The couple who brought the children's theater revolution to Madrid

When she was a child, Pury Estalayo played with her clothespins, imagining they were students and she was their teacher, and she used the kitchen window, flooded with steam, as a blackboard. Perhaps that is why she studied Pedagogy. When he was in college, a course on body expression and theater went through his body. Perhaps for this reason, her future is linked today to childhood as an educator but also as an artist. Something similar happened to Daniel Lovecchio, because his curriculum reveals that he is an educator and that he has a musical background... The day the two met in Madrid (she is from Cantabria and he is from Argentina) a new theatrical concept arose in the capital ( and something else, because today they are married): they created the first drama center for children and youth under the name of Teatro Tyl Tyl.

In Navalcarnero, on a pedestrian street next to the town square, they built a pioneering space 26 years ago -which is a theater but is also much more than that- which was and is a reference. With its light and color, with its moons, suns and stars, with its mermaids and its crazy Mona Lisa with glasses. Although the germ of that goes back years before.

Heirs of that movement for the renewal of pedagogy and art that took shape in the late 70s and early 80s in Madrid, they created the company Tyl Tyl nine years earlier with the idea that through education, art and culture can build a better world. Through it, they promoted a sound theater (linked to music, movement, instruments) that they themselves were creating and discovering every day. In this research work, the need arose to find a space where to continue carrying out this work. The exchange trips they made to Europe (Belgium, France and Italy) were inspiring, because there they were able to see with their eyes that idea of ​​theater that their minds had already imagined. And in 1995 the drama center was born.

A theater that is four in one

She gave birth to several branches, because the obsession was to become something more than just a theater. "Tyl Tyl is a permanent research center, where different professionals (archaeologists, doctors, psycho-pedagogues, biologists...) talk about fundamental issues for the development of children and what art can contribute", explains Estalayo. Also, "it is a production center, where shows aimed at families and educators are created", "an exhibition center, with a stable program for children" and, finally, "a training center, because it works as a school" for boys between the ages of 3 and 18, he adds.

And their figures attest to that work. In these years, they have produced more than 50 shows, have exhibited hundreds of national and international works (also hosting festivals such as Teatralia -which Estalayo directed for six years-, Madrid en Danza or Surge Madrid) that have seen 10,000 spectators each season and have trained more than 100 children each year, in addition to carrying out that extensive research work that is key, they insist, to everything else.

"Tyl Tyl is a place that is alive. Every year we start new things," says Estalayo, excited to think back on the road traveled. "Art for children is considered less important than that of adults and it has always seemed the opposite to us. Care and care at an early age is essential," adds the owner of this space, who proudly recounts some of her old students are part of his team today, including his daughter Nerea. "The best legacy," he says.

Their dedication is such (they direct, act, create, write, teach...) that neither of them imagines a different life. "Working with children as an artist and educator has marked and continues to mark my entire career. It is an engine, a professional mission," Estalayo slides. "I feel crossed by what each child gives me. I give my best in each performance, she adds. "It is an enslaving profession, but it is my vocation," Lovecchio also points out, "fascinated" every time he goes on stage. And They will continue like this even if they comb gray hair, seeking the "integral health of the human being" that is the law in Tyl Tyl.

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