From the archives of Andrei Kureichik
Andrei Kureichik (1980) is a prize-winning playwright, screenwriter, director and publicist from Minsk, Belarus, currently living in exile. He has written and/or directed 27 feature films, as well as over 20 plays that have been staged in 37 countries worldwide.
Kureichik passed the director’s internship at the Moscow Art Theater. A.P. Chekhov (teacher O. Tabakov, 2002). He taught at the directing department of the Russian Academy of Theater Arts (GITIS), at the European Humanities University (2012-2016), at the Belarusian State University of Culture and Arts (2009 – 2010), at the Council of Europe School (2014-2019). Author of more than 30 plays. Plays are put in many theaters of Belarus, Russia, Ukraine, Poland and other countries.
He has written more than 20 movies and TV films, including: “Love-carrot” (2007), “Love-carrot 2” (2008), “Yulenka” (2008), “Yolki” (2010), “Office romance. Our time ”(2011),“ Above the sky ”(2012),“ Horoscope for good luck ”(2015),“ Garash ”(2015),“ SOS, Santa or Everything will come true! ”(2015),“ War of the sexes ”( 2015), “Odessa-Mama” (2014), “The Trail of the Fighter” (2015), “Party-zan Film” (2016).
Films directed: “Above the Sky” (2012, co-director, artistic director), “Garash” (2015) (the first feature film was presented at the Council of Europe Building in Strasbourg), “Party-zan Film” (2016), winner of the festival “Smile Russia” by Alla Surikova.
The author’s latest work was a play about an outstanding Russian statesman, Count Muravyev-Amursky, on the stage of the Khabarovsk Drama Theater, and the script for the studio “Tri Te” of Nikita Mikhalkov about the brilliant victory of the USSR national team in basketball at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games “Moving Up” (director Anton Megerdichev), which became the highest-grossing film of Russian cinema in the entire history, having collected more than 3 billion rubles in the CIS film distribution.
As a writer and director prior to 2020, Kureichik was especially beloved for his comedies and suspense thrillers. Following the contested presidential elections and brutal aftermath in Belarus in August 2020, Kureichik has gained an international following as a political playwright. Forced to flee the country as a member of the Coordination Council working with perceived winner Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya’s transition team, Andrei leveraged his creative energy to produce the documentary play “Insulted. Belarus(sia)”, about the 2020 presidential elections, subsequent protests, and violent crackdown by Alexander Lukashenko’s regime in Belarus. Already, the play has been translated into 29 languages and received 200 readings and performances across the globe (including Hong Kong, Nigeria, throughout the EU, UK, and North America). Articles about the play have been published in Plays International and Europe, Contemporary Theatre Review, the Boston Globe, Dialog, among many others, and forthcoming in Theatre Journal. It has been featured on BBC Radio’s “The Cultural Frontline,” and by the HowlRound Theatre Commons. His newest play, a verbatim piece about Belarusian political prisoners, The Voices of the New Belarus, is beginning to receive similar recognition.
As member of Coordination Council of Belarus was awarded The Sakharov Prize of Freedom of Speech of European Parliament.
In 2020 founded You-tube Civil rights, Activism and Art-resistance channel “Alternative Blogovision” which in one year became one of the leaders of Belarusian segment of You-tube with more than two million of views per month.
Andrei Kureichik is an AR-ICORN Resident at Artists at Risk (AR)-Safe Haven Helsinki. The programme is co-funded by the City of Helsinki Culture and Leisure Division and the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union, curated by Perpetuum Mobile (PM) as part of Artists at Risk – A European Network of Safe Havens (AR-ENSH). The AR-Network is coordinated by the AR-Secretariat with support from Kone Foundation and curated by Perpetuum Mobile (PM).
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