An encounter with three workshops between local and international artists who seek to explore the impact of nature on theatre and performance.

FIELDWORKS invites 30 professional performing artists, who seek to develop, cultivate and enrich the Nordic performance scene with inspiration from the remarkable Icelandic landscape.

The prominent International performing artists Annabel Arden (Theatre de Complicité, London), Philippe Quesne (Vivarium Studio, Paris) and Richard Maxwell (NYC Players, New York), who have all developed a strong and distinctive voice, will guide three different workshops.

The three workshop leaders will each decide towards what aspect of Icelandic nature their workshops will be guided. As mentors they will share their expertise and ideas and guide the participants in their creative process and art making. They will transmit their personal artistic methods to the participants and a new common language will grow. An important aspect of the project is thus the interaction and sharing of knowledge between the International artists and the local Nordic artists.

FIELDWORKS is a collaboration between the Danish National School of Performing Arts (Continuing Education), Oslo Academy of the Arts, Iceland Academy of the Arts and Lókal Theatre Festival Reyjavík.

FIELDWORK with Richard Maxvell:

This workshop plays on the line between fiction and reality. The performer (or theater-maker) addresses questions of acting behavior through constructing physical environments and distinguishing borders. The "how" and "why" of physical surroundings are explored as to how they influence or affect performance. "Set-building for the actor".

Renowned theatre maker Richard Maxwell is a director, playwright and artistic director of the New York City Players (founded 1999). NYC Players is a theater company creating original work about people, relationships, and above all, feeling.

FIELDWORK with Philippe Quesne:

Although not obvious, Quesne also places political and social messages in his works, especially related to the environment. His views on the environment mostly show up in the stage design, as well as a series of picture books he created called Conséquences. Speech is kept to an absolute minimum, spectacle is decried and presence is considered to be most important.

Philippe Quesne – who took over as artistic director of the French National Theatre Nanterre-Amandiers in Paris in 2014 – established Vivarium Studio in 2003. The organization includes painters, actors, dancers, musicians and animals which have created and performed their own works in theaters and festivals in various parts of the world. Quesne has developed projects for art galleries, urban spaces, parks, gardens and forests. He is known for his irony and exploration of man’s relation to nature. He works with various types of techniques such as interviews, articles, poems, songs and word lists, along with actors, sound, lights, videos and movements. The works often contain references to literature, the sciences, the visual arts, music, cinema and comics.

FIELDWORK with Annabel Arden:

"This workshop will explore the actor in relation to space and the qualities released by the environment we find ourselves in. The sensitivity to light and to the others in the group . How our voices enter the space. How we create a sense of suspense. I am interested in the songs inspired by the Nordic landscape . Also in the contrast between stillness and violence . Each day we will work physically to increase our openness playfulness and sensitivity."

Annabel Arden, director of theatre and opera and co-founder of Theatre de Complicité, always begins with the body. In addition to her training at Lecoq and Philippe Gaulier, she is an experienced Feldenkrais practitioner and begins each day physically preparing to work. Among other things, breathing exercises, centering the body and gentle warm ups will be involved, in an attempt to enhance the experiential understanding of and connection to the body which is essential for a skilled performer.