Desert

The resident company of this season is the formation Atresbandes (La guerra dels mons), born of the artistic and personal encounter of Mònica Almirall, Miquel Segovia and Albert Pérez Hidalgo. Their project will deal with the unconscious.

Crítics Award 2024 to the best sound space to Sammy Metcalfe and Miquel Segovia.

There were a lot of people. A mass of people moving from place to place. And there was a lot of need to be heard. People paid to be heard. To be heard by someone else who was dedicated to that, to listening. Or also to be heard by a kind of superior being, an idea of God. And to be heard by this God you had to isolate yourself and from there the desert arises. As a place without noise, the only place in which to find silence. The silence that facilitates that listening. A place without distractions, but with other challenges. With sandstorms, with mirages and with authentic oases, privileged places that, in the middle of the void allowed us to light that kind of jam of memories, fears and fantasies that we carry inside. We used to search for this place, like cavers digging into humanity.

The word desert hides behind a great imaginary. It is a fundamental word of many religious and philosophical texts. For Hannah Arendt, it is a metaphor for understanding the place of the human being to the world ('the world is always a desert'). In the Bible, it represents the place where faith in God is tested, and Islam is a religion born of desert journeys in search of divine presence. It is, in short, a word very loaded with meanings: it is almost a symbol. But a symbol that contains a great paradox: we move away from it because it represents an empty space of life and, in turn, we seek its emptiness to get to distinguish the signs that life does not let us see.

This mixture of psychology, philosophy and mysticism is the starting point of this piece that presents four characters who are dedicated to listening to the world.


In the training environment of the Institut del Teatre de Barcelona, the members of the company decided to start a common project. Since 2011, the group has been characterized by conducting a laboratory theater in which the creation process is fundamental. Questioning everything around them, they are the authors of La guerra dels mons (2021), It don’t worry me 2020, with Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutsas), Ultima Thule (2019, with Hotel - Col lectiu Escènic), Coda (2019), All in (2017), Locus Amoenus (2014) and Solfatara (2012).

The Atresbandes residence is mentored by Swedish stage director Markus Öhrn. This support is part of the Institut Ramon Llull’s international mentoring program.

The Carlota Soldevila grants are possible thanks to the partnership between the Theatre and the Fundació Banc Sabadell.