International projects

Flagship international projects:

1. Change – now  2020-2023 founded from European Commission in the frames of Erasmus Plus Strategic Partnerships.

Partners:

– Justus Liebig University Giessen (Germany)

– Conservatoire National Supérieur d’Art (France)

– The Academy of Theatre and Dance (ATD) in Amsterdam// DAS Graduate School (Netherlands)

– The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (United Kingdom)

– The Institute of Performative Arts in Maastricht (Netherlands)

The project consists in establishing an international consortium of EU universities and theatres to develop and introduce innovative solutions in theatre education. We are committed to cooperation between the academic and professional circles, which is why, apart from universities, our partners are prestigious Warsaw theatres. The aim of the project is to develop innovations in education and theatre practices, based on democratic, subjective and team principles, responding to dynamic social transformations and changing working conditions in culture, including those, which will arise due to the pandemic. The assumptions result from the belief that the overlapping crises of the ecosystem, economy, democratic leadership, public sphere, social trust and solidarity, which affect the entire European community with varying intensity, pose specific challenges to culture. Its response must not only consist in minimizing losses, but should constitute a constructive vision of building a new, open and democratic community and regeneration of the public sphere. Culture has significant tools and its creators have competences, which can be activated for this purpose: imagination that allows to develop new models of communication and cooperation, the ability to shape a new language for describing reality and building a situation of real meeting with Others, the ability to combine aesthetic and cognitive experience, critical thinking and affirmation of co-being. However, in order to activate its transformational potential, culture itself must rebuild its own logic of action, verifying the primacy of productivity, competition and individualism for the sake of bolstering cooperation, solidarity, and striving to empower all participants. It is necessary to transform cultural institutions, which are often based on a highly hierarchical power and focused mainly on building their own brand. For many years, progressive and allegedly involved social institutions have unreasonably been subject to the mechanisms of overproduction, which exploited the life forces of creators and employees of institutions, producing an ever-increasing number of events and projects, focused primarily on the success of institutions on the art market, and not on the real social impact or self-development of their participants . This system is likely to break as a consequence of the pandemic and ecological collapse. In line with the selected priorities, the aim of the project is the joint work of an international team of experts – theoreticians and practitioners, creators and students – on the new logic and practices of work in culture, consistent with democratic values and principles of solidarity and open community. We need to transform the language we use to talk about culture and art, change production and participation models, find new ways of bottom-up organization and permanently link them with reformed and socialized public institutions. This process must take into account the radical postulates of an ecological shift in art, which requires the introduction of profound system changes allowing cultural entities to function beyond the logic of competition, unlimited development and continuous use of resources. It is about a new „ecology of culture”, understood as a concern for the entire social and natural environment. This concern for each other and for the environment is based on cooperation and sharing. It will not be possible to do this without appropriate methods of educating young artists, without international and intergenerational cooperation for a democratic and socialized process of artistic education and institutional transformation. Schools and theatre structures operate in a closed system, therefore the change must take place in both areas. Its implementation requires a broad alliance of creators, theoreticians, practitioners, curators and decision makers.

The project is based on the synergy effect: exchange of good practices and mutual learning of partners, each of whom contributes different elements of innovation, developed and tested successfully at home universities and in institutions cooperating with them. Innovation in the educational process is developed in four basic dimensions: 1) a new model of theatre production and institutional transformation, 2) developing a constructive feedback methodology supporting the autonomy and self-development of young artists, 3) counteracting discrimination and strengthening diversity by changing harmful stereotypes and limitations of theatre, and opening the university to people from marginalized or poorly integrated environments, 4) counteracting abuse of power towards students and working on changing social attitudes in this area. Profiling innovation in teaching and practicing theatre opens the project to common democratic values, social and civic commitment. It prevents exclusion and strengthens social integration. It develops key competences necessary to practice care for the common good and build a community of solidarity.

2. Dismissal of the Grecian Envoys

Dismissal of the Grecian Envoys is written by Polish playwright, Jan Kochanowski, and was  performed in English in a translation by Charles Kraszewski. Regarded as the father of Polish verse, Kochanowki’s play was the first tragedy written and performed in Polish and was presented at a wedding in Warsaw in 1579. A simultaneous staging of the play, in the original Polish, took place on the site of that original performance. Readings took place in Warsaw, London, New York, Los Angeles, Madrid and Athens on June 2019.

The Dismissal of the Grecian Envoys was followed by a reading of Kochanowski’s moving Laments, written following the death of his 2 year old daughter, in an English translation by Nobel Prize winner Seamus Heaney and Stanislaw Baranczak. Heaney regarded the Laments as Poland’s equivalent of Shakespeare’s Sonnets.

The project was co-produced by The Adam Mickiewicz Institute.

3. E:utsa

Europe: Union of Theatre Schools and Academies

The Academy is a member of E:utsa (Europe: Union of Theatre Schools and Academies)

E:UTSA is a union and exchange platform of European theatre schools which primarily supports student-led theatre projects and collaborations with the goal of enhancing the educational experience of European theatre students and of creating a students’ network which will enable future professional work. More: https://eutsa.eu/

4. Platform European Theatre Academies

PLETA

The Academy is a member of PLETA – gathering 8 Theatre Academies from 8 different countries, the Platform European Theatre Academies (PLETA) forms a strong “community of practice” aware of the latest evolutions in the sector and aware of the fact that theatre education is in principal aiming at the existing national practice. The partners in PLETA want to explore via co-productions new ways to give young professionals a broader European orientation. PLETA aims to make better use of the high-quality artistic production of the different trends in theatre practice across Europe. PLETA is supported by the Creative Europe program from the European Union. More: http://pleta.eu/

5. World Theatre Education Alliance

WTEA

The Academy is a member of World Theatre Education Alliance (WTEA). ABOUT WTEA

In September 2015, the proposal of establishing the World Theatre Education Alliance was put forward by 5 institutes, including The Central Academy of Drama from China, Shota Rustaveli Theatre and Film Georgian State University, Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Art from Germany, Toho Gakuen College of Drama and Music from Japan, Department of Theatre of Chuang Ang University from Korea, Kyiv National I. K. Karpenko-Kary University of Theatre, Cinema and Television from Ukraine. Thereafter, the proposal was successively seconded by National Academy for Theatre and Film Arts from Bulgaria, Nord University from Norway, Aleksander Zelwerowicz National Academy of Dramatic Art from Poland, Russian State Institute of Performing Arts, Institut del Teatre from Spain, and Guildhall School of Music and Drama from the UK. More: http://web.zhongxi.cn/wteaen/about/