ABSTRACT
Action is a performative opus with a consciously crafted, repeatable score developed at the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski in Pontedera, Italy, by workleader Thomas Richards and his group of actors/doers, a stable team of performing artists who commit to a minimum of one year of intensive practical research. One could say that Action, the central opus of the investigation conducted by Grotowski and Richards in the field of Art as vehicle, is analogous to a theatrical performance in its structure and precision of details, its use of performative means (song, movement, physical action in the sense described by Stanislavsky (see Toporkov 1979)), and its basis in the craft of acting. Yet the structure is not intended for public performance, even though invited guests periodically witness Action. The essential aim of the work, its primary purpose, is not to create meaning in the perception of an outside observer, but rather to facilitate a special process that can occur within practitioners performing with and around certain songs taken from African and Afro-Caribbean ritual traditions. 1 The performing structure functions as an objective support to assist the doer in what Grotowski terms an “itinerary in verticality:”
Verticality – we can see this phenomenon in categories of energy: heavy but organic energies (linked to the forces of life, to instincts, to sensuality) and other energies, more subtle. The question of verticality means to pass from a so-called coarse level – in a certain sense, one could say an “everyday level” – to a level of energy more subtle or even toward the higher connection. At this point to say more about it wouldn’t be right. I simply indicate the passage, the direction. There, there is another passage as well: if one approaches the higher connection – that means, if we are speaking in terms of energy, if one approaches the much more subtle energy – then there is also the question of descending, while at the same time bringing this subtle something into the more common reality, which is linked to the “density” of the body. The point is not to renounce part of our nature – all should retain its natural place: the body, the heart, the head, something that is “under our feet” and something that is “over the head.” All like a vertical line, and this verticality should be held taut between organicity and the awareness. Awareness means the consciousness which is not linked to language (the machine for thinking), but to Presence.
(1995:125)
