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Colleagues, Live & Mythical

 

Biographical notes on colleagues and mythical figures involved in recent or current Pantheatre projects - in alphabetical order.

Ares, Richard Armstrong, Athena, Discordia, Dominique Dupuy, Evil, Maria Fernandez, Nor Hall, Harmonia, Roy Hart, Hecate, Herakles, Hermes Trismegistus, James Hillman, Nick Hobbs, Haim Isaacs, Stephen Karcher, Kristin Linklater, Dick McCaw, Mole, Aristotle Onassis, Suzanne Osten, Pan, Pandora, Priapus, Connie Rodriguez, Cindy Sebrell, Sonu Shamdasani, Vicente Fuentes, Thor.

Biographies of Pantheatre's directors - Enrique Pardo, Linda Wise

 

 

James Hillman, président d'honneur de Panthéâtre est décédé le jeudi 27 octobre 2011. Nous lui dédions une page MEMORIAL; Il fut notre principal "maître à penser" ainsi que président d'honneur et membre fondateur du Festival Mythe et Théâtre, auquel il contribua à de nombreuses reprises.

Nous avons composé une page avec les références de ses ouvrages traduits en français.
James Hillman - France

FACEBOOK
Spring Publications


Ares
loves battle, martial encounters, the vivifying panache of conflict. Yet his interests lie much more with Aphrodite than with Nike, Goddess of Victory, (as a child, he was taught to dance by Priapus!). Homer, and with him all politically correct occidental thought, try to demote him from the Olympian Club, as a second rate incurable social case. While this exclusion goes on, war is taken over by the Gods of greed, hate and intolerance. Specialists tend to agree that he is the most repressed of all Gods today and that it is high time to listen to what he has to say. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Richard Armstrong
director of contemporary opera and music-theatre at the Banff Centre (Canada) is currently vocal director of Jackie O, a new opera by Michael Daugherty. One of the world's best known extended voice teachers, he navigated through the 60s art scene underworld, the avant-garde theatre of the 70s, and emerged with a unique approach to voice-theatre. Described as having "the noble bearing, the sureness and beauty of a lion", he is also an experienced performer, singer, and now writer. He will read extracts from a collection of vocal encounters. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Athena
is rather blood thirsty in the Iliad; she calmed down in the Odyssey, except when it came to slaughtering Penelope's suitors! Daddy's daughter (she leapt out of Zeus' head fully armoured), first of her class according to Homer, she was also Freud's favorite. This fabulous martial maid became a "one woman vice squad", and top model of civilising colonial empires, ('white' ones, of course!): Paris, Vienna, Brussels, London, where she oversees the City from the top of the Bank of England, and even New York, under the surprisingly dour features of the Statue of Liberty. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Discordia
the Goddess Eris, mistress of strife, antagonism and enmity, started the Trojan war because she was not invited to a wedding. (Would you invite her to yours?). She is very likely to turn up at a Festival dedicated to "The Enemy". One of her favorite tools is the sharp tongue of criticism, and Homer says that "once she begins she cannot stop". Alchemists offered the following advice when confronted with the unbearable crowing of the Black Raven: "cut off its head and put it in your pocket - never throw it away! The right context may come when you can bear to listen to what it has to say".
Dominique Dupuy
dancer, choreographer, is one of the world's ultimate alchemists of movement. His master classes are an eloquent revelation of what makes a 'moving' body: gesture, breath, ecstatic skin and flying bones, lyrical muscle and the necessary dose of narcissism. As a performer and writer, he has become France's dance ambassador all over the world. He recently inaugurated the Centre for Study and Research in Contemporary Dance at his beautiful Mas de la Dance in Provence. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Evil
the absolute enemy, is actually quite relative and takes many forms: for Christianity, it is Paganism. For the Olympians, it would rather be the Titans, beings with souls of steel, psychopaths devoid of feelings or boundaries, like today's cathodic cops and their 3000 killings a minute on TV. As for Pan, his enemy is probably still the Pope. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Maria Fernandez
is the kind of woman you like to stay in your house: she creates space and uncovers or lays to rest old allies or new enemies. Dancer, intrepid explorer, she braves her battles, be it with mosquitoes, rats or monkeys in meditation with the Dalai Lama, or a black-belt ex-boyfriend. Since the last festival she has followed the shamanic paths through Mexico and Lapland, and found her roots in the Trinidad melting-pot. She deals with the occult creatures in your shadow with an agile and exotic touch. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Nor Hall

"psyche's scribe", writer, therapist and classicist from Minnesota is a map-maker in the territory of Women's Studies, who took her first detour into Enemy Land with Broodmales, a book about takeover-from-within strategies of couvade. Since then she has incurred the wrath of several Immortal males who insist they don't want to be pregnant - Ogoon, Hephaestus, Tubal-Cain. Ever serene under pressure, Nor is listening through their flash & thunder and taking discrete notes on what could be the self-annihilating climax of the War Gods at the end of the current era. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Her lecture at the '99 Festival in New Orleans, Hermes, the God with the Keyhole Aura, inspired the theme On Gossip (Ireland 2000). "Psyche's scribe", writer, therapist, and imaginal mythologist from Minnesota, she is a map-maker in the territory of women's studies. Her lectures on the mysterious Dionysian goings-on in Pompeii have been heard from Vilnius to San Francisco. Moving into dramaturgy, collaborating with Archipelago theatre director Ellen Hemphill, she has produced three stunning pieces. The fourth, SNOW, is having its premiere in May, and a fifth is in the making. (From "On Gossip" brochure, 2000)See also New Orleans 1999 Hermes Festival biography and workshop presentation.

Harmonia
is the daughter of, guess who? Aphrodite and Ares! and, of course, her name comes from harmozein (=to fit together). This gives her a lot more character than her contemporary image of sweetness and light, advertising environmentally friendly margarine. She deals basically with extremes, and don't forget, Dionysos was her grandson: she married Cadmus to found the ill-fated house of Thebes - which is as far from New Age harmonics as you can get! (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Roy Hart
(1927 - 1975). His work with the vision of the eight octave voice led him to very different frontiers than those of other charismatic theatre directors of the 60s. He concentrated on the psychological 'inner' transformation of the actor within an intense communitarian setting, and, sharing the time's redemptionist zeal, claimed the dismantling of the barriers between theatre and therapy. His Roy Hart Theatre, founded in the landmark year of 1968, played an important role in the early voice and theatre training years of Mayer, Armstrong, Wise and Pardo. An extraordinary vocalist and performer, he inspired (and often quarreled with) composers like Stockhausen, Henze and Maxwell-Davies. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Hecate
Goddess of the three ways (tri-via), travels with a flock of suicides and freshly killed souls that she uses to make daimones. She likes owls, howling dogs and household rubbish. If you are out after dark, invoke her, for she can take you through the dark changes. Some swear she wears black underwear. (From the "Magic" brochure, 1995)
Herakles
saw enemies everywhere, so tried to turn the world into a safe suburbia. Never finishing his labours in time (like shooting Viet Congs well into the 80s), only once did he doubt his mission: when crashing his way into the Underworld. Neither club, nor arrows, nor strangleholds seemed to work there. Hermes tried to point out that he was shooting at the DEAD: IMAGES. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)
Hermes Trismegistus
god of high magic and profound secrets, is young Hermes' big brother. Product of an incestuous marriage between an Egyptian dog who can write and see in the dark and a Greek pickpocket, he has been keeping the library of hte soul's sectrets for three thousand years. (From the "Magic" brochure, 1995)

 

James Hillman

See Homage to James Hillman

American writer and psychoanalyst, James Hillman was the founder of Archetypal Psychology and the world's most renowned Jungian psychoanalyst. Having been director of studies of the C.G.Jung Institut of Zurich until 1974, his work deepens and questions the practice and theoretical inheritance of C.G.Jung. One of its characteristics, besides its exceptional literary quality, is a cultural wealth that links depth psychology, the inheritance of Freud and Jung, with Western traditions of the imagination, from mythology and neoplatonism to the contemporary arts, poetry, dance and theatre. His more recent writings, like "We've had one hundred years of psychoanalysis, and the world is getting worse", question with great humour and radicality the way his own work is used today, accusing today's intelligentia, especially in America, of abandoning politics for the sake of therapy. His "The Soul's Code" (1997) has been a best-seller throughout the world.

James Hillman was one of the main speakers at the Eranos Conferences in Ascona, Switzerland; he has been invited to lecture at the main American Universities, and was made citizen of honour of the town of Florence, for his contribution to the importance of Florentine Renaissance thought. He was honorary president of Pantheatre, was an inspiring presence in most of Pantheatre's cultural and performing events since 1982. He also invited Enrique Pardo to contribute to Robert Bly's Mens' Movement in its early days in California and the U.K.

Visit James Hillman - Life and Work at the Pacifica Graduate Institute Library

Free download of a lecture : http://shop.betterlisten.com/products/a-blue-fire-part-ii-with-james-hillman

A very thorough presentation also on http://www.mythosandlogos.com/Hillman.htm

Spring Publications for more information and books.

James Hillman France - références des traductions françaises

 

Stephen Karcher

2012 : Curently living in Washington state. See : http://www.stephenkarcher.com/

(2001 - from the 9th Myth and Theatre presentation) Author, translator, lecturer and consulting diviner, he has worked with oracle texts, myths and archetypes for more than thirty years. He was Co-Director of the Eranos Yi Ching Project and helped to pioneer a depth-psychological approach to divination. He has danced, acted and choreographed professionally. His latest books are Ta Chuan: The Great Treatise and The Oracle of Kuan Yin, Goddess of Compassion. Consulting oracle to the Festival, he currently lives in North Wales where he is working on a new book, The Classic of Dreams, and makes dinner for traveling ghosts-and-spirits.

(2002 - from the Granada Forum presentation.) Stephen Karcher, Ph.D is an internationally known scholar, writer, translator, lecturer and consultant. He was Director of Research at the Eranos Foundation, Ascona, Switzerland, and has published many books, translations, and scholarly articles in the field of comparative mythology, divination, depth psychology and religious experience, including The Classic Chinese Oracle of Change (Harper Collins), The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Divination (Harper Collins), Working with Change: How to Use the I Ching (Harper Collins), The Oracle of Kuan Yin, Goddess of Compassion (Little, Brown), and Symbols of Love (Little, Brown). His newest book, Myths for Change, will be published next year. He was a professional dancer and choreographer for several years and has trained and performed in New York, Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. He holds a doctorate in Comparative Literature and Archetypal Psychology.

Kristin Linklater
Internationally acclaimed voice teacher; co-founded Shakespeare and Company (USA). Her books: Freeing the Natural Voice and Freeing Shakespeare's Voice, are classics in the field. She has directed workshops at previous Myth and Theatre Festivals and entered into a Linklater/Pardo conspiracy which resulted in a production entitled The Shakespeare Betrayal, directed by Pardo in which Linklater embodied the illegitimate half-sister of the Earl of Oxford -- revealing the real authors of the canon. Despite all this, she was appointed in 1998 to the Chair of Theatre at Columbia University, New York. (From the "On Gossip" brochure, 2000).
Venice Manley

In memoriam
Venice Manley
24 January 1934 - 31 August, 2004
une voix et une joie uniques se sont éteintes
a unique joy and voice departed

On the photo opposite, during the 2002 May Malérargues Symposium, in an exquisite "thinking" moment, with Nor Hall (centre) and Linda Wise (front)

Venice Manley, a close friend and collaborator of Pantheatre, died August 31st, 2004. The following short biographies are drawn from projects in which she was involved. They are a tribute to her professionalism and enterprise. Her voice will always be with us.

Venice Manley, 24 January 1934 - 31 August, 2004.

Merry and bright and bonny and blithe… an irrepressible songbird was she…and deeply missed. A foster child and native Londoner, Venice was born singing, and as a child sang for a penny in the street. Aged 11 she was a soloist in one of Benjamin Britten's pieces. At 13 she lost her leg from below the knee in an accident. Singing for pleasure continued, through her teens and into her early 20's when she began working with the Tinkers in Ireland as part of a social work scheme - she grew to love them and their songs, and later worked closely with Yul Brynners' gypsy projects. It was in Dublin that she first had more formal voice and musical training.

Her voice remained incandescent and never lost it's lovely, lilting natural quality - A wonderful teacher, she also sang for charity, formed an a capella group in London: "Kite"; she sang and taught her way through festivals and workshops, in England, Europe, Canada and the USA and in recent years met and worked with Georgian singers and musicians, spending several weeks there last October. These last years in London she directed a Georgian choir.

Songs from every corner of the world seemd to find her, and she them - she taught a capella polyphonic singing with great verve and grace - always by ear and always acknowledging where they came from and what they were about, the human element ever present.

A painful bout with cancer several years ago didn't diminish her joie de vivre and capacity for delicious gossip. This year the cancer came back to claim her… Perhaps though, it's just a metamorphosis, a sea-change, bringing a certain something whenever a song is heard, or sung… along with a lilting giggle and a whoop of joy …. (Obituary by Liza Mayer - for VASTA - Voice Teachers Association.)

Singer, Singing Teacher , Chorale Director - the grand-daughter of a Gaiety Girl, was born in London. She began her singing career in London, aged 11, when Benjamin Britten chose her as soloist for his "St Nicholas Cantata". She went on to study solfege and classical singing, and also began a life-long interest in folkmusic ("World Music") whilst working with gypsies in Ireland. Ms Manley has worked closely with Frankie Armstrong, Helen Chadwick, Isaye Barnwell of "Sweet Honey in the Rock", the Giving Voice Project in Wales, The Natural Voice Association, The Roy Hart Theatre and Pantheatre. She taught regularly at the Guildhall School of Music, the Philippe Gaulier School, The International Workshop Festival, and Coventry's Triangle Theatre, as well as in continental Europe: The Odin Theatre, the USA and Canada - She sang with the a capella group: "Kite", in the UK and Europe, and directed a choir of Georgian music: "Maspindzeli". In 2001 Ms. Manley and her Georgian choir were invited to participate in a unique festival of polyphonic music at the Roundhouse: "Because I Sing", by the composers: Orlando Gough and Richard Chew (Director of "The Shout"), and choreographer: Alain Platel. In September 2002, Ms. Manley and Mazpindzeli toured Georgia.

Venice Manley was a lyric soprano and singing teacher from London. Militating with Irish tinkers nurtured her curiosity about their music, and her irrepressible gathering instinct turned to collecting songs and chants from all over the world. Grand-daughter of a London Gaiety Girl, she sings with the a capella group KITE and has recently performed in 'The Soundhouse', a project directed by Meredith Monk. She has coached at the Odin Teatret, the National Theatre, Giving Voice Project (CPR Wales), the Roy Hart Centre (France). (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

V e n i c e (un homenaje de Sara Ledesma)
mi preciosa maestra
abrió caminos en mi voz y en mi, hasta entonces insospechados, totalmente vírgenes
también fue ella quien me llevó hasta vosotros, Linda, Lisa, Enrique, Haim, Pantheatre, Roy Hart
Su habitación en Londres en aquella época, con el piano, el chal cubriendo la mecedora y el jardín mirándonos desde el otro lado del enorme ventanal que la presidía, me parecía el rincón donde nacen todos los cuentos, donde nace la fantasma, donde nace la miel de azahar.
Ella se consideraba vieja y fea, o quizá solo decía eso para ganarse algún que otro dulce piropo; como si aflorara en ella una coqueteria adolescente. ?¿Cómo convencerla, en la Inglaterra victoriana de parabienes y amabilidades aprendidas y usadas hasta la saciedad desde la cuna, de que mis ojos la dibujaban como un hada madrina salida de un bosque encantado, con poderes para sacar de mm mil sonidos de arco iris ?
"don't you know that I have a wooden leg Sara? " (she said while showing me the comic stripes that Helen Chadwick,also my teacher and her felow partner in a singing CD, had offered her as a gift picturing her whole life since she was a little girl) - "I knew that finally there should be something "not real" in all the magic world you create around "- I thought
- No!!! - I did just say.
Mi querida Venice...
fragil, y fuerte a la vez
A veces parecía que le faltaba uno de los dos "puntos de apoyo" en la realidad
A veces parecía que sólo lo fingía

V e n i c e
seguiré cantando todas las canciones que me enseñaste
para que otros y otras también disfruten de tu magia
IN MEMORIAM

Dick McCaw

an outrageous backbencher (constantly harassing the PM William Shakespeare), and brilliant graduate of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, is a specialist in medieval and early Renaissance culture: "Was There Intelligence Before Shakespeare?" He originally proposed "Love Thine Enemy", but then asked to have the "love" crossed out and replaced with "know", explaining: "I fear more what my enemy knows about me, than what I know about my enemy". His talk will consider knowing one's enemy, drawing on Sade and Bakhtin. Founding member, actor and musician with the legendary Medieval Players, he is Artistic Director of the International Workshop Festival, London. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Mole

or at least the European mole, talpa europaea, "lives in a many-chambered underground establishment with a bolt run tunnel for emergency exits". Poor eyesight makes her a model initiate (outer eyes veiled, inner eye opened) and she tracks current, collective trends with her nose for what's happening. She needs to be closely watched and frequently consulted during the Festival as her Coyote husband (a charmer who's also a vicious, drunken scavenger) can constellate rampant antagonism and confrontation for the heck of it - especially between the men! (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Odin

looms as the father and strategic warlord of the Nordic Gods. He wins battles via dark magical tricks rather than relying on heart and muscle. He gained wisdom by managing to sacrifice himself to himself, and became the demanding protector of the arts. He has a propensity for magico-acrobatic trainings: one can see him hanging upside-down form the world tree for nine days at a time. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Aristotle Onassis

was promoted public enemy number one when he abducted the young President's widow to his Greek island. Most of us, at the time, reacted like Demeter when Hades (also called 'the millionaire'), drove off with Persephone in his black limousine and made her the queen of his 'night clubs'. Yet, when Jackie O died recently, eulogies were respectful, even admiring. Puritanical attitudes to Sacra Moneta (Goddess Money) were part of the problem, and her temple, Wall Street, remains 'the' enemy to those whom Americans are now calling 'euromarxists'. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Suzanne Osten

has never shied away from using her prolific energy, nor her position as one of Sweden's most important film and theatre directors, to speak out on social issues or to take radical artistic risks. "Several of my shows have been flops. Not because of carelessness... they have been about difficult things, strange things..." she states with characteristic generosity and fighting spirit. With her company Unga Klara, she has directed masterpiece productions and revolutionized theatre for young people with performances like Medea's Children. Two of her films have won prizes at the Créteil Women's Film Festival: The Mozart Brothers '89 (also shown at Myth and Theatre that year), and Speak Up, Its So Dark (subtitled "Auschwitz Exists") in 93, amidst furore. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Pandora

Pandora, supposedly, charmed them out of their wits and got the best and worst from ALL the gods (pan-dora: all gifted)! Her beauty and curiosity wrought havoc to Prometheus’ ideologies, though his followers still think Hope can save humanity. Enrique Pardo is looking into Pandora’s Box and the cast of this production will be stirring the gossip in his workshop.

Priapus

like Pan, is a child of Hermes (Hermaphroditus completes the 'hermetic' triangle). His mother is said to have been none other than Aphrodite, who abandoned him at birth, finding his endowments just too grotesque. Keeper of gardens (gardener and exhibitionist scarecrow), Late Antiquity vowed this phallic God a fervent, prophylactic and apotropaic cult: witness Petronius' and Fellini's Satyricon. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Connie Rodriguez

Associate Professor of Classical Studies at Loyola University in New Orleans, she teaches Latin, Greek, Classical Archaeology, ancient mystery cults and Pandora's Daughters, a course on women in antiquity. She has served for two years as interim associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. Prior to that she was chair of the Department of Classical Studies. Dr. Rodriguez has taught abroad in Italy and in Greece both during the academic year and summer. The only thing she likes more than gossip is chocolate! (From the "On Gossip" brochure, 2000)

Cindy Sebrell

left her career as a Speech Language Pathologist to study mythology at the Pacifica Graduate Institute after discovering that her chronically wilting flowers bloomed once Priapus was around. It did not take long for her to discover that the enemies of her now favorite god, were everywhere "from church ladies to feminazis to the emasculated slaves of suburban culture". In her writings on Priapus you may discover the God's salutary and salubrious properties, and the fact that it is not "the Goddess" with all her birthings that will save the planet, but the God of phalloi. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

Sonu Shamdasani

Historian of psychology, editor of C.G.Jung's Red Book, published by the Philemon Foundation in 2009.

...will lead us through the underworlds and corridors of power of modern psychologies. How did a movement that promised a new era in personal relations where enmity and strife would be allayed with conscious understanding, give rise to the new mafias, war lords and drug barons of psychology? Historian of psychology at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, London, he is editor of Flournoy's "From India to the Planet Mars", Jung's seminar on "The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga", "Speculations After Freud: Psychoanalysis, Philosophy and Culture" (with Michael Munchow) and "The Past of an Illusion" (with Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen) forthcoming. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997)

See also New Orleans 1999 Hermes Festival workshop presentation.

Thor

is the fire screen of iceberg mythologies, constantly battling out in the cold, protecting the frail boundaries of humans against the roving giants. Glorified into slavery by Stalin, who turned him into a proletarian Rambo, this earnest, passionate, hard-working hulk is being rediscovered as a friendly, even sexy, symbol of power, even though his hammer adorns the piercings of most Swedish punks. (From "The Enemy" brochure, 1997.)

 

Résidences

An ideal flat for artistic residences with piano check LINK