THE PEDAGOGY
Neutral Masks by Donato Sartori
The Journey of Initiation of the ACTOR-CREATOR
Theatre is PLAY. Imitation, transposition and re-invention of the world. It’s a very ancient human expression, based on the fun of playing, the awareness of the dynamics of life, the urgency of storytelling and the rigor of technique.
It’s a space and time where life is represented, celebrated and transformed -through the body. This is a process that requires observation and curiosity in front of the mystery and wonder of life in movement. The Actor-Creator is a poet who enters the journey of discovering the world and manifests the world’s beauty, through poetical forms. She is the poet of ecstasy. His body is the body of the world.
This pedagogy is, and will be, a constantly evolving process. It’s an alchemy in which I distill the best of my findings. The latest version is always the most updated. There are a few fundamental sources that have nourished and inspired my pedagogic practice: the Theatre Pedagogy of Jacques Lecoq, Gestalt-therapy, Western Bioenergetics (Wilhelm Reich), Taoism (Wutao), the practice on the state of playing (le jeu) as an Non-Ordinary State of Consciousness, Breathwork, Process Work (Process Oriented Psychology), as well as Theatre of the Oppressed by Augusto Boal, and in general the use of theater in communities, education and political action.
The integration of different practices has lead to the creation and development of a pedagogy with multiple branches.
PEDAGOGY OF MOVEMENT
The BODY is the first space of knowledge and sensitivity of the human being, the foundation of the artistic experience and the theatrical language. The experience and study of the body moving in space leads to the progressive discovery of the principles of movement and of artistic creation. Nature, in the sense of “the movement of life” is our master.
Kiklos School, 2002
PEDAGOGY OF PLAY
Before being Homo sapiens, we are Homo ludens. Playing is knowing. Play (le jeu) exists when the rigor of technique joins with the pleasure of the artist. The “playing” actor represents and reinvents the world, revealing its poetic richness, in an ecstatic process. A poet through gestures, the actor-player works with rigorous fun and disciplined folly. The beginner’s mind of the player walks on a path of joy.
Helikos School, 2012
PEDAGOGY OF CREATION: pedagogia dell’arte
The Player is the Creator of her/his own work. The aim of a pedagogic process is to train creators capable of developing their own artistic voice in an autonomous way (arte). It’s a work that inspires not only theater artists, but any person who is interested in creating her/his own life journey. Pedagogy is a space of research and practice, where the world is recreated every day, and the pleasure of learning and teaching provokes the learners to develop their own unique poetic identity and theatrical folly. Both the teachers and the students are servants of the creative process.
Kiklos School, 2000
PEDAGOGY OF STATES
Play is a particular state of consciousness and each theatrical genre flows from a specific state. The ability to reach this state in order to play and to create from it, is the essence of the shapeshifting vitality of the actor. Each form, each character, each mask, each movement, each story, is the threshold into a non-ordinary state of consciousness. To play is to participate in an enhanced state of vitality, to be aware of connections and to constantly re-act to movement. Play is ecology in motion.
Helikos School, 2013
PEDAGOGY OF INITIATION
The actor, as poet, player and creator, is a shapeshifter, as well as a stateshifter, journeying in the footsteps of ancestral shamans and working every day to refine and develop her perception of reality, and to train his expressive skills. For this purpose, several pedagogical tools are creatively integrated within a unique “alchemical pot”.
In the journey of the discovery of the world, the artist encounters herself in a new state of self-awareness and transforms his inner world into a conscious instrument for poetry. She needs to face his own powers and her own wounds, often merged in a mysterious alchemy of awareness. The pedagogic purpose is not only to train theater artists, but to accompany them towards a wider state of consciousness, and further levels of awareness, in order to work consciously with personal powers: emotions, life experiences, visions, dreams, wounds and desires. In the journey through theater genres the actor-creator discovers how each genre appeals to different dynamics of the individual and of society, and therefore has unique and peculiar powers and potentials.
A reproduction of a petroglyph (rock drawings) of Val Camonica, Italy, dating 2.000 BC,
representing what is believed to be a chorus of women dancing in a ritual.
When theater looses its body, it looses its soul.
Jacques Lecoq (1921-1999)
Nature is full of genius.
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
Poor is the pupil who does not surpass his master.
Leonardo Da Vinci (1452 -1519)
Giovanni Fusetti 