This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY fellow Nicolas Noreña. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.

 01/22/2019

      a BRIDGE*

manifesto for a horizontal theater

• the space, the objects, the lights and the sounds have autonomous realities and are as communicative as the performers and the text

• the actors do not play stable/continuous characters, but rather parts that are defined by a combination of their actions (what they do) and their presence (who they are).

• CHAOS  must be invited into the room as a creative force. Every decision should make room for CHAOS to shape it.

• the audience will always be an audience of mindreaders--- Actors, think in front of them! And act with your brain.  

• rehearse as little as the piece allows

• present to a small audience as many times as possible, so the piece can accumulateand layer information from it’s encounter with audiences

• make changes to the performance every time it is performed. As a director. As an actor.

• exchange actors and parts as often as possible, this is also an act of layering more information.

• maintain a delicate balance of highly choreographed actions and improvisation.

• allow enough space between the text and the action so they move independently and in slightly divergent directions

• All of the materials of performance: Space, Time, Shape, Movement, Emotion and Logic, are autonomous and should be articulated independently. They can enter into dialogue and sometimes fall into momentary arrangements.

• by having so many individual autonomous pieces pointing in different directions what should be achieved is a FIELD created by the tension between all of these directionalities, as opposed to a scenario where all elements converge to collapse. The theater is a FIELD  for noticing.

• when possible curate the audience. They also shape the piece.

• allow the un-reified content of the piece to spill into the way it is produced

• all action should in some way define the division between perception and imagination

• The parts that the actors are performing exist in the same space in overlapping realities

Nicolás Noreña

*The roots to this way of thinking was originated by the cavemen and has been passed through generations. Here most temporarily influenced by Mary Overlie’s Six Viewpoints, Richard Foreman’s Total Theater, and Jack Smith’s Reptilian Acting Technique.