Echoes from uranium mines.
Yellowcake amplifies those moments of togetherness and commonality usually excluded from the main narrative of protests and yet, essential to foster the commitment along with a struggle.
How do people come together? How do we participate in collective actions? How do we form a collective body?
Yellowcake is a participatory performance that invites the audience to take part in micro exercises on collaboration, accompanied by a convivial lunch and a moment of sharing time and thoughts.
Through her practice, Tea Andreoletti explores how her hometown and its neighbouring villages of the Upper Seriana Valley could work together to address service shortages, isolation and depopulation. At Baltic Circle, Andeoletti activates collective exercises and a discussion on cooperation through the story of the Upper Seriana Valley demonstration against uranium mines in 1979. The movement against extraction was the last moment of communality that united the valley villages, and it has been forgotten in the background of political defeats.
What has survived from that sense of community? How can collaboration re-emerge when a conservative spirit discourages the dialogue between neighbouring villages, isolating them in their private interests?
Yellowcake is the name of the final product of uranium purification processes, a yellow powder. The name also reminds of the typical dish of the Upper Seriana Valley, polenta, a hot porridge from cornmeal that resembles a large yellow cake.
Tea Andreoletti (she/her)
Tea Andreoletti (1991) grew up in Gromo, a mountain village of the Upper Seriana Valley in Italy. She is an artist who performs as a storyteller, water sommelier, guide of pilgrimages and a non-professional fencer. Since 2021, Tea has been working on a long-term project that will lead her to run for the mayor of her hometown’s 2026 elections, through a leadership she called Povera. Her nomadic projects are documented through oral narratives and embroidery on her Sunday Dress. Tea lives and works between Helsinki and Gromo.
Thank yous: Arlene Tucker, Arja Renell, Dash Che, Eero Yli-Vakkuri and Teemu Vaarakallio.
YELLOWCAKE is a part of Kulkue, a joint project between three Finnish art festivals. ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival (Kuopio), Hangö Teaterträff (Hanko), and Baltic Circle (Helsinki) create an exceptionally large-scale series of Finnish co-productions along with related tours. The project’s central goal is to promote the accessibility of the festivals and to prolong the life cycle of the performances. The project is financed by the Finnish Cultural Foundation.