Character and Clowns: A playful exploration of embodied empathy
The Approach
Dive into the richness of human personalities through movement-based theatre and play!
Enter into the different orientations to life expressed through the body!
The body is the first space of knowledge and sensitivity of the human being. Thoughts, feelings and emotions are embodied in postures and gestures and they in-form the dynamics of the body moving in space.
Through the body we can arrive at what we think and feel. And through character and clown, rooted as they are in the body, we can access an infinite source of discovery and insight into the human condition.
The word character is a Greek term meaning engraved, sculpted. A character manifests itself through actions (drama) in space. The first action is the posture: the way the body exists in space, stands, walks or shakes a hand. Every character is a form of contact with the world and with the self, it is the manifestation of the inner life of the person in the here and now.
What psychology studies as personality or psychopathology, theatre plays as character. And Theatre came before Psychology! In the ancient Greek and Roman theatre all actors used a mask. The Latin word for the theatrical mask is …persona!
The substance of this workshop emerges at the fertile edge between Physical Theatre, Gestalt Therapy and Character Analysis.
The Program
After developing awareness of the infinite possibilities of creating characters through the body and the analysis of movements, participants will explore their individual Clown. No body is neutral – every body carries profoundly expressive themes, embodied in everyday movements.
There is a web of patterns and physical and emotional "background sounds" within each person's movement and physical presence. If observed through the reference of Analysis of Movement, this web appears like paintings/markings on a white sheet. They are “dramatic” in the etymological sense. They contain a drama: an action, an "individual physical drama". If treated with the Red Nose this physical persona becomes a unique source of comedy.
The discovery of the Clown emerges from the analysis of the physical and emotional world of each person, as revealed by her or his natural body. The use of the smallest mask in the world, the Red Nose, and the amplification and articulation of personal themes allow the actor to enter the Clown State. The clown emerges from a state of playing where the poet has access to this key question: what is so funny about myself? To discover one’s own clown is to reveal one’s own unique comic persona and turn it into a universal comic form.
In Essence
In this highly experiential and experimental workshop of awareness through play, participants will explore different movement patterns that will lead to different types of embodied characters. Each one of them can be played with fun and awareness and reveal their unique wisdom, providing precious insights in the process of exploration, amplification and integration of the amazing theatre of our Psyche.
Who is this workshop for?
Psychodrama trainees and practitioners, therapists, playback theatre practitioners, and other creative human beings with a commitment to an enriched life.
A fierce and playful curiosity about human folly and beauty is required!
Workshop Presenter
Giovanni Fusetti is an Italian multi-disciplinary fool. Natural Scientist, Theatre Artist, Pedagogue, Gestalt Therapist and Permaculture Designer, he works internationally as a teacher, director and process facilitator, exploring theatre as a tool for artistic training, education, healing, personal awareness and political awakening. Trained in agriculture and ecology at the University of Padova, he became passionate about the social and educational use of theatre. Street theatre, puppets, storytelling, clown and political theatre, led him to the Ecole International de Theatre Jacques Lecoq in Paris, where he was a student, pedagogic assistant and then teacher of improvisation. He has been the pedagogical director of KIKLOS school in Padova and he is the founding – pedagogic director of HELIKOS, International School of Theatre Creation, which he founded in Florence in 2009 and now operates in Padova, Italy.
As a pedagogue, he runs trainings and lectures internationally, and has collaborated with theatre companies, theatre schools and universities, including Pig Iron Theatre Company (USA), LISPA-London International School of Performing Arts, Dell'Arte School of Physical Theatre (USA), Accademia Teatrale Veneta, Venice, The University of London, Naropa University (USA), Stockholm Uniarts.
His 25 years of pedagogical research include studies and trainings in Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed, Gestalt Therapy, Reichien analysis and Process Oriented Psychology. In his pedagogy, he integrates physical theatre with different practices of physical and emotional awareness, for the training of the actor/poet/creator, on the path reconnecting theatre to its origin: ecstasy. For more information please visit www.helikos.com