PlayON! is a large scale cooperation project funded by the European Commission under their European Culture Funding Stream Creative Europe (2019-2024). The five years work is dedicated to the development and implementation of digital technologies for youth theatre and runs under the theme “Concrete Utopias in the Digital Age”. The project was initiated by nine theatres with experience in the use of digital technologies and a university with high digital expertise under the lead the Estonian VAT Teater from Tallinn. Eight universities from the creative digital sector are associated partners in order to facilitate access to technical knowledge. In the context of the project, a total of around 25 new productions are being created, and several (online and in person) conferences are taking place, as well as numerous workshop formats and other working meetings in which knowledge is being communicated and disseminated. Across five years the partners‘ aims are: 

1. to develop new forms of storytelling, building on narrative structures used in the creative game sector 

2. to merge these new forms with a variety of immersive technologies 

3. to use this new format to extend theatre towards the public urban space with relevant stories and the involvement of young adults as co-creators. 

4. to disseminate the gained knowledge and to ancre them in the daily working structure of each theatre.

In addition to the project leading theatre in Estonia (VAT Teater), the Academy itself as an advisory institution and the Dortmund Theatre, which is developing a total of three productions in the children's and youth theatre (KJT), the Young Opera and the Young Ballet in the PlayOn! context, seven other theatres in the children's and youth sector are involved. In addition to the associated universities of applied sciences and universities, the ARS Electronica and re:publica festivals are also important partners in this project.  

Partners:

Elsinor Centro di Produzione Teatrale (Mailand, Forlì, Florenz, Italien)

Kolibri Színház (Budapest, Ungarn) 

Teatr Ludowy (Kraków, Polen)

Landestheater Linz (Österreich)

Teatro O Bando (Palmela, Portugal)

Teatret Vårt (Molde, Norwegen)

Pilot Theatre (York, Großbritannien) 

VAT Teater (Tallinn, Estland)