Workshop with Master Practitioner H. Aristizábal

Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) is a form of popular education that uses theatre as a vehicle for fundamental social transformation. Forged in the crucible of revolutionary movements, it uses the dynamized human body and the charged theatrical space as laboratories for exploring power, transforming oppression, and finding collective solutions to the fundamental problems of conflict, exploitation, violence, and human suffering. Harnessing the reflexivity of the theatrical form as a generative critical methodology, TO contends that there are no neutral observers, ideologies, or systems of practice: every spectator is a potential actor, every system potentially oppressive or liberatory, and that the collective artistic liberation of our human capacity, dignity, and creativity is an imperative for transformation and survival. 

Join us for this 3-day workshop with Master practitioner Hector Aristizábal! 
The workshop for beginners and experienced practitioners in Theatre of the Oppressed (TO).
Hector will bring us all together with his expertise!

In 3 days, the trainer will share with us his own way in using TO with communities and how he creates the Forum plays with the materials that come from the group participants. Experientially, we will explore this process with the materials that come from us and concern us as participants.

The workshop will not focus only on Forum Theatre but will include varied TO processes and techniques:

• introducing games & exercises that can be used to engage a community
• exploring Image Theatre to analyze & challenge oppression
• creating a Forum Theatre play and learning rehearsal techniques
• Introducing tools of Rainbow of Desire to explore internalized

oppression or the oppression within us.

Depending on your experience, you will also have the chance to explore, develop or strengthen your Jokering Skills: staying curious, playful, present, honest, ethical, creative and aesthetically engaged.
If you are an experienced practitioner, this will be a unique opportunity for you to further enrich your own practice and receive constructive feedback on your Jokering Skills. If you are a beginner you will have the chance to try!

Remember that everyone has a place in this journey, actors and non-actors, beginners or experienced practitioners in the world of TO. 

HECTOR ARISTIZABAL was born and grew up in Medellín, Colombia when it was the most dangerous city in the world. He survived civil war, arrest and torture. In 1989, violence and death threats forced him to leave his homeland and immigrate to the United States. He combined his training in psychology and the arts with lessons gained from life experience in his therapeutic work with torture and trauma survivors in post-conflict and war areas, with incarcerated youth, immigrant families, people affected by HIV/AIDS and many more. He is a theater director, actor and practitioner of the techniques known as Theater of the Oppressed, developed by Brazilian Augusto Boal. He founded ImaginAction to help people use the transformative power of theater around the world, including Colombia, Northern Ireland, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Nepal, Senegal, South Africa, India, Palestine, Syria, etc." as a way to address the needs for healing and social transformation in our communities.
Hector is currently working with an international and local team of researchers and theatre practitioners on the "Mashrou3 Insan" project which is a community driven intervention and research project that employs participatory and citizen science methods, as well as participatory and forum theatre. Its purpose is to investigate and improve the psychosocial health, mental health, and overall well-being conditions for youth and marginalized individuals in Lebanon.

FEES: $180 for a 3 day master class 

REGISTRATION
Deadline for registration is July 20th. Places are limited. To apply, please email Dr. Samar Zebian, samar.zebian@lau.edu.lb/[email protected], (cc [email protected]). Instructions for an OMT transfer will be sent to you upon your registration.
Or call +961 76 170 359

ELIGIBILITY 
This workshop is open to actors and non-actors, beginners or experienced practitioners in the world of forum theatre and theatre of the oppressed.

ATTENDANCE POLICY 
For the benefit of group process, full attendance is required. We therefore ask you to apply only if you can commit to attending the entire workshop.

CANCELLATION POLICY 

• Between 7 and 4 weeks prior to the workshop: 30% of the total amount.
• Between 4 and 1 week prior to the workshop: 50% of the total amount.
• In case of cancellation at a later point, you will be charged the full amount.

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