THE PROGRAM
“The Stromboli Project” is comprised of summer workshops held annually in Stromboli, Italy. Each workshop is carefully designed for distinct participants and dedicated to a specific focus. The program is committed to Research, Education & Production and intends to explore and hone connections between the text, the Linklater Voice Technique, the participants, and Stromboli’s magnificent landscape. The process is dedicated to communicating the universal power of stories and natural elements through film and theatrical performances.
STROMBOLI
The Sicilian island of Stromboli is one of seven Aeolian Islands and among the most active volcanoes on the planet. Its dramatic black sands, lush vegetation, deep blue seas, breathtaking sunsets and volcanic rumblings offer an inspiring set for the exploration of literature and theatrical texts. Among the texts explored each year is Metamorphoses, which Ovid wrote largely in neighboring Sicily. The presence of the characters in those immortal stories inhabits this magical part of the world. The participants’ voices and the texts will resonate in Stromboli and its dramatically changing environment: a landscape of earth, wind, fire and water, evoking elemental metamorphosis.
THE LINKLATER TECHNIQUE
The Linklater Technique for voice and text was developed by world-renowned voice teacher Kristin Linklater. It consists of a progression of exercises that aim to free the natural voice from physical, mental, emotional and energetic blocks developed over the course of one’s life. The goal is to release a voice that is free, expressive, evocative and powerful. At the core of the teaching is the idea of a “classical self”—a larger self that is able to embody and express all human experiences and allows actors to metamorphose into any imagined character (human or otherwise). The Linklater Technique is designed to discover, release and strengthen the individual voice, in order to reveal this larger (or classical) self.
METAMAMORPHOSES AND METAMORPHOSIS: An Introduction
Metamorphoses, by the Roman poet Ovid, was completed in 8 A.D. and remains one of the most popular and instrumental narrative poems in history. It is the single most complete and extensive narrative of Greek mythology. It was extremely popular in Ovid’s own time and also informed countless artists and writers throughout time (one for all: William Shakespeare.)
Though it has had an immeasurable influence on Western culture, Ovid’s Metamorphoses is not a textbook, a scientific treatise or scholarly essay. It is a thrilling tale of tales that run relentlessly one into another, offering a dizzying experience of time and a visceral sense of transformation. It contains elements of tragedy, comedy, pathos, and irony. The lightness and speed with which Ovid jumps from one image to the next creates a cinematic quality, and the stories, though fantastical, dramatic, mysterious and elusive, resonate with us. The themes contained in the tales speak to us and at the same time seem to defy any firm definition or final interpretation.
Without the Metamorphoses, our culture would be lacking an essential treasure, and we would be missing the language and metaphors through which we analyze, interpret, and understand our human experience.