Physical theatre: intensive program

Physical theatre is about the body and the power of its expression and transmission. In this in-depth training, we work from physical perspectives and connect meaning, voice, language, and space. The line between theatre and dance often blurs. Playing is the foundation. With and moving from your whole being and body, and the group.

WISPER has been offering weekly physical theatre classes for years. New is this intensive program: seven Sundays with five different facilitators, each with their own expertise and approach. In each session, we delve into a specific theme. One of the teachers, Mileen, will also be on board for the entire program, walking alongside, challenging, and supporting.

By the end of the journey, you will have experienced physical theatre in numerous ways. There is plenty of space to discover your own passion and preferences, and develop them further.

Sunday 1 | My body and I

(with Mileen Borgonjon)

We take the space to arrive with our bodies, movement and with one another. We focus on movement qualities and -textures, body awareness, parameters in movement, layers of perception, and volume buttons. You start from your own movement qualities as a performer, actor, mover, or dancer. What do you already have in your arsenal? What drives you to move? Which movements are close to you? What do you want to stretch yourself in? And through it all: finding our pleasure for dancing and moving.

Sunday 2 | The Power of the Group

(with Jan Sas)

We work from collective responding and elements from the Greek chorus. We move as one being. We train focus and alertness while constantly entering into dialogue with ourselves and everything around us. We play with rhythm and intention. How can the group create an atmosphere, support a solo or monologue? How quickly can we collectively switch between stillness and outburst, between small-scale play and grand gestures? The group becomes engine, intimate witness, collective power and poetry.

Sunday 3 | Embracing the Voice

(with Mileen Borgonjon)

Our voice is an integral part of our body and can support the projection of our movement and give it extra meaning. It is also a muscle that we can train. Voice textures and movement qualities become our playground during this session. What do our voice and movement tell us in different places, situations and positions? It will be a dynamic laboratory, where we alternate between exploration and instant composition.

Sunday 4 | Building interesting and exciting images and scenes

(with Katrijn De Cooman)

Scenes emerge through improvisation. What do they tell us? And why does an image become suspenseful or interesting? Images that emerge are further developed in their expressive power. We balance between improvisation and making conscious choices. During this session, we also experiment with materials and props. They become part of our exploration, our body, or the scene.

Sunday 5 | Texts and Movement Language

(with Jan Sas)

Dialogues are the red thread. We explore the sounds or rhythm of the text. We observe our natural movements during dialogues and develop them further as a language of movement. We play with supporting and abstracting the meaning of the text. During this session, the text becomes our prompts—a next puzzle piece with which we, as individuals and as a group, deepen our play and performance.

Sunday 6 | Space as the source of inspiration

(with Elke Van Der Kelen)

The physical space in which we work, and how aware we are of it, influences our movements. “What happens when the first questions asked are not about text or characters, but about space?” Architect, theatre maker, and photographer Elke has a unique perspective on space. We start from the scenography. The (imagined) space determines how scenes subsequently develop. We dialogue with the environment, let movements originate from there, and use the space as a co-player.

Sunday 7 | Give it all!

(with Bérengère Bodin)

For Bérengère, there is only generosity and ‘surrender’. Surrender to the moment, to the body, to the performance, to the audience, to the music, to the whole. May we be seen? May we be moved? And what about a wink, humor? In her work, music is a driving force and a landscape that we inhabit. Bérengère dreams of touching a language that defies all definition and where pure emotion embraces every spectator. She will lead this final Sunday session as the culmination of our journey.