Jakab Toffler House invites you to take part in the second edition of the ”Football in Traian”, a mini-football tournament organized on a field with natural grass, in the middle of Traian Square in Timișoara. It is an event inaugurated last year, during the BETA Architecture Biennale, through which we proposed to promote belonging to the community. This tournament is not a sports competition and football is just an excuse to give a voice to the people living in the Fabric. It is a celebration of neighbors, residents and friends of the neighborhood in celebration of our social and cultural diversity. Tournament prizes and trophies are symbolic. We want Fair-Play, mutual respect to prevail on the field, and off it. The second edition brings a larger playing space and, in addition to the tournament itself, more events. We are waiting for you!
Friday July 28th:
- Married vs. Singles (18:00)
- Femina Politehnica Timișoara vs. Juniors Politehnica Timișoara (19:00)
- Neighborhood Managers vs. Local Administration (20:00)
These matches are purely friendly and cordial in nature. In the case of the Singles, it is an opportunity to
symbolically take revenge against the Marrieds, who won the last match with a score of 5-2. To the #girls and #boys in boots, we wish them the best of luck in the new sports season. And in the case of neighborhood managers and administration, it's our opportunity to make game suggestions to them, as only participants in neighborhood life know how to do.
- Inauguration of the exhibition "Cingo, cingo, shot, GOL!" (21:00)
The exhibition proposes a retrospective of the traditional amateur football match Married vs. Unmarried, started in 1936. Without historicizing this tradition, archival images and objects with symbolic value have the role of presenting and contextualizing the elements that form this intangible heritage of the Fabric neighborhood, which serve as a functional model for coexistence and community coagulation and which provide a sense of historical continuity and cultural significance.
- Workshop Tom Russoti / Institute for Aesthletics (21:30)
Tom Russotti is an artist whose practice lies at the intersection of education and offline gaming. He has worked with museums and spaces such as Tate Modern, MoMa, Phillips Collection, Dallas Museum of Art and Kumu National Art Museum in Estonia. He founded The Institute for Aesthletics - an organization that creates new sports and contributes to projects of social integration and artistic education. In a first workshop, Tom Russotti proposes a Mercurian competition – a game in which the rules and teams are constantly changing, and players must constantly invent new strategies and alliances. The purpose of the game is to overturn the Us vs. Us mentality. They also provide the opportunity for continuous collaborative interaction.
Saturday July 29th:
- Matches of groups A, B and C (starting at 09:00)
16 mixed teams with connections in the community - the rule is that at least one team member is a resident of the Fabric -, divided into four groups, will participate in the tournament. In the first phase, it will be played on a head-to- head basis, with the top two qualified teams advancing.
- Workshop Tom Russoti / Institute for Aesthletics (21:00)
In the second workshop, Tom Russotti proposes a game where gravity is reversed and the balls, instead of being pulled to the ground, are lifted into the air. It's not quite sure how the mechanics of this game will play out, but what is certain is that any miss will be a ball that rises to the sky.
- Watching the documentary "Fair Play Day" (22:00)
The documentary "Fair Play Day" is a cinematic experiment, on the border between anthropology and video art, filmed over the course of eight days during the sTRAdART Piața Traian festival, 2009. Its central subject is the amateur football match between the "rival" teams of the Married and the Unmarried, a tradition that has been taking place since 1936 in the Fabric district of Timisoara. The film captures in a familiar and nostalgic key fragments of the life of the neighborhood, together with the way the matches were prepared and the rituals that accompanied them. With no stake other than the symbolic one, this game was a source of pride and excitement for all the players and the neighborhood's neighbors.
Sunday July 30th:
- Group D matches, quarter finals, semi finals, small finals, grand finals (starting at 09:00)
The continuation of the matches, and the tie-breaking of the eight qualified teams from the first part of the tournament. The top two ranked teams of each group will compete in the semifinals and finals of the tournament.
- Awards ceremony (19:30)
- Workshop Tom Russoti / Institute for Aesthletics (20:00)
In a final session of workshops and games, Tom Russotti proposes a competition where the contestants must incorporate various drinks into their dances and the spectators must judge. It's a Reality TV type of game that allows anyone to get on the dance floor.
After the awards ceremony, the football field will become the dance floor where athletes and spectators can practice their skills together in the last half of this year's event, to music from all over the world for all. The party is hosted by Arhiva de Sunet.