İrfan Şahinbaş Atölye Sahnesi

About İrfan Şahinbaş Atölye Sahnesi

İrfan Şahinbaş Atölye Sahnesi (the İrfan Şahinbaş Workshop Stage) is a small State Theatre venue inside the State Theatres' social facilities at Macunköy, in Yenimahalle. It is one of the stages of the Ankara State Theatre (Ankara Devlet Tiyatrosu) and carries the name of İrfan Şahinbaş in his memory. The stage opened on 4 April 1990 and was set up as a studio for trying out new work; according to Turkish Wikipedia it is used for experimental theatre, and its first production was Jean-Paul Sartre's Men Without Shadows (Mezarsız Ölüler). The Ministry of Education's out-of-school learning guide describes an arena-style room with the stage in the middle and the audience seated around it, which brings spectators very close to the actors. Figures for the size vary between sources: the same guide gives about 109 seats, while Turkish Wikipedia gives 108. The State Theatre's schedule lists performances on Wednesday and Thursday at 20:00 and on Saturday at 15:00, and the box office opens at 17:00 on performance days. Because Macunköy is outside the centre, the State Theatre runs an audience shuttle that leaves from the Büyük Tiyatro car park in Ulus one hour before each performance here and brings spectators back after the show. The same campus also houses the Stüdyo Sahne and an open-air stage used for summer plays. Tickets are sold through the State Theatre box offices and online; the box office phone is +90 312 397 30 24. It is a good choice for theatre-goers who want to see more adventurous, intimate productions than the main city-centre stages usually offer.