Tag: Ethnodrama
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Some Reflective Notes on Directing the Online Auto-Ethnotheatre See You Zoom – An Account of the Lives of Hongkongers in the Dramatic 2020 | DaTEAsia Vol. 10 GallerySome Reflective Notes on Directing the Online Auto-Ethnotheatre See You Zoom – An Account of the Lives of Hongkongers in the Dramatic 2020 | DaTEAsia Vol. 10
Some Reflective Notes on Directing the Online Auto-Ethnotheatre See You Zoom – An Account of the Lives of Hongkongers in the Dramatic 2020 | DaTEAsia Vol. 10
This article accounts the director’s reflection on the creating and performing of the auto-ethnotheatre See You Zoom series (February-October 2020), through the video-conferencing software Zoom during the staying home period due to COVID-19. Driven by an urge to connect community people under the cumulative impact of the social unrest and the pandemic since mid-2019, the director started this creative journey, encountered challenges, and gained insights of devising, rehearsing and staging auto-ethnotheatre entirely through Zoom. Three aspects of online theatre-making were reflected: (i) working with actors without their physical presence (ii) playing with the public and private spaces, and (iii) managing the engagement of Zoom participatory-audience.
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An Alternative Path: A Physical and Metaphorical Group-devised Ethnodrama | DaTEAsia Vol. 7 Gallery
An Alternative Path: A Physical and Metaphorical Group-devised Ethnodrama | DaTEAsia Vol. 7
Applied Theatre Practice, Journal of Drama and Theatre Education in Asia (DaTEAsia), Applied Theatre Research
An Alternative Path: A Physical and Metaphorical Group-devised Ethnodrama | DaTEAsia Vol. 7
Graffitopia is a group-devised ethnodrama on the lives of twelve children aged 6 to 12 of different family and socio-economical backgrounds in Hong Kong. It was performed in May 2015 in the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, a public performance venue. In this paper, using Graftopia as a case study, we discuss how researcher-devisingperformers (RDPs) embody, transform and present ethnographic data in the creative process of an ethnodrama, and how such process deepens the RDPs’ understanding of the informants, themselves as well as the devising methodology and aesthetics of ethnodrama. The devising process of the eight RDPs were recorded and studied, and small-group interviews with all the RDPs were conducted towards the last stage of the rehearsal process to investigate their experience and moments of discoveries throughout the creative process. It has been found that the physical, stylised, metaphorical, and reflective devising process and performing style generated an aesthetic space for the RDPs to build not only their understanding of the ethnographic data, but also a strong connection between the RDPs’ selves and the children’s lived experience. Such aesthetic space is crucial to the transformative power, authenticity, research purposes, educational and artistic values of ethnodrama as a form of applied theatre.
