La MaMa Umbria International is a non-profit cultural association, cultural centre and artists’ residence, founded by Ellen Stewart in 1990, former founder and artistic director of La MaMa E.T.C. Theatre in New York.
Its aims are artistic research and experimentation, information, and the promotion of art and culture on an international level. The Association exclusively pursues cultural and artistic aims, guided by the idea that art can contribute to overcoming the limits and barriers still placed on communication, which in any way reduce imagination and creativity: cultural, social, national, linguistic and artistic limits and barriers.
This is why from the very beginning La MaMa Umbria has been strongly committed to promoting exchanges and collaborations between individual artists and groups of various nationalities and backgrounds. The Centre organises and welcomes different types of initiatives: artists can reside in the centre during periods of study and work, to develop new projects, to create performances or works of various kinds, to attend courses, seminars and workshops, at various levels and on different techniques, to carry out activities aimed at developing their artistic skills.
In over 20 years of activity, La MaMa Umbria has presented many events: numerous theatre and dance performances, concerts, exhibitions, conferences, courses and even a small summer festival. In the last ten years, one of the main activities has been higher education, with courses held by internationally renowned lecturers and artists. Several groups have also made use of La MaMa Umbria’s facilities to carry out residency periods, aimed at preparing new artistic projects.
Since 2011 it has organised La MaMa Spoleto Open, a special fringe event of the prestigious Festival dei 2 Mondi. La MaMa Umbria is a founding member of the Italian Centre of the ITI – International Institute (UNESCO) and is a member of PAIR-Performing Arts in Residency, a European Network of artistic residencies, established thanks to the support of the European Community.
Since 2015 it has been recognised by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and the Region of Umbria as one of the 5 artistic residences in Umbria, and since 2018 it has been part of C.U.R.A. Centro Artistico di Residenze Umbre, also recognised at ministerial and regional level.
Since 2012, together with other associations in the area, it has been managing and organising the Creative Hub Cantiere Oberdan, a municipal space used as a theatre hall, an interdisciplinary cultural centre for aggregation, participation and training, aimed at the local community and in particular the new generations. A regenerated and alternative space where young people work to help design the cultural and social architecture of tomorrow’s city.
Among its most important projects, it founded the ‘Ellen Stewart International Prize’, which is awarded bi-annually to an artist or a company that has particularly distinguished itself for conducting a theatrical activity that promotes social change, community participation and the involvement of young people.
It collaborates with the Municipality of Spoleto and with many local and national associations. Internationally with many structures both in Europe and worldwide, the main ones being the La MaMa ETC Theatre in New York, the Culture Hub in New York and the Seoul Institute of the Arts in South Korea.