| Contra/dictions |
|
Workshop led by Matej Matejka Fri-Sun 11–13 April 2014, 11:30am–3:30pm Na Grobli Studio Contact and application Please send your completed application form to Izabela M³ynarz at iza@grotowski-institute.art.pl by 1 April 2014. The number of places is limited. Applicants will be accepted on a first-come-first-serve basis. Workshop will be conducted in Polish and English. In this work session, we will explore the territory of “contradictions” as a source of research for the performer. Contradictions are not a limitation, but rather, by focusing simultaneously on opposite ideas, they open doorways for the inner, primal sources of the body to flow. The world exists as a dynamic fusion of contradictions in which the performer is able to discover a path to his total essence. Through a laboratory model that seeks to break the borders between dance, theatre and movement techniques, we aim to unlock the potentialities for beginnings, where action is born. This is an invitation to delve into the rigorous and experimental workspace that defines Studio Matejka. The workshop is targeted towards practitioners with an interest and experience in theatre or dance. It is open both for professional actors and dancers. This challenge requires serious focus and precision from all engaged in the work. It is open to those who are willing to explore less common fields of physical expression. The aim is not to create bodies that are plastic devices in service to the storytelling of theatre, but on the contrary, to instill a practice that keeps the physical body a well-cleaned instrument, capable of complex subtle expression. By engaging the entire body-mind, the body becomes a luminous reflection of the inner thoughts and the channel for the self. Matej Matejka Conditions for Work
Studio Matejka began its activities in 2010 as a physical theatre laboratory exploring 21st-century performance techniques that specifically work across borders: Borders between performance genres, borders between training techniques, and borders between individual expression and collective resonance. Through practical investigation, the performers work to develop the strength, agility and dexterity to physically “speak” through a diverse range of ideas, images and vocabularies.
Matej Matejka is the founder and leader of Studio Matejka. He studied acting at the State Conservatory in Bratislava, Slovakia, later at JAMU University, Brno, Czech Republic. In 2001–2006 he was an actor of the theatre studio Farm in the Cave, Prague, and co-creator of performances Dark Love Sonnets and multi-awarded Sclavi/The Song of an Emigrant (Total Theatre Award, Fringe First, Herald Angel). Since 2005 he has been a collaborator of the Grotowski Institute, where he is engaged in the research of physical expression in the theatre. He is an actor with Teatr ZAR and co-creator of Anhelli: The Calling and Caesarean Section: Essays on Suicide, awarded with the Herald Angel and Total Theatre Awards in Edinburgh in 2012. Since 2010 Matej has been the leader of Studio Matejka, an ensemble that works under the auspices of the Grotowski Institute and takes part in the BodyConstitution research programme.
He directed the short films Life While You Wait, Twenty Second Street, Juste comme ça, The Desire, The Mess, Conflicts of Apathy and Pearadise, which won Best Foreign Film at Los Angeles International Underground Film Festival. With Studio Matejka he directed: Awkward Happiness or Everything I Don’t Remember About Meeting You, The Echoes off the Walls Underground Are Louder Than Your Footsteps Above Me, Woman Decomposed and Charmolypi. He has led workshops in theatres and universities all around the globe (UNEARTE, Venezuela; CalArts, California, USA; NSD, New Delhi, India; DS Delos of Dimitra Hatoupi, Athens, Greece; University of Salford, UK; Double Edge Theatre, USA; Charles Working Theatre, Boston, USA; Au Brana, France; Lebanon, etc.). In his work he searches for the performer’s “essence of communication” where both dance and drama are equal vehicles for the actor’s expression. As part of BodyConstitution, practical seminar
|