story and explore possible responses alongside a professional psychologist.
Sluchaynaya (Random)
A site-specific performance-installation in a former teahouse, bringing Gorky’s The Lower Depths into dialogue with the building’s history, local residents’ stories and contemporary experiences of homelessness.
Fragile Summer Camp
An adult summer camp experience inspired by David Lynch’s Twin Peaks, combining collective play with documentary reflections on the changing realities of children’s camps in contemporary Russia.
Maria and Me
Translating the visual language of a comic into theatre, and creating an ethically attentive encounter with an autistic perspective.
Listen City
Twenty spectators become the ensemble of a carefully composed dramatic work.
Artistic
practice
I build performances from encounters with people, places and the situations we share. Working with professional and non-professional participants, I develop structures that leave room for their choices and lived experience.
Participation
I work with invitations, instructions and shared tasks that give participants a part in shaping what happens. Rehearsal becomes a way to listen, test and make decisions together, with attention to community, care and shared responsibility.
Site-specific work
A station, a city or a theatre brings its own rhythms and histories. I use these as material, placing a work in dialogue with the people and activities already there.
Game design
I use live-action role-playing and game structures to explore how people enter a shared world, negotiate its rules and act within it. These forms allow us to test possibilities together through play.
My current research also explores artificial intelligence as part of the audience’s experience in participatory performance.
Ariadne’s Thread / Since 2010
In 2010, I co-founded Ariadne’s Thread with my brother Pyotr Kurkin: a live-action role-playing camp for teenagers. This sustained work with young people continues to inform my approach to collaboration, learning and shared worlds.
About
Ivan Kurkin
I’m Ivan Kurkin, a theatre director and participatory performance artist based in Salzburg, with roots in Saint Petersburg.
Alongside directing and performing, I develop theatre laboratories and curatorial programmes with young people and professional ensembles. My projects take place in theatres, at festivals and in public spaces.
- Currently
- MA Applied Theatre
Mozarteum University Salzburg · 2025–present - Education
- MA Performance Design · 2014–2016
Russian State Institute of Performing Arts
Marat Gatsalov / Valery FokinActing / Puppetry · 2005–2010
Russian State Institute of Performing Arts
I. Zaykin’s workshop - Recognition
- Maria and Me · Golden Mask nominee · 2019
Listen City · Golden Mask notable productions · 2016–17 - Languages
- Russian — native
English — professional working proficiency
German — beginner
Project
archive
2009–2026
- 2010–presentAriadne’s ThreadCo-founder & artistic director
- 2026Green Means HopeCreator, with Jonathan Llaguno
- 2022NeighborsAuthor
- 2022Planet Ludus. SchoolProject manager
- 2021Memory ConstructorDirector
- 2018–2021Sycheval’naProject manager
- 2020Let Them Always DanceCurator
- 2018A Reading Experience of Three SistersConcept & direction
- 2010–presentAriadne’s ThreadCo-founder & artistic director
- 2026May I Stay?Co-creator & performer
- 2026Vosmiklassnitsa (8th Grade Girl)Co-director with Dmitry Krestyankin
- 2026Green Means HopeCreator, with Jonathan Llaguno
- 2025Sluchaynaya (Random)Director
- 2025Fragile Summer CampCo-director & performer
- 2024–2025Cabaret of Broken HeartsCo-creator & performer
- 2023ChipatangaDirector & performer
- 2022NeighborsAuthor
- 2022Planet Ludus. SchoolProject manager
- 2021Memory ConstructorDirector
- 2021Me and the TheatreDirector / workshop practice
- 2021Blockade RoomCurator
- 2018–2021Sycheval’naProject manager
- 2020Let Them Always DanceCurator
- 2020Turn On the Volume, Turn Off the WorldCurator
- 2019–2020About SwearingDirector (2019) / Curator (2020)
- 2020City. TalksDirector
- 2019HALL07Co-author / collaborating artist
- 2019PlaythingsPerformer / devising ensemble
- 2019GovorenieDirector
- 2019Cherry SartreDirector
- 2018A Reading Experience of Three SistersConcept & direction
- 2018Elza’s LandDirector
- 2018Maria and MeDirector
- 2018Ploshadka vol. 3Director
- 2018Old Lady’s RouteDirector of the Nevsky Prospect location
- 2018Where We Are NotTheatre consultant
- 2015–2018Concert Programme at Ariadne’s ThreadConcert organiser
- 2016Listen CityDirector
- 2016The Life Is Only OneDirector
- 2016Keepers of PassageDirector
- 2016Freedom to Choose YourselfPerformer
- 2015WritersDirector
- 2015Fairytale’s BirthdayDirector
- 2015ReloadMember of the directing group
- 2013UbikGame master / LARP designer
- 2011–2012DemetriusPerformer · title role
- 2010SolarisGame master / LARP designer
- 2009Lost HeavenGame master / LARP designer
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Talks &
writing
Why Theatre Is Needed
Higher School of Economics · Saint Petersburg · 24 September
Ethics of a Director’s Work with Children and Teenagers
Generation Next Festival · Online · 20 September
Testimony of Witnesses
Mask Plus · Stanislavsky Electrotheatre · Moscow · 23 February
DocumentationAmong Dungeons and Dragons
Theatre magazine · No. 26
Read articleNew Theatre for a New Generation of Spectators
Rainbow Festival · Theatre for Young Spectators · Saint Petersburg · 2 June
The Acting Audience
Theatre at the Crossroads of Time · Russian State Institute of Performing Arts · 17–19 March
Metatheatre: Role-Playing Games at Ariadne’s Thread Camp
In The Sum of Role-Playing Games, 2012–2013 · Edited by Emma Mikheykina · pp. 298–306
Read article (PDF, p. 298)ContactSalzburg · Austria
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