Artistic director

Director, choreographer and actor

Born in Wroclaw in Poland, Elizabeth Czerczuk is immersed right from her youth in the theatrical atmosphere of two important people of this city: Jerzy Grotowski and Henryk Tomaszewski, two major faces of the Polish stage. She begins her training at the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art, in 1984, in Cracow, the city of Tadeusz Kantor.

In 1991, thanks to a grant from the French government, she enters the Conservatory in Paris, in order to follow the teaching of Daniel Mesguich, Philippe Adrien and Jean-Pierre Vincent. She also studied at the Marcel Marceau mime school and she perfects her formation with the Comédie-Française, with Daniel Mesguich, and then with Karine Saporta, especially for her choreography on Colette, becoming afterward the person in charge of the production and the promotion of her company in Poland and Japan.

Still astride between Poland and France, she tries to find, through her multiple theatrical activities, to learn about her roots, and to link her two cultures: French and Polish. Her goal is to mix the French technic with the emotion inherent to the Polish dramatic art. 

Actor and dancer

In Poland, she starts as an actress, under the direction of important directors: Jerzy Sthur; Waldemar Smigasiewicz, Jerzy Grotowski…

Out of her native country, she plays Serafombix in The sale of the demonic woman, a play inspired by Witkiewicz, under the direction of Zofia Kalinska, collaborator of Tadeusz Kantor, in the Grand Meeting Company Theater, in England ; Edwige in Le Canard sauvage by Ibsen, choreographed by Karine Saporta and presented in several festivals in Scandinavia, and then at the Théâtre de la Ville, in Paris. She then played Salomé, by Oscar Wilde, with Daniel Mesguich as advisor in staging, in the context of international festivals in Leipzig, Saint-Pétersbourg, Almada-Lisbonne, Dresde, as well as Avignon repeatedly.

Director

Elizabeth Czerczuk creates her own company/troup in 1992 and, creates her own shows, often dictated by the voice of important Polish authors. Moreover, she creates shows containing a strong message, like Le Cri d’Ophélie, based on Study on Hamlet by Wyspianski or Matka from Witkiewicz.

She also pays tribute to important compatriots, such as Adam Mickiewicz in 1998 for the bicentenary of her birth, where she develops Les Adieux (parts II and III) and Tadeusz Kantor in 2015 for the centenary of her birth, with Le Banc de l’école. She stages Le Cri d’Yvonne the same year, inspired of Yvonne, princesse de Bourgogne by Gombrowicz (selected for the 12 x 12 festival, in Paris, and played in Théâtre de l’Aquarium, at the Cartoucherie in Vincennes).

The director is received in France and across Europe on national stages and during international festivals. She always meets a very favorable reception from the medias and the public, especially in Avignon.

Elizabeth Czerczuk also offers lectures, dramatizations of her own creations and adaptations of the works of contemporary European dramatists who contributed to the renewal of the theatrical stage, like Samuel Beckett, Jean Genet and Jon Fosse, among which Le Rêve d’automne gives place to the choreographed performance L’Adieu à l’automne.

Director of theater and european project director

In 2002, after the death of the grand master of pantomime H. Tomaszewski, she is nominated at the head of his theater, where she manages the administrative team but while pursuing the artistic line of her creator.

From 2010 to 2012, she creates and manages the artistic project Homme@Home focusing on current environmental issues, with the support of the European commission, as part of the programme “Culture 2007-2013”. During this time, she worked with artists from four countries, such as Carolyn Carlson and Karine Saporta. One of the five performances, “Carnaval”, was staged by Elizabeth Czerczuk in the Nowy Theater in Lodz, in Poland. These performances were presented with exhibitions and practical workshop.

In 2013, she takes possession of a place she named the Théâtre Laboratoire Elizabeth Czerczuk, in tribute to her master Grotowski.

This place allows her to begin a personal and multidisciplinary approach, by mixing all the forms of artistic expressions: theater, dance, music, pictorial effect.