BEYOND COMMON SENSE
Laboratory report after the academy week
Annette Krauss / Amelie Mallmann
The 'Common Sense' of a society is an agreement on the generally accepted rules of behaviour that need to be obeyed: how to behave in public places, which conventions need to be observed when you consort with other people and which boarders need to be respected in any case.
In the laboratory BEYOND COMMON SENSE of the WINTER ACADEMY 2 a group of 16 to 20 year olds consciously headed towards the grey area of subtle irritation: the daily life and goings around the Frankfurter Allee in Lichtenberg (district of Berlin) was first analysed and then, in a second step, distracted by 'invisible' actions a little changes of behaviour and therby translated into the form of artistic intervention. Starting point and preparatory work of this interaction in the public sphere was the acting method VIEWPOINTS, which conveys an intensive experience of all aspects of acting to the performer; e.g. Duration: how long can I perform an action on stage before it gets boring? Kinaesthetical response: impulses of other people are recognized and answered with a physical reaction. Especially important: repetition. Which impulses from the outside can I repeat and how? What causes this principle on the spectator's side? This repetition was carried as a first exercise into the public sphere: a teenager, as an example, followed a woman for several minutes, stopped when she stopped and stared into a shop window, lost in thought with the head slightly bend to the right and a hand in the coat, just as she did. What wasn't noticed by the women turned out to be an even more interesting scene when watching the reactions of the accidental audience of pedestrians. They reacted in very different manners, ranging from not noticing the action, over ignoring, interpreting the entire situation as coincidence to recognizing the situation as set up. On the videos the action is clearly noticeable as a performance.
Even within the WINTER ACADEMY the teenagers intervened. For every lunch break they had the assignment to provoke a social conflict. Once, laboratory 8 hoarded all the beverages on their table. The people sitting on the other tables had to come up with strategies to get something to drink. This example showed that the reactions of the outsiders can be fiercer than expected; because some didn't notice that it was a trick (the director of the academy threatened to make them pay for all the drinks).
In the laboratory BEYOND COMMON SENSE of the WINTER ACADEMY 2 a group of 16 to 20 year olds consciously headed towards the grey area of subtle irritation: the daily life and goings around the Frankfurter Allee in Lichtenberg (district of Berlin) was first analysed and then, in a second step, distracted by 'invisible' actions a little changes of behaviour and therby translated into the form of artistic intervention. Starting point and preparatory work of this interaction in the public sphere was the acting method VIEWPOINTS, which conveys an intensive experience of all aspects of acting to the performer; e.g. Duration: how long can I perform an action on stage before it gets boring? Kinaesthetical response: impulses of other people are recognized and answered with a physical reaction. Especially important: repetition. Which impulses from the outside can I repeat and how? What causes this principle on the spectator's side? This repetition was carried as a first exercise into the public sphere: a teenager, as an example, followed a woman for several minutes, stopped when she stopped and stared into a shop window, lost in thought with the head slightly bend to the right and a hand in the coat, just as she did. What wasn't noticed by the women turned out to be an even more interesting scene when watching the reactions of the accidental audience of pedestrians. They reacted in very different manners, ranging from not noticing the action, over ignoring, interpreting the entire situation as coincidence to recognizing the situation as set up. On the videos the action is clearly noticeable as a performance.
Even within the WINTER ACADEMY the teenagers intervened. For every lunch break they had the assignment to provoke a social conflict. Once, laboratory 8 hoarded all the beverages on their table. The people sitting on the other tables had to come up with strategies to get something to drink. This example showed that the reactions of the outsiders can be fiercer than expected; because some didn't notice that it was a trick (the director of the academy threatened to make them pay for all the drinks).
All interventions were prepared and reflected in extensive discussions. With the combination of the very physical acting method VIEWPOINTS and the experience of interventions of the public sphere, the teenagers had the possibility of learning in an intensive way. Together the actions were tested and the surprise at the first viewing of the resulting video sequences was experienced together as well.
In the final presentation we tried to show elements of the VIEWPOINT method and the most important phases of the week by playing and by using video documentation.
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