Accademia Dell’Arte Newsletter Fall 2013
Tuscany Italy
Fall Semester 2013
This semester we welcome 40 new Theatre and Music students. Fall 2013 also brings more excitement with a new MFA cohort just beginning and the previous cohort finishing in Malovice, CZ. We are looking forward to sharing many concerts, showings, cabarets and other events together. To keep up with the current news at the ADA including weekly posts from current students, make sure to visit our ADA Life Blog and Facebook Page. You can also catch a sneak peak of the first two weeks on our YouTube channel.
* Announcing New Design Track
spring 2014 theatre design track
Sabine Fichter and Kali Quinn on USA Tour
one cohort tours CZ while another just begins
catch up with our Alumni all over the world
* Summer 2013 Highlights
summer arts program, crisisart and Dario Fo
* New Faces at the Accademia
meet the newest members of the ADA family
* Inside Tuscany
the 2013 donor's Tuscany excursion
* Support the Accademia
donate to the ADA or join the Amici dell'Arte
New Cohort Begins While Previous Cohort Tours The Czech Republic
The 2013 – 2015 MFA in Physical Theatre Candidates
The Accademia dell'Arte is happy to introduce the new MFA in Physical Theatre Candidates. This cohort of 14 students began Orientation on September 2nd followed by a large welcome buffet at La Stalla. Students from the two previous cohorts as well as Accademia faculty and staff welcomed them. They have already begun classes in Voice, Acting and Movement and performed their first Autocorso that was devised in pairs.
The 2011 – 2013 MFA Candidates are currently working with Continuo Theatre in Malovice, CZ to create their final performance. At the end of October, they will take this performance on a short tour throughout the Czech Republic. MFA candidate Francesca Chilcote had this to say about their experience so far:
"The semester in Malovice serves as a capstone for our time in the MFA. The company is open and generous professionally and socially, and the Plum Yard, their home, is a beautiful plot of land in a rural region outside Prague. By living and training in residency, I am gaining experience in a a true ensemble creation within the practicalities of a professional physical theatre company before graduating into that professional world myself. Their method of creation takes advantage of our previous training and pushes our skills to the extreme, calling any and all individual and ensemble skills and interests bring to the devising room. Moreover, they challenge that we bring these technical skills to the next level, demanding material that is original, truthful and meaningful."
MFA Students in Berlin with Familie Flöz
The 2011 – 2013 MFA Cohort had the pleasure of working with Familie Flöz in Berlin for their final summer session. The students spent 6 weeks with the company learning their aesthetic through workshops in mask making, movement, voice and improvisation. To see more about the creative process of Familie Flöz through the eyes of the MFA students, visit their blog.
Learn more about the MFA Program
Highlights From Summer At The Accademia
Summer Arts Program
In collaboration with University of Rochester, this year's Summer Arts Program offered courses in Intermediate Italian, Commedia dell'Arte and Leather Mask Making. All of the students left the program with a new understanding of themselves and their art.
The 2014 Summer Arts Program. "Place and Perspective", will be offered in partnership with Hendrix College. Students will have the opportunity to take two of the following courses: Commedia dell'Arte, Leather Mask Making, Painting, Documentary Film and Creative Writing. All students will have access to a little of every course through cross-discipline exchange. Learn more about the 2014 Summer Arts Program.
CrisisART Festival
The third annual CrisisART Festival was a beautiful meeting of artists, activists and scholars from all over the world. This year participants came from the USA, Australia, South Africa, Italy, Greece, Ireland, Scotland, Burma, Argentina and Brazil. The Collective has again grown and is already planning for next year. To see how you can get involved or to spread the word see the CrisisART Festival website or the CrisisART Facebook Page .
The Dario Fo Project
Artists from all over the world gathered at the Villa Godiola in partnership with the Teatro Scuola Paolo Grassi in Milan to work intensively on the plays of Dario Fo and Franca Rame. Along with master teacher Michele Bottini, students had the rare opportunity to exchange experience and information with the students from the Scuola Paolo Grassi. Francesca Chilcote, MFA in Physical Theatre Candidate, tells us about her experience:
"The Fo Project gave international students the unique opportunity to discover the solo work of Dario Fo in his home country, with his collaborators that carry the ancestry of his history and technique.
While many English practitioners often misuse or misinterpret Fo's texts, particularly the incredibly dense and demanding material of Mistero Buffo, this workshop raises bothmind and body to the task of performing them. Professor Michele Bottini situates the work in the ancient tradition of the guilliare, or medieval gesture,
demonstrating Fo's social-political intents, all while building a physical and vocal technique to support the articulation of these ideas. The students this program attracts crosses all boundaries of age and experience, connecting me with students and professionals from all over America who share the passion for Fo's theatre and, lacking a better word, his politics. However, it is partnership with the actors of the Paolo Grassi School of Milan that distinguishes this program from other study abroad experience: I will be forever grateful for the chance to meet these young Italian performers who generously shared their expertise acquired on tour with Fo's work."
Next year Dario Fo will première a new play: La storia di Qu
In partnership with the Teatro Scuola Paolo Grassi in Milan, the Accademia dell'Arte will première a new play by Nobel Laureate Dario Fo in Arezzo July, 2014. The play is liberally inspired by the best selling novel "Q" by Luther Blissett, the nom de plume of four Italian authors who now write under the name of Wu Ming. Dario Fo and Franca Rame have recast the setting from 16th Century Europe during the Protestant Reformation to revolutionary China. The play will be directed by Massimo Navone (Director of the Paolo Grassi School) with the lead role played by Michele Bottini (Artistic Director of the Accademia dell'Arte). Third year students from the Paolo Grassi School and selected students from the Accademia dell'Arte will make up the rest of the cast. In addition, students from the Accademia di Brera in Milan will be designing sets and costumes. Dario Fo has already begun his collaboration with Massimo Navone who tells us that we can expect a performance that will include music, acrobatics, juggling and much more. The show is expected to play July 1-3 in Arezzo with a tour planed for the remainder of July, 2014.
Learn more about The "Q" Project.
View Photos and Video from our student performances and in-class work on the Accademia Facebook page.
Announcing New Design Track Spring 2014
The Accademia dell'Arte will collaborate with faculty from Coastal Carolina University, Boston University and Utah State University to provide a study abroad experience for Theatre Design Students in Spring 2014. These students will have the opportunity to take the usual physical theatre courses – commedia dell'arte, movement, voice, etc. – but will also take lighting, costume and stage design courses. Learn more about the Spring 2014 Design Track.
