Clown

In this workshop we will take off our clown noses, develop your clown from the inside out, and then put the nose back on-if you want to.   Develop your inner clown nose.  Tune in to your inner funny, to the impulses generated by your sense of humor, your delight, mischief, tricksterdom and more….and develop your capacities to share that.

Using your sense of fun and funny (and all your senses) as a guide, define and map your clown world. Expand this universe through improvisations, short set pieces, solos and duos. Use these practices to define, deepen and expand your clowns’ non-verbal vocabulary and emotional expression. Invite humor and lightness into how the clown feels.  Develop capacity to create resonance and connection with the audience.  Work with different levels of expression, from subtle elements of lightness to expansive exuberance.

Deepen your connection to clown through Butohclown practices, integrating aspects of butoh dance into clown theatricality, discover how Butoh demands that the clown be more present by slowing down their movement.  This slowness dissolves all ‘thinking mind’ aspects masking your authenticity, thus bringing you to a place of ‘being’ clown rather than playing clown.  Developing this in-depth internal connection strengthens the clown’s external clarity and physical expression. Butohclown offers great tools to explore and develop your performing, to decompose moments to reveal the fundamental energies driving the clown, and offering pathways to play (with) them.

Based in Richard Pochinko’s (Canadian) clowning method, Ohno-sensei’s lightful butoh philosophies, and physical theater pedagogy, the workshop also integrates a large number of principles and influences from Asia – Kyogen, Butoh, Taoist health exercises, Shintaido and Zen-style walking meditation (kinhin).