Supporting Images

Points to Make For My Oral Exam (With the Help of Leyla)

1. Did not know much about theatre before - the only time I was on stage was for a band concert or when I played narrator in Elementary School
2. Had the most difficulty with sharing my ideas and revealing/exposing who I am
3. Broke the barrier by being encouraged and hearing others' ideas as well, learning more about practitioners and realizing I may be able to really develop with mine
4. I learned from the process of using stimuli and devising that
   - theatre can be as simple or as complicated as you want it to be, as long as you have a clear message
   - stage elements take a lot of work
   - practioners' theories can be of great use
5. Grown in developing my ideas and thinking more outside the box
   - I'm more creative than I thought and am having less of a difficult time creating a message
6. A message I find in a lot of my pieces: It's okay to be different and there's no need to hide.
7. Themes I find in (almost) all of my pieces: acceptance, difference, vibrance

Images:

- a blank canvas (I have so many ideas to paint)

- trombone (another passion of mine that is stressful at times, but gives me the sense of release: COMPARISON)

- thinking outside the box

- a nice necklace with different beads (all these different people make a beautiful product)

- something simple looking on the outside, but complicated on the inside

THEATRE IN PERFORMANCE:

• Acting
  - Brecht
  - Disney
  - The Empty Space (Deadly, Holy, Rough Theatre)
  - Green Team Piece
  - Improv. Pieces
• Devising
  - Little Airplanes
  - Disney
  - Musical
• Writing
  - Musical
  - Little Airplanes
  - Monologue
• Critiquing
  - We critiqued everything
  - Sweeney Todd
  - Julius Caesar
• Directing
  - Pulp Fiction (?)
• Stage Elements
  - Doing set of Love's Labour's Lost

THEATRE IN THE WORLD:

• Three Penny Opera (Brecht)
• Topgirls (Caryl Churchill)
• Little Airplanes of the Heart
• Marat/Sade
• Romance Language
• took a peek at Commedia dell'Arte
• practitioners
  

1. Brecht (Epic Theatre)
2. Meisner (Method Acting)
3. Shakespeare
4. Brooke (theories)
5. Jacques LeCoq (Physical Theatre)
   - space, colors, plateau, animals, elements
   - clown (Bouffon), neutral mask

THEATRE IN THE MAKING:

• devising from stimuli
  - process, music
• directing and visions
• acting
  - physical (LeCoq)
  - method (Meisner)
• make up
• color
• masks
• spatial awareness
• researching, doing, observing, recording (journal/blog)

Theatre Exam. Oh boy.

Alright, this is officially my drawing board for my Theatre exam on Tuesday. After visiting the museum on Wednesday a few main ideas have popped into my head:

• four people (each from a culture I briefly mentioned in my previous posts) meeting and showing one another their own cultures
• transforming into a different animal according to character traits (happy - dog, shy - ostrich etc.)
• going from an objective world to an animated world

I'LL EDIT WHEN I THINK OF MORE IDEAS!

Un Monde Subdivisé/ A Divided World (Branly)

Same body, same soul.

My group looked at the totemic object of a kangaroo from Australia. The idea that one is part of one bigger ancestor animal is shown. A story was told to us of aboriginal Australians hunting together and dividing up the animal they have caught later. While a person from the South takes the tail of the animal, a person that lives in the center of the land takes the heart of the animal. By hunting the animal and taking their specific parts, they realize that they are a part of the same clan. One ancestor is always kept in mind, as each clan has a different animal. Each family takes a different part of the animal, as they are part of the ancestor.

Un Monde Objectif/ An Objective World (Branly)

Same bodies, different souls.

We looked at a portrait (naturalist object) of a woman from Europe painted during the Renaissance. In this culture, animals are seen as objects and are not equal as in an animist world. The material world is paid attention to and humans are seen as better than animals because they have souls. It is humans that show the importance of the material world. Humans like showing how different they are as the light is always on them in paintings, every person looks different, we are just machines and the soul is more important than the being.

Un Monde Enchêvetré/ A Entangled World (Branly)

Different bodies, different souls.

We looked at a statue which captured the idea of analogism; bringing similarities to oneself. The idea that one can represent the whole world in a small thing just as Japan is represented in a small Zen garden is applied to the statue. One can gain the qualities of animals by adding the animal pieces to a statue of oneself. Examples of this can be wanting the ferocity of a lion by adding its teeth. Representations of elements are also included and mostly shown in the concept of analogism, but also appear in all other beliefs in some way or another.

Un Monde Animé/ An Animated World (Branly)

Different bodies, one soul.

We looked at an Inuit mask from Canada and had a discussion about their beliefs. In an animated culture, the beautiful idea of metamorphosis is illustrated. The body is just clothing that one can change. The mask had a man inside the bird, implying that metamorphosis is always constant. When wearing the mask, one can transform from a human to a bird to communicate to animals. Animals and humans are equal and one cannot possibly know whether one is meeting a human or an animal. Although the mask is merely an object, it embodies a major belief of an entire culture. It shows the constant change of "clothing" from animals and back to humans.

The Battle Between Art Critics and Archeologists (Branly)

When the museum was built, art critics and archeologists argued over how the various artifacts were to be displayed and how they were to be viewed. While the artists wanted to show beauty, the archeologists wanted to show the meaning. Archeologists noted that these objects were not supposed to be on display as art during the specific time periods in the first place. An aboriginal Australian did not draw in the sand for the entire world to see, but rather to mark the presence of their community and let it be swept away. Having visited the museum with my classmates, we noticed that the artists won.

Architecture of the Museum

Here are a few things Leyla and I noticed about the museum:

• White, light earthy colors and dark earthy colors are mainly used in the interior design
• The bottom floor where you check-in is very dark and dimly lit
  - burgandy and deep/wine red are the most prominent colors and banners are hanging from the ceiling
  - circular columns
• A tube of musical instruments is in the center of the wide stair case
  
• The rungs throughout the museum curve like snakes and are not adjusted according to what they are attached to
• There is a projection of a river of geographic and cultural words (white on white with some deep red)
• The idea of a river of culture is reoccurring in the entire museum based on the interior design

Musée du Quai Branly Field Trip!

Okay, so I'm going to compile a bunch of notes that will probably be extremely out of order and will add images later on.