Raging
Dreams–Into the Visceral
Theatre
Gargantua
PIP Fest, Lincoln Performance Hall, Portland State University,
1620 SW Park Ave., 725-3276
7 pm Thursday, 8 pm Friday-Saturday, July 29-31
$8-$16
In a short film on his life, British painter Tom Phillips
traced his artistic lineage, connecting his teacher's paintings
to the paintings of his teacher's teacher, and so forth back
to Fragonard. Phillips' point was plain: Without these important
connections to Fragonard's influential work, there might've
never been a Phillips. One of the primary glories of the Portland
International Performance Festival is that it connects local
artists to new ideas being developed in the performing arts
from other parts of Earth. The importance of such encounters
cannot be underestimated, as many of Portland's artists can
attest. Their work has been transformed by connecting with
other work, which in turn had been inspired by the work of
others.
This weekend sees the Portland premiere of a piece by one
of Canada's most innovative theater companies, Theatre Gargantua.
Now in its sixth year, the Toronto-based troupe has become
an important laboratory for dramatic experimentation. The
work is interdisciplinary, wedding text, dance, music and
design with the goal of achieving a total art. The company
was founded by Jacquie P. A. Thomas, who was inspired by
the Polish director Ossetynski and by Wlodzimierz Staniewski,
the artistic director of Teatr Gardzienice and a past guest
of PIP Fest. Thomas spent more than a year in Poland studying
with Gardzienice, a company renowned for its own theatrical
experiments, which use iconography, funereal lamentations
and the folk rituals of weddings and baptisms. "It's a style
of theater based in rhythm, movement and music," Thomas
told WW. "The experience reconnected me with what
I wanted to do.
"When speaking with theater artists from around the world,
you find the same complaint," Thomas says. "They aren't
given chances to produce the work they truly want to." If
this is really so, then many would be envious of Theatre
Gargantua's methods. In six years, the company has created
only three works. Each piece has been developed over a set
period of two years. Thomas calls these works "cycles."
"We wanted to create work that lasts past a three-week rehearsal
period and limited run," she says. Like Gardzienice, Gargantua
is a company interested in the process of creating theater
rather than producing a product. It's a philosophy found
in the writings of the influential Polish director Tadeusz
Kantor, who wrote, "The development of art is not a purely
formal, linear process...It is a permanent motion and transformation
of thoughts and ideas."
"Each year of the two-year cycle represents what we call
a 'phase,'" says Thomas. "The first year is foundation work,
developing ideas and material for a project."
The process begins in late winter. Come fall, the company
synthesizes the best of what's been created and fashions
the piece. Once finished, the first phase is performed before
audiences. Phase Two begins with the company making radical
departures from the foundation work, stripping the work
of anything that has become habitual and challenging the
work as a whole to see what holds up. The piece is again
refined and then performed at the second year's end. "This
allows both performers and audiences to observe the stages
of a piece's growth," she says.
The company's first cycle was The Templar Project, The
Trials--Fortune's Desire, a work based on the trials
of the Knights Templar, who were accused of practicing black
magic during the 13th century. The piece was famous for
being lit only with candles and torches. "It's not a piece
we do very often because of fears of liability," Thomas
says, laughing. The third cycle, Love Not Love, is
a ronde of love and desire. This year marks the first
phase of the fourth piece, Epoch Project. For PIP
Fest, Theatre Gargantua will perform its second cycle, Raging
Dreams--Into the Visceral.
Raging Dreams explores the impact of violence on
a group of characters' subconscious minds. The stage is
transformed into a dream chamber, and all the action takes
place behind a continual scrim of rain, separating the audience
from the performers. Ropes and hanging metal cages provide
most of the playing area. As in The Templar Project,
the actors are in control of the lighting, though here the
lights are battery-operated. Each performer attaches hand-crafted
lighting instruments to his or her costume, which allows
for endless lighting possibilities.
After three years, Raging Dreams is fairly set,
though there is still room for experimentation. "We are
always re-examining work, though from this distance the
core of the piece remains," Thomas says. She has developed
a novel method for keeping the piece fresh. "Wherever we
perform, we always hire a local musician," Thomas says.
"This infuses the cycle with a new energy in every performance."
It's also a way of connecting artists to other artists.
Local musician Hollis Taylor will be working with the company
while it's in Portland.
Very few artists can create great art in a vacuum. To fend
off staleness, an artist must be challenged by the work
of others. E.M. Forster's philosophy on art and life was
simply stated: "Only connect." PIP Fest gives us the opportunity.
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Willamette Week | originally
published July 28, 1999
|
