For Immediate Release

Chopin Theatre presents

Theatre No Theatre
in the project
"GROTOWSKI to RICHARDS: SONG and ACTION"
With a public performance of SONGS, introduced by Thomas Richards

And a Masterclass workshop
THE POTENTIAL OF SONG

CHICAGO (March 25, 2022) - The Theatre No Theatre team presently touring the US is comprised of Thomas Richards (US), Jessica Losilla-Hébrail (France) and Hyun Ju Baek (South Korea) all former members of the performing arts establishment the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards. Their project reflects on the legacy of the Workcenter established in 1986 in Pontedera, Italy, as well as on their present day international research.

"Working with Grotowski on ancient songs awakened something inside of me; gave me the sensation that I was hearing someone from my ancestry sing. This was a very deep experience for me. I'm half black and half white. I come from a mixed family. My father's line comes from the Caribbean, and I grew up in NYC completely disconnected from any kind of African tradition. I went to a school that was almost all Jewish in fact. I wanted desperately to to be Black, to understand my Blackness, but without any means to do so. And when I met this Polish man with a white beard who kind of looked like Santa Claus, who had worked in the Caribbean so deeply, it was very bizarre. It was strange to encounter something of my African conditions somehow through him."

"Our work is aimed at helping people recuperate contact with that which is hidden, through action. Your daily life, my daily life, all of our daily life is often made up of a more superficial part of oneself. We smile before we really smile. We frown before we really frown. We pretend to be humble when we're not. A song can be a kind of call. You're singing, this song - and you perceive already in your being a kind of intention that is hidden inside the ancient song. An intention, a kind of desire to call to the surface a deeper strata from within. A way of relating yourself to something that is much greater than yourself can appear. And then a kind of process can start to flow and articulated itself through action, in which it's as if all these levels of your human nature, which are awakening and intensifying through the work on the song, start to stack up so to speak, like a ladder, one on top the other, and a kind of special lived experience can take place, Grotowski used the term verticality." -  Thomas Richards (Based upon the podcast.  Corrections by the Author.)

Theatre No Theatre tour at Balch St. Theatre (Akron) & Wayne State University and The Hinterlands (Detroit). Chicago events partially supported by Polish Consulate RP in Chicago and cooperation with Columbia College and other universities.

Performance audience must provide proof of vaccination OR proof of having Covid-19 within 5 months OR a negative rapid test which can be taken at Chopin Theatre. Workshop participants must provide, on the first day, a negative Covid-19 rapid test result.

"Grotowski to Richards: Song and Action" includes:

Songs, presented by Thomas Richards, former Artistic Director of the Workcenter and "essential collaborator" of Jerzy Grotowski. Mr. Richards will introduce us to the work on songs of tradition developed at the Workcenter since 1986. Songs, the presentation which follows, has its roots in a concept initiated in 1986 by director and performing arts theorist Jerzy Grotowski and which Thomas Richards has refined since Grotowski's passing in 1999. The performing arts approach within this work, come to be known as "Art as Vehicle", envisions art as a practical means to "work on oneself" fundamentally through a specific approach to song and action.

The Potential of Song is a two day Masterclass, conducted by Thomas Richards with the assistance of Jessica Losilla-Hébrail and Hyun Ju Baek, and is open to anyone wishing to deepen a practical work on singing. During the workshop, participants will be introduced to an exploration of a work on songs of tradition consisting in practical sessions of work on songs coming from Afro-Caribbean traditions, which have been at the core of Richards' performing arts research for over 35 years. Such a work on song explores the potential impact that the rhythmic and melodic qualities of certain songs of tradition can have on the persons who sing.

Chopin Theatre is pleased to continue its three decades of presenting international theatre with this special event in cooperation with Columbia College Chicago and partially supported with a grant from the Polish Consulate of Chicago. Chopin has presented over 120 of its own productions mostly Eastern and Central European. It has hosted artists from each American state and from over 40 countries. After 30 years of operating as a for profit theater, Chopin Theatre became a non profit 501C3 (Jan 2020) and continues its mission of promoting enlightened civic discourse through a diverse range of artistic offerings.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Thomas Richards (Artistic Director) - Thomas Richards (B.A. Yale University, M.A. the University of Bologna, Ph.D. University of Paris VIII) was Artistic Director of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards from 1999 to 2022. He began his apprenticeship with Jerzy Grotowski in 1985, and their work together developed until Grotowski's passing away in 1999. Thomas Richards arrived in Italy in 1986 with Jerzy Grotowski from the University of California, Irvine, where he had participated in Grotowski's "Focused Research Program in Objective Drama".

In Italy, at first Mr. Richards worked as Grotowski's assistant, but soon he became the leader of one of the work teams, and then Grotowski's "essential collaborator". Eventually, Mr. Richards became Director of the Research Program on Performing Arts at the Workcenter. Richards was a fundamental driving force in the research developed at the Workcenter that came to be known as "Art as Vehicle". In 1996, Grotowski decided to change the name of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski to Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards, because, as he specified, the direction of the practical work already concentrated itself in the hands of Thomas Richards.

Concerning Richards, Grotowski stated, "The nature of my work with Thomas Richards has the character of ‘transmission'; to transmit to him that to which I have arrived in my life: the inner aspect of the work."
Richards was the main creator and doer of the performative opus entitled Downstairs Action (filmed by Mercedes Gregory in 1989); he was the creator and main doer of Action, and the creator and a doer of The Letter (formerly: An Action in creation). He co-directed One breath left, and Dies Iræ: The Preposterous Theatrum Interioris Show.

From 2008 to 2022, Richards was leading the Focused Research Team in Art as Vehicle, and the Workcenter Studio in Residence (2016 to 2022) at the Workcenter. With his teams, he directed, The Living Room (premiered in 2009), L'heure fugitive (premiered in 2015), The Underground (premiered in 2016) Sin Fronteras (premiered in 2017), Gravedad (premiered in 2018) and Han! (premiered in 2021).

Thomas Richards is the author of:
At Work with Grotowski on Physical Actions (Routledge, 1995), The Edge-Point of Performance, published in English (Documentation Series of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski, 1997), Heart of Practice: Within the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards (Routledge, 2008).

Jessica Losilla-Hébrail - Jessica Losilla Hébrail was born in France. She studied performing arts for three years at the University of Nice and spent the fourth year of her program in Finland, studying performing arts at the Turku Academy of Art. After her studies, she participated in various workshops and collaborated with different companies and artists in Europe. In 2008 she joined the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards and became a member of the Focused Research Team in Art as Vehicle. During those years at the Workcenter, Jessica Losilla-Hébrail was a performer in The Living Room and The Underground, both opus directed by Thomas Richards and was an assistant director on Gravedad, Sin Fronteras and Han!. During those fourteen years at the Workcenter, Jessica Losilla-Hébrail has been performing, conducting workshops and assisting Richards in workshops in different countries around the world. In 2014, she became one of Richards' assistants.

Hyun Ju Baek - Hyun Ju Baek was born in South Korea. Her career developed mainly as musical theatre actress for a decade in Korea. She traveled to London studying theatre directing and earned a master's degree in Theatre and Performance at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK. Before joining Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards, Hyun Ju worked as an actress, director, and playwright in both Seoul and London. She wrote, produced and directed many theatre pieces including: Flatmates V Zombies (Tristan Bates Theatre UK, Camden People's Theatre UK - a piece that won a fund of the Arts Council of England); The Lady of Burma (Moon Light Theatre Korea); Today (commissioned by Kyunggi Cultural Foundation); and The Sound Factory (commissioned by the Pusan Cultural Foundation). In 2017, she participated in the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards' Master Course, supported by the Korean Arts Council. After attending another pedagogic encounter with Thomas Richards in Hong ong, she organized a theatre group: The association for Theatre Craft and Creative Process GB, and held the Seoul Work Encounter 2018, inviting to Korea the Focused Research Team in Art as Vehicle. The following year, she joined the Workcenter's Focused Research Team in Art as Vehicle.

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