Newsletter October 2017 is published. Link to full version here.
The newsletter contains:
- Main experiment with the Danish School of Performing Arts
- Come to the open lab on the experiment
- Since last
- New administrator in full swing
- New office hours
- Intern
- ACT in the house – artist talk
- GAGA weekend
- Upcoming activities
- Open laboratory – The scenographic actor
- Platform dates
- Nadine George workshop 2018
- Should you be a member?
- Current membership attempts
- Fair Phone
- The meeting of poetic narrative and expressionist physical theatre
- Shakespeare in two languages
- Imprints after the body in motion – a study
- Story Play
- Special for members
- Use the network!
- Training
- Renewal of membership
- Date for this year’s Christmas party
Main experiment with the Danish School of Performing Arts
The third part of the main experiment “THE ACTOR AND THE OVER-MARION” – entitled ‘The Scenographic Actor’ – takes place just after the autumn holidays. It is a collaborative project between the Danish School of Performing Arts and Forsøgsstationen and is an investigation of external technique as a pathway to a new method for the creative processes of the actor, puppeteer and set designer.
“Through concrete physical obstacles, we explore how external constraints can free and open up new possibilities for the actor’s work and expression. This is done, among other things, by changing the actor’s weight, posture and balance through the set designer’s costumes and by looking at the actor as if he/she were the puppeteer’s puppet, being modelled and sculpted.”
Extract from the trial website
The experiment is led by Charlotte Munksø from DDSKS Copenhagen and Øyvind Kirchhoff from the Experiment Station. The experimental team of 12 people also includes 5 third-year students from DDSKS Copenhagen, professional puppeteers/actors and scenographer/docemaker Rolf Søborg.
Teateravisen recently covered the project. Read the article in Teateravisen here.
Come to the open laboratory on Friday 27 October
We would like to invite those interested to come and have a look on the last day of the experiment – Friday 27 October, 4-6pm – when we will ‘open the workshop’ and let an audience in on our investigation of the ‘scenographic actor’. There will be no direct mediation but you will get a unique look into an artistic research process. Registration necessary with Rikke at rikke@forsoegsstationen.dk – limited number of places – first come first served.
SIDEN SIDST…
Our new administrator is in full swing!
As some of you already know, we have hired Dorte Wium as our new administrator as of 1 October. Dorte is both production manager and administrator with experience from among others. TeaterKunst, Republique, Spring festival and many other theatres large and small. Dorte has training in both project management, engineering and finance and a large network within the performing arts industry. Dorte is already in full swing – and getting to know the whole house.
Dorte can be contacted via dorte@forsoegsstationen.dk (she also manages mail@forsoegsstationen.dk) or on our main number 38 79 38 28 and is in the office Monday-Thursday.
Office opening hours
We have updated the opening hours of the office in connection with Dortes’ arrival. The office is open for personal and telephone enquiries Monday to Friday 9-13. You can leave a message on the phone outside office hours or send an email.
Student trainee
And we have the pleasure of having Anna Margrét Ásbjarnardóttir as a trainee for the next few months. Anna Margrét is studying Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Copenhagen. She comes from Iceland, has a bachelor in anthropology from Háskóli Íslands (University of Iceland) and a diploma in modern dance from Listdansskóli Íslands (The National Ballet School of Iceland). She has been involved in various productions in Iceland and is particularly interested in the interplay between culture, tradition and the performing arts.
Anna Margrét will be associated with the main experiment under the leadership of Øyvind Kirchhoff and will also follow one or more of the other experiments in the house.
Artist talk by director George Mungai, Kenya.
On Friday October 6th we had an artist talk with George Mungai who talked about his next project in Denmark which includes both a play and a documentary about Karen Blixen from a Kenyan perspective. It was exciting to get an insight into the research around the project which uncovered new connections in a Nordic context – and interesting to hear about how Mungai realised that Karen Blixen’s ‘legacy’ still lives in the Kenyan narrative as ‘the good one’ …
Mungai is in Denmark in connection with the staging of Ibsen’s “Enemy of the People” – which ACT (Afro Cosmopolitan Thespians), is staging at Baltoppen in October. The setup team is currently working here at the Experimental Station.
GAGA & Research
On weekends 7. – On 8 October we had the first GAGA weekend – it was a sweaty affair! It will be repeated in January. Remember that from now on there will be GAGA with Siri Wolthoorn every Thursday (except during the autumn holidays). There is no need to register and non-members can join for 50 DKK (to be paid to the office).
Read more about Siri and GAGA here.
Upcoming activities
Open laboratory – The scenographic actor
As mentioned, there is already the opportunity to take a look at the artistic workshop on Friday after the autumn holidays when the main experiment opens its doors on Friday 27 October at 16-18 – register with Rikke at rikke@forsoegsstationen.dk – limited number of places – first come first served…
Dates for Platforms in season 17/18
This season we have two platform events where the season’s trials exchange newly acquired insights with each other and other particularly interested parties. Mark your calendars now for Friday 15 December 2017 and Friday 15 June 2018.
Nadine George workshop 2018
We have now secured this year’s workshop with internationally renowned voice teacher Nadine George – and it will take place just after Pentecost on Tuesday 22 May to Sunday 27 May 2018.
This year it costs 3.600 DKK to participate. There is a great demand for places and the advertising to members means that it is already almost fully booked. Registration by email to rikke@forsoegsstationen.dk
IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE…
…about Nadine George’s work and its significance, we recommend reading the 2013 publication “Growing Voices”, edited by Professor Ros Steen, Director of the Centre for Voice in Performance, Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. And if you are a member, you can get to know her technique at the weekly voice training where Angelina Watson teaches the technique.
More information about the workshop will be available as we get closer – where you will also be able to register as an audience member for the open audition on 27 May.
Are you considering becoming a member?
Who can become a member?
All professional performing artists, dramaturges and theatre scientists, graduates or trainees, can become members of the Experimental Station.
From October onwards, membership costs DKK 125 per month and is paid for a whole season at a time. This means that the price in October is: 1.125 kr, November 1.000 kr, December 875 etc.
If you live outside Copenhagen it is cheaper to become a member – it costs only 350 DKK for the season.
Friends of the Research Station
If you just want to support the activities of the experimental station – you can sign up as a SUPPORT MEMBER for only 200 DKK per season – and you will be invited to our wonderful Christmas party!
Become a member of Forsøgsstationen or renew your membership for the 17/18 season by filling in this form and sending it to mail(at)forsoegsstationen.dk. If you have not been a member before, please include a short CV. Payment information will be sent to you after approval.
Current membership attempts
It is always possible to read about ongoing or previous trials on the website, where you can also download trial reports and read the trial intention reports – the trial team’s presentation of the trial itself. Members can apply for time and sparring on trials – see how here. It’s not always possible to get views into the newsletter, so keep an eye on our facebook page and the website if you are particularly interested in experiencing the artistic research processes up close…
The Dadaist experiment Cigar Bums Næse – a musical paper theatre experiment – under the direction of Anette Asp – became the artistic starting point for the development of a performance entitled Gashjertet which has just received production funding from the Danish Arts Council. We congratulate and look forward to seeing the work.
Another experiment that is very topical is Birth/Breath, a member experiment from the last season of OTHERNESSPROJECT led by Rita Sebestyen. They are playing the show IF at Bådteatret this week – a show that is derived from their trials here.
Membership attempts in the calendar…
OCTOBER
** Fair Phone
Through a sensory unfolding of a smartphone, it is investigated whether it is possible to create a sense of the object as a concrete starting point, a landscape that can perhaps be used to find our footing and direction when we have to navigate in cyberspace on a daily basis. The experiment is led by Tora Balslev and runs from October to December 2017.
Read more about the trial here.
** The meeting between poetic narrative and expressionist physical theatre
In August 2017, the Olske Orkester began a three-year research project at the Forsøgsstationen to investigate and develop a theatrical idiom based on a combination of poetic narrative and expressionist physical theatre.
The research project is a further development of the formal language created by the Olske Orkester with the award-winning and much-performed performance “When We Went Away” and forms the artistic basis for the theatre’s upcoming major venture, the trilogy “A Nation’s Self-Hatred – Denmark Between Shame and Self-Evaluation” consisting of the performances “Sugar”, “Salt” and “Who’s Knocking?”
The research project works on a weekly basis and involves a company of 6 actors/dancers and a director. Follow the experiment here.
** An experiment with Shakespeare in two languages
This season, Rikke Liljenberg has chosen to intensify and focus her Sunday labs with Shakespeare in the form of an experiment – and has already recruited experimental participants for this work. The focus of the experiment will be to see if there is anything to be gained by working with the original English text first, and then working with the same text in Danish translation (or other language if Danish is not your mother tongue.) Can working with the text in the two languages inspire and open up new possibilities in terms of. character, interpretation and ownership? Or is it an unnecessary, and perhaps confusing, detour?
There has been a great interest in participating (there is now no room for more). If you are particularly interested in this work, we encourage you to join the facebook group ‘Forsøgsstationen – intern’ where there will be news about screenings etc.
Read more about the experiment here – or read about the recurring open Sunday Labs here.
** MAIN EXAM – The scenographic actor
Also mentioned at the beginning of the newsletter – Read more about the trial here.
The experiment is part of a three-part study led by Øyvind Kirchhoff entitled “The Actor and the Über-Marionette”. The first part was conducted in autumn 2015 and the second part, entitled “The Aesthetics of Death” was held in October 2016, as a 5-day development project and an open knowledge sharing seminar. The report on the second part is available here.
NOVEMBER
** Imprints after the body in motion – a study
The intention is to investigate the graphic language that the autonomous body creates in its encounter with paper. The hypothesis is that the emerging individual compositions together create a graphic expression in which movement and body are recognized. It is also an examination and documentation of the body surface with hair, pores and folds. To let the prints speak separately in detail/texture and together in form/composition. The trial takes place in week 47.
The experimental team consists of Katrine Stewart, illustrator and graphic designer (leader of the experiment), Tora Balslev, dancer and physical performer and Mireia Serra, dancer and psychomotor therapist.
Read more about the trial here.
** Third Story Play attempt
The Danish Arts Foundation has given support to the Narrative Theatre’s 3rd Story Play experiment at Forsøgsstationen. The experiment will continue to investigate whether the Story Play model is a meaningful starting point for developing stories with artistic potential in groups of children, young people, adults and older people. See documentation of 2 previous trials here.
In the 3rd experiment we will exchange and develop our own stories and explore the artistic qualities of sharing simple stories outside the rehearsal room, in the public space. If we rehearse a story, where will it unfold? The trial will take place over three periods, the first of which will run from 28 to 30 November. The last two periods are in week 5 and week 8, 2018.
We are working to gather participants and there is still an opportunity to join the trial. Read more about the trial and participation criteria here.
Special for members
Use the network!
We would like to encourage members to use this unique network (which many already do – not least via the facebook group “Forsøgsstationen intern”) – both in the form of invitations to screenings of experiments or rehearsals, but of course also when it is time to play a performance.
We have just received an offer from our member Jonas Littauer, from the Dramatic Starting Point – who is currently performing The Cocka Hola Company – they would like to invite members to the theatre for free. Here is their invitation.
And then Andreas Dawe has a revival of the success Lampedusa – where he would love to have a test audience! It is about Friday the 17 November at 20 and Saturday 18 November at 12 noon. Please keep an eye on the Facebook group “Forsøgsstationen – intern” for any changes.
Training offers and workshops
We are now well into the season and we have again after the autumn holidays delicious training, almost every day:Dance Monday evening (with Stands&Dans), the popular voice training by Angelina Watson Wednesday at 9-10:45, GAGA Thursday morning 9-10:30 AND from 27 October Øyvind Kirchhoff is back with mask work Friday at 9-10:30.
The first MHS training will be on Sunday 29 October from 10-14.
In short, the training offer for the 17/18 season looks like this:
Monday 18 & 19:30 – Modern Dance (Stands&Dans)**
Wednesday 9-11: Voice training* (REMEMBER TO REGISTER)
Thursday 9-10:30: Gaga***
Friday 9-10:30: Mask work***
*) Registration required by 21:00 the evening before by SMS to 20150949.
**) Also read more about the teams on their website here. Members can attend for free.
***) Masquerade on Fridays from 9-10:30am begins October 27, and Gaga on Thursdays from 9-10:30am (minus fall break, week 42).
Christmas lunch at the research station
The date for this year’s or (is it Year’s?!) Christmas party is now set.
It will be on Saturday 9 December at 17-02
…and you are welcome to start cooking (let your creativity sizzle and bubble) – to be able to serve up delicacies for the palate and for the eyes and ears – as always, we would like to have cheerful features along the way – and very much like to try local dishes from near and far…
There will be a proper invitation later – but I think you should be able to tick the box now…
Membership renewal?
If you have not renewed your membership for the 17/18 season, you can do so by filling in this form and sending it to mail(at)forsoegsstationen.dk.
If you have not been a member before, please include a short CV. Payment information will be sent to you after approval.
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