KATIE’S TALES
A Woman’s Desire In The Whirlwind Of History
Katie’s Tales is the story of a woman and her lover who, after a terrible event, left her with the promise to come back. It's the story of a garden, with an orchard of cherry trees.
Katie's life unfolds during savage times, times of waiting and of becoming. Her beloved left after a recent catastrophe, with a promise to return. Accompanied by a couple of foreign servants, Katie lives protected in her garden, under the shade of her cherry trees - silent witnesses of her life and of History. Every day she receives visitors, every moment could bring the return of the one who left, and Katie keeps herself ready.
She who waits is on a journey herself, on the road of her life sculpted in vivid frames, under the shade of the cherry trees thick with memories and unfulfilled desires of many generations. - She is a woman standing in front of History, facing her own lights and her own shadows.
Sheltered in the cherry orchard, standing at the crossroads of past and future, armed with her desire, she weaves moving evocations of intertwined pasts and deeply wished-for futures.
The desire that Katie embodies invites reflection on belonging and the role of our consciousness, in the deafening flow of world events, and in the confused whirlwind of human desires.
Prof. Dariusz Kosiński, Jagiellonian University, Kraków, says:
“Katie's Tales is a complex and multi-layered meeting with Katie – a girl whose life’s experiences and fate are encapsulated in the songs… [the name Katie] is traditionally used in Polish folk songs, poetry and tales, as a name of a female hero. Therefore, the encounter with Katie is a meeting with thousands of women whose experiences were excluded from and silenced by the heroic histories written and retold by men… [Agnieszka] transforms her solo performance into a fascinating dialogue with her Foremothers and – at the same time – her kinswomen.”
"How can such a pure feeling emerge from an actor's body?"
— Franco Acquaviva, Sipario.it
“Fascinating dialogue with her Foremothers and – at the same time – her kinswomen.”
— Prof. Dariusz Kosiński, Jagiellonian University, Poland
Join the upcoming Katies Tales performance and step into a powerful, storied, feminine world of colour, song, hope and love – despite and beyond the wars and other ruins that (capital "H") History keeps throwing our way.
Quotes from reviews
“...She passes over the stage like a light bird that jumps from branch to branch and sings: she touches objects, she touches her own past, assuming that there is a past, and not, instead her eternal ecstatic present…” --- Franco Acquaviva
“...One woman alone. Who masters the sense of "History" in relation to her personal history, and makes it filled with things unspoken, with songs, and with an almost "clandestine" embodied physicality, almost inviting the public (in a full room of attentive and silent spectators) to fall in love, as she does, with her lover.
The stage space is as a fifth, not a fourth, wall of the theater: it allows us all to belong to each other, so as not to separate the audience from the stage with the artist…” --- Cristina T. Chiochia
“…But another suspicion also arises: that the beloved that Katie is waiting for is not exactly the man who left one day, but the superhuman echo of an invoked presence, in anticipation of which Katie spends her days.
Thus, the packet of letters seems at a certain point to assume the value of a sacred writing that awaits completion; and the girl's words of love become words thrown into the void in anticipation of something which will fill with divinity the prosaic everyday in which she lives immersed.
Because, in the end, that which leaps to one’s eyes, beyond everything, is the joy that permeates and at times erupts from the actress's slender body. How can such a pure feeling emerge from an actor's body, from its interior, in such a spring-like way?” --- Franco Acquaviva
Reviews and interviews
'How can such a pure feeling emerge from an actor's body?' - Franco Acquaviva, Sipario
Veteranas del amor y la guerra - Virginia Giacosa. Revista REA
Performance credits:
With and by Agnieszka Kazimierska (Poland).
Directed by Mario Biagini (Italy).
Photos by Renato Esposito and Nikita Chuntomov.
Produced by Fondazione Teatro della Toscana/Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards (Italy).
Performance is in English, with traditional Polish songs
Duration: 55 min
Katie’s Tales premiered in 2018, under the direction of Mario Biagini (Associate Director of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards, Teatro Nazionale Della Toscana until 2021), and it has since been presented in various festivals, theaters, theatrical and non-theatrical spaces, including in Pontedera, Italy (Teatro Era 2019, 2021); Florence, Italy (PARC-Teatro Della Pergola, 2018), Milán, Italy (FE Fabbrica dell'Esperienza Teatro, 2020); Selcuk, Türkiye (Medresesi Tiyatro, 2018, 2019); Perm, Russia (Diaghilev International Festival, 2018), Toronto, Canada (Studio Theatre, 2018); NYC, United States (Andrew Freedman Home Cultural Center, 2018, 2019); París, France (Theatre de La Ville, 2019) and, more recently, in Istanbul, Türkiye, (Theater Bahçe Galata, Theater BAU PERA SAHNE, Theater Alan Kadıköy, 2022) Sofía, Bulgaria (Toplocentrala Cultural Center, 2022); Edinburgh Fringe Festival, United Kingdom (Thistle Theater, 2022), Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States (Fusion at The Cell Theater, 2022, 2023), Buenos Aires, Argentina (Espacio Polonia, 2022), Rosario, Argentina (Espacio Bravo, 2022), Santa Fe, NM (Teatro Paraguas, 2023), Buenos Aires, Argentina (Area 623, 2023), Rosario, Argentina (Teatro La Sonrisa De Beckett, 2023), United Solo Festival in NYC (2024), and Prescott, Arizona, United States (Hazeltine Theater, 2025).
Contact: aga@agnieszkakazimierska.com
Agnieszka Kazimierska is an independent Polish actress, vocal practitioner, theater pedagogue, psychologist, and coach. She is working internationally on a variety of projects, including Katie’s Tales, SONICALITY, LOS RIOS DEL CANTO, among others.
She creates interdisciplinary theater performances, leads workshops on acting and encounters through singing and movement, providing contexts for artistic exchange and co-creation through live arts.
She works with people individually as a creative companion, performance creation mentor, vocal practice facilitator, and a coach.
“I am fascinated by indigenous ways of knowing. I have deep respect for our sentient divine nature.”
“My working style can be described as poetic, playing with the aesthetics of magical realism.”
Inspired by post-Jungian and depth psychology, her works often explore historical, social, psychological, and spiritual phenomena from a personal angle.