Stas Zhyrkov

Stas Zhyrkov is a director and theatre manager. He studied acting and directing at the National University of Culture and Arts in Kyiv. In 2008, he co-founded the independent Open View Theatre in Kyiv with Ksenia Romashenko. From 2014 to 2019, he was artistic director of the Golden Gate Theatre in Kyiv, and from 2019 to 2022 he served as artistic director of the Left Bank Theatre there. Since 2021, he has also been head of the theatre department at the City Academy of Variety and Circus Arts in Kyiv. His international professional connections include links with the Theater Magdeburg, where he took part in the Wild East Festival in 2016 with Pavlo Arie’s play »At the Beginning and End of Time«. Zhyrkov’s work as a director has received numerous awards: in 2011, he won the Kyiv Pectoral Theatre Award in the category of Best Directorial Debut for the play »Natasha’s Dream«. In 2017, he was awarded the honorary title of Honoured Artist of Ukraine. He has directed around 50 plays in Ukraine, Lithuania, Germany and Switzerland. In Germany, since 2022, he has worked at venues including the Schaubühne Berlin, the Nationaltheater Mannheim, the Münchener Kammerspiele, the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus and the Berliner Ensemble. The world premiere of »King Lear – The Last Walk« by Pavlo Arie, based on an idea by William Shakespeare, was Stas Zhyrkov’s first production at Theater & Orchester Heidelberg in 2024/25. In 2026/27, he will stage Bertolt Brecht’s »The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui« in Heidelberg.