Freedom to Act - Listening
An Online Conference on Acting and the Alexander Technique
January 8-10, 2021
The theme for our conference this year will be… Listening
Listening is at the heart of how we bring the Alexander Technique to Acting.
In this year of facing challenges, of living more online and less in the studio or on the stage, we are making time to listen. We are embracing the art of listening.
Listening connects us to our inner sources. Listening connects us to our partners, opening the way for dialogue. Listening includes all voices and brings more voices into the dialogue. Listening aligns us with our stories and encourages us to speak up honestly. It is at the heart of creative collaboration.
Listening is what makes us a community.
“Listening is not merely hearing. Listening is reacting. Listening is being affected by what you hear. Listening is active.”
— Michael Shurtleff
Conference Schedule
Friday, January 8th, 2021
Session One:
6:00 - 6:45 pm: Introduction to the Alexander Technique in Acting with Belinda Mello
7:00 - 8:30 pm: Keynote Presentation on Listening: The intersections of listening and sharing, equity and justice with Yuko Uchikawa
Transforming conflict—whether within ourselves or between ourselves and others—require a way of listening that moves beyond the level of awareness that gave rise to the conflict. How we listen has the capacity to create or dismantle justice. Introducing the principles and practice of Restorative, Transformative, and Healing Justice, we will explore the intersections of listening and sharing, equity and justice.
Saturday, January 9th, 2021
Session Two:
10:00 am - 12:00 pm Listening to Yourself with Sheila Bandyopadhyay, Sarah Barker, Ann Rodiger
Session Three:
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm Listening in Dialogue with Janet, Madelle Feindel, Cathy Madden, Belinda Mello
Open Evening:
A. Explore On Your Own: (resources provided)
B. 4:30 - 5:30 pm Meet in the Online Cafe with Topic Rooms - Free event
Sunday, January 10th, 2021
Session Four
11:00 am - 12:30 pm Listening in Collaboration with Adriana Chavez, Erin Leigh Crites, Joe Krienke
Session Five
2:00 pm - 3:30 pm Listening as a Community - A Long Table facilitated by Jean E Taylor
The Long Table originated as a performance installation, developed by artist Lois Weaver, which experiments with using the private form of a dinner party as a structure for public debate. It encourages informal conversation on serious subjects and experiments with formats that inspire public engagement.
Conference Fees & Details
Conference Fees:
One Session: $40
One Session + Long Table: $65
Two Sessions: $75
Full Conference Fee: $135
Registration will close at Noon EST on January 8th, 2021.
Cancellation policy - Full refund is available minus $25 fee through 12/31/20.
Presenter Bios:
Yuko Uchikawa is a Restorative Justice practitioner, antiracist mediator, trainer, and consultant. She works with individuals and organizations to transform conflicts occurring across dimensions of diversity. Her website is https://www.opentalkbk.com/
Sheila Bandyopadhyay is a Brooklyn-based director, movement specialist and devisor of original theater. She is drawn to hybrid forms of performance that feature strong physicality, music, multinational/multiethnic ensembles, and gender free casting. Sheila teaches and regularly directs productions at The American Academy of Dramatic Arts, where she is also Head of the Movement Department. Sheila is an AmSAT certified teacher of the Alexander Technique since 2008. www.sheilabnyc.com @sheilabnyc
Sarah Barker teaches movement, acting and Alexander Technique through intensive workshops and private coaching. She is a published author and her book, The Alexander Technique, and her video course, Moving with Ease are used in many theatre-training programs throughout the US. She is often a guest teacher for schools for Alexander Technique teachers around the world. See her website at www.easyalexander.com.
Ann Rodiger (Conference Co-Designer) is Founder and Director of the Balance Arts Center and Balance Arts Center Alexander Technique Teacher Training Course. She has private Alexander Technique practices in NYC, Berlin, Germany and Antwerp, Belgium. She is also skilled in Labanotation, Laban Movement Analysis, Bartenieff Fundamentals, yoga, meditation, and various dance techniques. She produces and co-produces conferences and workshops for the Alexander Technique as it relates to Dance, Music, Voice, Acting, and Writing. www.balanceartsat.com
Janet Madelle Feindel, AmSAT, ATI, Designated Linklater Voice; Certified Fitzmaurice Voice, Certified Yoga Alliance Teacher. Credits include: Theatre for A New Audience/Royal Shakespeare Company (UK); Stratford Festival, Canada, (including Voice & the Alexander Technique at the Birmingham Conservatory); international conferences including: Choice for Voice (British Voice Association); ATI & International Alexander Technique Congresses & the Care of the Professional Voice Symposium. Publications: The Thought Propels the Sound and Chapter on Alexander and Voice is included in Performer’s Voice (both Plural Publishing); articles with the Congress Papers (STAT); A Particular Class of Women, Canada Playwrights Press. Professor Emerita, Voice/Alexander & Dialect Coach, School of Drama, Carnegie Mellon University, where she initiated Linklater Voice & the Alexander Technique into the curriculum.
Cathy Madden, Director of the Integrative Alexander Technique Studio of Seattle, Teaching Professor for the University of Washington School of Drama, Author of Integrative Alexander Technique Practice for Performing Artists: Onstage Synergy and Teaching the Alexander Technique: Active Pathways to Integrative Practice. Founding Member and former Chair of Alexander Technique International. Director. Actor. Clown. Doula. www.cathymadden.net
Belinda Mello (Conference Co-Designer, pronouns she/her/hers.), MFA, member ATI, ATME, founder of ATMOTION and the new AT Motion Center for Actors program of group classes, private lessons and intensive workshops. She draws on her experience with movement, mask and Margolis Method as well as her background as a director and performer when coaching role preparation and auditions. She is currently on the faculty at The Barrow Group and the Terry Knickerbocker Studio. Belinda is a member of the AT Diversity Coalition. www.AlexTechMotion.com
Adriana Chavez (she/her/hers) is an actor-creator, director, visual artist, teacher, and community connector. Adriana currently resides in Las Vegas, NV where she has been an active participant in the local artist community for the last five years. Her performative and sculptural installations are currently on display and in performance at the Donna Beam Fine Art Gallery and at the Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art in Las Vegas. She has performed in several productions with Vegas Theatre Company, The LAB LV Experimental Theatre Company, Majestic Repertory Theatre and Meow Wolf. In 2019 she was a director for A Public Fit Theatre Company. In 2017 she co-produced and co-directed the Las Vegas chapter of the nationwide reading of It Can’t Happen Here. She co-created and co-curated Small Space Fest, an immersive art and performance experience that took over the Emergency Arts Building in downtown Las Vegas for the whole month of June 2016. She taught and directed for the Academy of International Education (AIE), in partnership with Northwest Playwrights Alliance, for five summer seasons in Washington state and Japan. From 2017-2019, Adriana was invited to ZForge, an annual devising residency in Hudson, NY. Adriana received an MFA in Ensemble-based Physical Theatre from Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre. Other performance credits: New York City: Homunculus Mask Theater (Innovative Theatre Award), Palissimo Dance, NYC Clown Theater Festival, Collective Opera Company, Elke Rindfleisch Dance, Jonah Bokaer Dance. California: Naked Empire Bouffon Company, Dell'Arte Company. Massachusetts: Shakespeare & Company. Adriana has been studying the Alexander Technique remotely at SOMA Studios, led by Joe Krienke.
Erin Leigh Crites (she/they) is an international theatre artist, educator, and maven of make-believe. In the last ten years, Erin has traveled extensively to explore the global community and create bonds through theatrical play and ensemble dynamics work. She is a full-time faculty member at the international arts boarding school, Idyllwild Arts Academy as well as Vice President of the Board of Directors and an ensemble performer for the US chapter of Clowns Without Borders. She is a founding ensemble member of LA-based Fiasco! Physical Theatre and an Alexander Technique teacher in training. She is also the founder of Feel Better Sessions, a culture-building community that provides prompts, coaching, and curated content for those who dream of a stronger connection with themselves, others, and the cosmos. She has facilitated workshops in empowered storytelling, positive presence, and collective creation for many institutions globally, including but not limited to: VICE, Plaza de la Raza and the Hollywood Fringe Festival; Los Angeles, CA, University of Louisville; Kentucky, Hunter College; NYC, Accademia dell Arte; Arezzo, Italy, Dell’Arte International; Blue Lake, CA, The Paolo Grassi School; Milan, Italy, Hospital Juarez and Risaterapia; Mexico City. And the following partnerships were made possible through Clowns Without Borders: UNHCR - United Nations High Commission on Refugees, The World Lutheran Foundation; Kenya, Plan International; Haiti, Fundacco; Nicaragua, and Cali Clown; Colombia.
Joe Krienke is a mover and maker based in Minneapolis, MN. Joe has been making and performing his own physical theater work for 25 year and endeavors to make work that inspires movement and laughter. While on the core faculty at Dell’Arte International (2006-2014) Joe designed and implemented a comprehensive movement curriculum for Dell’Arte’s one-year Professional Training Program and three-year MFA program in Ensemble-Based Physical Theatre. He also served on the faculty in the MFA Actor training program at the University of Missouri, Kansas City (2001-2006), and has taught workshops or been in residence at another two dozen organizations nationwide. Currently, he is a Lecturer in The University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater BFA Actor Training Program and is the co-founder of Soma Studios, a Minneapolis based organization dedicated to movement training and performance.
Jean E. Taylor is on the Lincoln Center Education staff, works extensively with the Teaching Artist faculty, national and international consultancies, and is facilitator of LCE’s TA Development Labs. She is a recipient of Lincoln Center’s Directors Emeriti Award and presented at the International Teaching Artist Conferences in Oslo, Brisbane, Edinburgh, and NYC. Jean teaches Theatrical Clown for The New School for Drama and The Barrow Group. She studied clown and movement with Philippe Gaulier, Merry Conway, Ron Foreman, and David Shiner among others. Her approach to Theatrical Clown has been published in Movement for Actors, Allworth Press. Her current solo work, Stop/Slow will premiere in 2020. She is artistic director of Anthropological Theatricals and on the board of The Maxine Greene Institute for Aesthetic Education and Social Imagination.
Nicki Pombier (she/her/hers) is an oral historian, educator, dramaturg and writer. She brings an oral historical approach to work with artists across disciplines, with a particular interest in how the process and products of these collaborations reflect, and enact, desires for change. She is deeply invested in co-creation, grounded in listening, with a rigorous ethic around stewarding stories into the world, in the labor of belief that doing this work might create better conditions for justice, repair, restoration, and restitution. Nicki teaches in the College of Performing Arts at The New School University and in the Oral History Master of Arts program at Columbia University. She lives on Munsee Lenape and Canarsie land, in present-day Brooklyn. More about her work can be found at www.nickipombier.com