SYMPOSIUM - BETWEEN PRESENCE AND MEANING STRATEGIES OF TEACHING PRACTICAL DRAMATURGY OF CONTEMPORARY PERFORMANCE

February 13th and 14th, 2025

at Na zábradlí theatre, Anenské nám. 209/5, 115 33 Staré Město

organized by KALD, DAMU, The Academy of Performing Arts in Prague
Prague, Czech Republic


What are the available tools for teaching practical dramaturgy in the contemporary performance field, where each event has its own performative logic, lives in a different context, and triggers different kinds of relationships? As teachers of practical dramaturgy, we cannot provide recipes: in devising things “work” or “don't work” depending on the context they are in; each performance provides different unfolding, timing, landscape. If dramaturgy is “unfolding of the performance for the audience” as Behrndt and Turner write in their book ´Dramaturgy and Performance´ (2007) - what are the strategies to teach this unfolding in the classroom? What are the tools, approaches and exercises that students need to encounter in order to be able to develop coherent performances with their own inner system, that are unique almost every time.

Contemporary performance happens between presence and meaning, where the narrative and the sense that can be represented in words is often not the main tool for the encounter with the audience. Here we build dramaturgies that can be described as intensities, presences, energies, processes, gestures, experiences. They are built on full-body knowledge and equally experienced by the audience as such. How can we teach something this complex in the classroom? What is the role of words in these exercises? What are the pedagogical principles? How much can we explain? How do we trigger? What are the questions the dramaturg can ask? What are the strategies of dialogue, and support for processes that they need to possess? How does one teach flow and composition in the classroom?

Dramaturgy is one of the most overused words in contemporary performance theory. It is so fashionable that it has become a word that can replace almost any word in theater vocabulary, like a joker in a deck of cards. But at the same time there is very little written about practical dramaturgy, on how to engineer these “unfoldings of experiences”, aspects that the makers need to be aware of, and what to base dramaturgical decisions on. And we, teachers of dramaturgy, are often lonely in finding ways to provide the students with this knowledge within the classroom setting.

This symposium aims to provide a platform for teachers of practical dramaturgy to exchange good practices, bad experiences and unresolvable problems connected to teaching practical dramaturgy; to talk about specific practical tasks, as well as organisation of individual courses. The sessions will consist of short 10 min max presentations that will provide a basis for discussion. Additionally, the event will facilitate the formation of smaller working groups and roundtable discussions.
The symposium is organized by the KALD department / Prague Performing Arts Academy in collaboration with Residenz Leipzig, Hochschule für Musik und Theater Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Leipzig and DAS Theatre/Amsterdam University of the Arts.

Convener: doc. MgA. Sodja Zupanc-Lotker, Ph.D.

Committee: Thomas Frank, doc. Miguel A. Melgares, Ph.D., Dr. Dag Kemser and MgA. Mgr. Marta Ljubková

Open call for presentations is closed.

REGISTRATION IS NOW CLOSED

There is no fee for the symposium. We cannot provide financial support for participants. Only invitation letters.

PROGRAM 

February 13

9:00      registration, coffee

9:30      opening

Room Eliade

10.00 – 11.45 Teaching Between Ethics & Praxis (host: Miguel Melgares)

S. Adamczak / Going through it with you. How to be a drama daddy?

I. Falke /  Depleted professional language as a base for artistic and pedagogic process

A. Shamsavari / DRAMANETWORK: third-space

C. Schmutz / Interplaying Between Discourse, Nature and Shared Understanding

Discussion

 

11.45 – 12.00 coffee break

 

Room Eliade

12.00 – 13.45 Expectations (host: Dag Kemser)

K. Boros / Theatrology and dramaturgy – theatrology or dramaturgy?

M. Hriešik / Dance Hacks or Teaching About Dance Dramaturgy

H. Slättne / Teaching Production Dramaturgy: Analytical Tools for the Rehearsal Room

H. Sulima / Teaching to Transgress

Discussion

 

Room Attic

12.00 – 13.45 Dramaturgy in Scenography (host: Sodja Lotker)

C. Lindgren / Listen to the costume, let the performance unfold!

M. Trübenbach / Unfolding Material Dramaturgy:  Sensory Approaches in the Education of Architecture and Contemporary Performance

A. Trümper / Practicing scenography beyond the theatre building - Expanded contexts of artistic research practices and their challenges

Discussion

 

13.45 – 15.00 lunch break

 

Room Eliade

15.00 - 16.45 Sharing Good Practice (host: Sodja Lotker)

Á. Szabó-Székely / Finding a place - Launching a new dramaturgy programme at the University of Pécs, Hungary

M. Turošík / Searching for dramaturgy of the body at a physical theatre school

I. Gańczarczyk / How do we tell others about dramaturgy?

F. Klüsener / Dramaturgies of Rag-Picking

 

Room Attic

15.00 - 16.45 Dramaturgy in Dance and Movement (host: Thomas Frank)         

P. Hulkko & E. Kirkkopelto / How do We Teach Corporeal Dramaturgy for Actors in Contemporary Performance?

Y. Vasilev / Dramaturgy as an embodied and collective practice

E. Vavříková / Musical Dramaturgy of Movement: Integration of Rhythm and Structure in Physical Theatre

R. Vomvolou / Teaching Dance Dramaturgy: Concrete Tools for a Fluid Practice”

Discussion

 

Foyer

17.00 – 17:15 Book Launch of Otakar Zich's book Aesthetics of the Dramatic Art: Theoretical Dramaturgy (1931) with editors of the English translation (2024) David Drozd and Pavel Drábek

 

February 14

9:00      registration, coffee

 

Room Elide

10.00 – 11.45  Teaching Between Theory & Praxis (host: Miguel Melgares)

C. Eeg-Tverbakk / Theatre – ting, a dramaturgy of assemblage

K. Georgelou / Teaching dramaturgy transversally, for dramaturges and artists

E. LeQuesne / Teaching Dramaturgical Thinking with The Mosaic Scale System

J. Malinarić / Classroom as a work of art - playing with digital tools

Discussion

 

Room Attic

10.00 – 11.45  Sharing Good Practice (host: Thomas Frank)

K. Trencsényi / Curating and Dramaturgy as Artistic Research

P. Dobrowolski / Performance Writing vs. Writing for Performance: The Need for Feedback, Evaluation and Practical Support

M. Pesti / Making Physical Performance in an International MA Programme

C. Poos / Teaching Dramaturgy for Collaboration: A Case Study from HKU Theatre

Discussion

 

11.45 – 12.00 coffee break

 

Room Eliade

12.00 – 13.45  Dramaturgy and its Material in the Class (host: Synne Behrndt)

Š. Peták / To Throw, To Offer, To Invent, To Steal?

J. Refsdal Moe / Dramaturgy as withdrawal and desire

P. M. Boenisch / Dealing with Diversity: Teaching Dramaturgy for and in a plural society

B. Puigdefabregas / The need to put down roots for weaving dramaturgy

Discussion

Room Attic

12.00 – 13.45  Classroom as a Playground (host: Marta Ljubková)

J. Poon / From Personal experience to Shared Art Experience

L. Thomas / If Plays are Small Planets, then Student Dramaturgs are Mars Rovers

I. Ubben / Working from where we are: Instant co-creating and dramaturgy with teenagers in the class of cultural labor

L. Ríos / Ideokinetica:  a somatic approach to dramaturgy

Discussion

 

13.45 – 15.00 lunch break

 

Room Eliade

15.00 – 16.45  Role of a Teacher (host: Dag Kemser)

R. Allen / Grid Pedagogies: Teaching dramaturgy through student agency and choice

J. Balodis / Here is…

M. Kilpi / Conceptualizing Dramaturgy -What Is Your Vocabulary?

D. Radosavljević / Authority and vulnerability – a pedagogical tightrope

Discussion

Room Attic

15.00 – 16.45  Dramaturgy as Methodology (Host: Marta Ljubková)

S. Vanhoof / Embodied Cripabilities: Advancing Othered Epistemologies Through Dramaturgy

M. Thygesen, K. Trencsényi, N. Müller-Schöll / Comparative Dramaturgy as a way of teaching contemporary practices

S. Wenner / Field trips. Searching for a dramaturgy of teaching against nature

F. Thielmann & P. Schulte / Reflecting Productive Agencies As Dramaturgical Work

Discussion

 

16.45 – 17.00 coffee break

 

Room Eliade

17.00 – 17.30 Conclusion (Host: Sodja Lotker)

3. února 2025