© Luis Camacho
José Sanchis Sinisterra, Max Award of Honor 2018
Key figure in the contemporary history of Performing Arts, the organizing committee has highlighted its immense trajectory, its social commitment and its entrepreneurial character
The organizing committee of the Max Performing Arts Awards announces today, April 13, the Max Award of Honor 2018, which has been awarded unanimously to the playwright, director and theatrical pedagogue José Sanchis Sinisterra, for being a key figure in the history of the Performing Arts. The committee, which has highlighted its vast trajectory, its social commitment and its entrepreneurial and renovating character of the dramaturgy, makes the award public through this press release.
The Valencian author will receive the award on June 18 during the ceremony of delivery of the XXI edition of the Max Awards of Performing Arts organized by the SGAE Foundation. According to this mention, Sanchis Sinisterra has declared that it supposes "a recognition of the guild" and that it coincides with a curious circumstantial circumstance: "I complete 60 years of profession in the theater. Six decades perpetrating texts, many years, many texts. I think the Max Award is an acknowledgment of having remained true to this activity. " (See full interview).
José Sanchis Sinisterra born in Valencia in 1940. Of restless nature, his first approach to the theater arose in the classrooms of his school, with school representations. "It was a topical beginning where I discovered the pleasure of creating and exhibiting before the public," he recalls. Since then, more than 40 works have been premiered, 3 scenic spaces founded, hundreds of workshops and master classes given and 15 awards received, such as the National Theater Award or the Max Award for Best Theatrical Authoring, which endorse an impeccable career dedicated to the Arts Scenic
One hundred authors in one
Director, writer and playwright, upon coming of age he divined in creative work a source of joy that has made him one of the most prolific and innovative authors of the Spanish scene. "I find pleasure in posing problems at the time of writing or staging, so as not to repeat myself, not to mechanize myself and to discover aspects of myself and my environment that, with an excess of trade, sometimes get away. I like that my works seem written by different authors, I define myself as an author without personality ", he emphasizes.
Titles like Ay Carmela! (1986), text with the highest number of visits by a living Spanish author, considered a classic of our contemporary theater and adapted to the cinema by Carlos Saura, Ñaque or lice and actors (1989), The reader for hours (1999) or Moon blood (2001) testify to the transgressive character of his pen.
"There has been a permanent enrichment of my work as a dramatist through the activities as a director and to relate the theater to other disciplines such as psychology, history or philosophy", continues this author, who never obviated the value of the text for the staging.
In his long theatrical career he has witnessed what he calls "several death certificates of the text theater". "In the 70s it was said that dramatic literature was an anachronism, a burden, that the theater was created in the group, in the theater collective …", he laments. "I have always vindicated that literary dimension of theater, the solitary exploration of the playwright and I have dedicated my whole life to promoting the training of authors, through workshops, courses and seminars," he adds.
Entrepreneurial and committed spirit
Bachelor of Philosophy and Arts, Sanchis Sinisterra has combined his career as a teacher with that of dramatic author. "I have been able to live more as a teacher than theater. Not depend on the writing of my works and the assemblies to survive has facilitated me to have a great freedom to write, without caring that some of my works were left in the drawer, as it has happened to me, "he says.
A scholar of the limits and boundaries of theatricality, of involvement with the public and of a renewing spirit, he founded "tinglados", as he likes to say, or collaborative spaces to promote writing and research. An entrepreneurial facet that started in 1977 in Barcelona, when he founded the Border Theater, continued with Sala Beckett in 1988 and has culminated with the New Border Theater or "La Corsetería" in the Madrid district of Lavapiés. The space received the Max Prize for Contribution in 2010 and in it experiences are made with groups at risk of exclusion and intercultural and dramaturgies induced to talk about topics that do not always work on the billboard.
"I went through different neighborhoods and Lavapiés seemed like the future of the world. The world will be mestizo or it will not be, I thought. This is Lavapiés, it is our responsibility to try that these collectives find a common resonance territory and in this space a true effervescence is taking place ", confesses the writer.
"You only have what is shared, what I somehow in my solitary work I am planning to expand the boundaries of dramaturgy and theater, if I keep it to myself it is not interesting or fertile. This fertility comes from putting it in contact and friction with other creators that will transform it, modify it, betray it and turn it into its own creative substance, "he concludes.
A life of professional recognitions
Among his numerous prizes are the "Carlos Arniches" Theater Prize (1968), the "Camp de l'Arpa" Poetry Prize (1975), the National Theater Prize (1990), the "Federico García Lorca" Prize (1991). ), the Award of Honor of the Institut del Teatre de Barcelona (1996), the "Max" Award for Best Theater Authoring (1999 and 2000), the National Prize for Dramatic Literature (2003), the "Life Achievement Award" of the XXIII International Hispanic Theater Festival of Miami (2008), the Medal of the Latin American Center of Creation and Theater Research (CELCIT) (2010), the "Adolfo Marsillach" Award of the Association of Stage Directors of Spain (ADE) for a Significant Theatrical Work (2014), and, more recently, the Lavapiés Teachers Network Award (2016), the "a whole career" Award of the Spanish University Theater Federation (2016), the "Palma de Alicante" Prize of the Sample of Spanish Theater of Contemporary Authors (2016), and the Prize «Max» of Honor (2018).
Previous winners
In previous years the award went to Salvador Távora (2017); Lola Herrera (2016); Rosa Maria Sardà (2015); María de Ávila (2014); Ana Diosdado (2013); Julia Gutiérrez Caba (2012); José Monleón (2011); Josep Maria Benet i Jornet (2010); Miguel Narros (2009); Víctor Ullate (2008); Fernando Arrabal (2007); Pilar López (2006); José Rodríguez Méndez (2005); Francisco Nieva (2004); Alfonso Sastre (2003); José Tamayo (2002); Antonio Gala (2001); Adolfo Marsillach (2000); Antonio Buero Vallejo (1999) and the Teatro de la Zarzuela (1998).
Three special prizes
In addition to the 19 contest categories of the Max Performing Arts Awards, the organizing committee awards two special prizes: Max de Honor and Max Amateur or Social Character. Likewise, this year the Max Prize of the Public begins, which will allow the spectators to value their favorite shows.
Organized by the SGAE Foundation since 1998, the Max Awards, whose prize is designed by the poet and artist Joan Brossa (Barcelona-1919/1999), promoter of one of the renewing collectives of post-war Spanish art, have been consolidated as over these years as the broadest recognition in the field of Performing Arts in the Spanish State.
The organizing committee of the 21st edition of the Max Performing Arts Awards is composed of Inés París, president of the SGAE Foundation; Juli Disla, institutional director of Performing Arts of the SGAE Foundation; Paloma Pedrero, vice president of the College of Great Law of the SGAE, and authors Eduardo Galán, Ana Graciani, Juan Luis Mira, Teresa Nieto, Pera Tantiñá and Joan Vives.
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