Árpád Schilling (b. 1974) is a theater director and artistic director of Krétakör. He began staging plays at the age of 19, and in 1995 he began his directing studies at the University of Theatre and Film Arts in Budapest as well as established the Krétakör Theater. Schilling studied at the university and was the leader of Krétakör simultaniously; in 1998-2000 Schilling was invited by Gábor Zsámbéki to be a guest director at the world-famous Katona József Theater. In 1999, he staged Chekhov’s Platonov with students of the National Theater in Strasbourg, performing at the European Theater Union Festival. That same year, he won the prize of the Hungarian Theater Critics for Promising Newcomer for staging Istvan Tasnádi’s Public Enemy at the Katona József Theater. After declining several offers to join institutional theaters, together with cultural manager Máté Gáspár he turned Krétakör Theater into a permanent theater collective.