Article 55

The subtitle, A Documentary Celebration, tells us that we are engaging with documentary theatre. The creators use their own experience regarding societal expectations around reproduction and intertwine them with the experience of the Slovenian feminist movement in the 1990s, which fought for the decision to have or not to have children to remain exclusively the decision of a woman. […] But, spoiler alert, the road to the actual wording of Article 55 was full of thorns and spikes and surprisingly absurd. The production illustrates this by focusing on the most senseless moment in this crucial fight. Together with the performers, we watch an excerpt, several minutes long, of a session in the National Assembly where, among other things, a possibility to repeal Article 55 altogether was discussed. While watching this session – to which the previously named activists were invited but never got to speak – the actresses provide sarcastic commentary and, mimicking sports commentators, over-dramatise every single detail. While commenting loudly, the actresses munch on popcorn so that this extraordinary cinema experience is as real as it can be. The recording could have simply been left out, because the session yielded no results, but it underscores the bizarre discourse  surrounding Article 55 at that time and elicits an even stronger why-was-all-this-even-necessary sentiment in the spectator, a sentiment that the production so effectively conveys. […] Although it all ended well and Article 55 remained in the Constitution, the very fact that fighting for it was even necessary leaves a bitter aftertaste and we appreciate that the production draws attention to it. We believe the target audience for it should be young people in the education system. If memory serves, sex ed was never quite as informative as this when we were at school, and it is certainly time for some changes.

The strength of this performance lies in its research and honesty. These qualities have also been also evident in the director’s earlier works. The creators skilfully interweave elements characteristic of feminist theatre, women’s theatre, and auto theatre with archival material. One of the production’s greatest assets is its focus on local history, which perhaps surprisingly, takes on an affirmative tone. Contemporary theatre often adopts a critical stance: criticizing the system, the regime, and those in power. In contrast, Črnigoj’s performance is affirmative. From beginning to end, the actresses repeat that Slovenia was the first country to enshrine the right to abortion in its constitution. Even when recounting moments when this right was threatened, the director does not portray women as victims. Instead, she consistently constructs a narrative of Slovenian women as fighters who do not give up. The scenes are carefully crafted to inspire admiration for their resistance and courage. This shift in theatrical storytelling, one that addresses both national identity and women’s history, opens up new narrative perspectives. These are not stories of victimhood or blind celebration, but expressions of genuine respect for the past and for the people who shaped it. The affirmation of women’s history has become a trademark of Tjaša Črnigoj’s artistic voice. […] This is why it is so important to create performances that tell local stories, stories that Slovenians can take pride in. They serve as a reminder that behind these rights are real women who fought for them  – for themselves and for future generations.

The production opens with personal stories by women from different times: a young student who took control over her own body and successfully had an abortion, our ancestor who didn’t have this option and had to resort to a dangerous back-alley procedure. These stories are continuously interspersed with actresses’ first-person testimonies, in which they talk about their experience of pleasure, their first period, the first objectification by men and the sexualisation and shame that are so often attached to the female body. The production thus follows one of the feminist slogans: the personal is political. And although the bodies in front of us are witnesses to the history of patriarchy that erased female pleasure and reduced female sexuality to reproductive function, the actresses on stage are confident, relaxed and provide comic inserts. […] The production – by using audio-visual archival footage, combining fictional scenes with documentary segments, and by shifting between personal stories of actresses and the invented but totally plausible characters from the past – spins a thread about a historical reality that is oftentimes overlooked and is, actually, the other, less pretty side of the story about the Slovenian independence. The documentary celebration Article 55 can be read primarily as a tribute to the women who fought to preserve reproductive rights and as a reflection on the fact that capitalism can soon take away something that socialism brought to us in 1974. The fact that Slovenia became the first country in Europe to have an accessible, legal and free abortion and contraception is not a negligible one.

The production, subtitled A Documentary Celebration, draws on motifs of the Slovenian oral, literary and material heritage, occasionally using irony and caricature in its visual image, stage choreography, or verbal expression. The focus is on remembering and presenting the eight protagonists who fought for Article 55 of the Slovenian constitution, their stories and the documentary material that bear witness to an awakened contemporary society and the socially and professionally grounded advocacy for the right to bodily autonomy to be enshrined into the core of the country’s legal framework. The politicians, scientists, university professors and activists to whom we bow and thank with utmost respect today, knowing that they were the people who, in that pivotal moment, managed to attract the critical mass that tipped the scale to the right side of history. Crucial for the content and the visual aspects of the production are also the documentary videos and photos of the December 1991 political events inside and in front of the parliament (known at the time as the Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia), which, in that incarnation had close to 200 members but only 26 women, as well as the photos of women’s movements organising from the 1980s. The potential that the production carries is hard to describe. It fundamentally emphasises the fact that gender equality and dignity are something we must fight for. Fight for awareness and for free society as a whole. Once again, theatre played its part as a mediator of this call flawlessly.