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| At The Mask Center in L5P, Atlanta, Georgia (photos by Ruth Schowalter) |
ECSTATIC FOLLOWING: Atlanta
InterPlayers are learning what it means to be part of an InterPlay performance
group!
Written
from the perspective of Ruth Schowalter, InterPlayer participant and social media facilitator
I'm so grateful for
Jennifer Denning being an anchor for InterPlay here in Atlanta and
bringing Sheila K. Collins to our beautiful
southern city to help us develop an InterPlay performance group. Sheila has
already facilitated the development of 5 InterPlay performance groups form (4
in Texas and 1 in Pittsburgh). And Friday January
24, 2014, was monumental for those of us in the Atlanta InterPlay community
(visit our Facebook page)!
We got our beginning
performance workshop in the series of four that we will receive over the next 8
months. First, Sheila gave us a brief
history of InterPlay performance groups. The first one was “Wing It,” which InterPlay co-founders
Phil Porter and
Cynthia Winton-Henry started in San Francisco more than 2 decades ago and continues to be
vibrantly alive today. Then after the brief history…drum roll…
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| A BRIEF HISTORY. Sheila K. Collins (second from left) gives us a quick history of how InterPlay developed performance groups in different cities (see a list of InterPlay performance groups HERE). |
…Sheila introduced the
concept of "ecstatic following."
What a curious phrase--ECSTATIC FOLLOWING!!!
In Cynthia and Phil's
book, What the Body Wants, there is a section
about being a FOLLOWER when you are doing InterPlay activities. Yes, you can be a leader as well, but an
important way of being is FOLLOWING! This is a “charged” word to a citizen of
the United States! We are taught to be independent and to shed other people’s
new ideas like yesterday’s old skin.
In InterPlay
performance and activities, however, FOLLOWING is essential. I leaned in to
listen to Sheila because I had read about this concept of being a FOLLOWER
several months ago in Cynthia’s and Phil’s book. Now, to hear about
"following" again in the context of our newly forming performance
group, my understanding of this concept heightened, deepened, and became
evermore curious!
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| DEMONSTRATING LEADING AND FOLLOWING. |
Did Cynthia refer to
FOLLOWING as an "ecstatic" activity, I asked myself. Maybe…I will
have to check that out later. But for
now, I am leaning into the concept of "ecstatic following." What does
it mean for us—the Atlanta InterPlay Performance Group? For me?
Well, to perform
improvisation using the tools of InterPlay, one needs to follow his/her fellow
InterPlayers--that's what creates the awesomeness for the audience. The actions
look rehearsed. That is...if players
are fully committed to following movements of other players. That means
surrendering your own ideas, being vulnerable and present to others, and taking
risks.
WHY would we want to
surrender our own ideas, be vulnerable and present to others and to take risks
when performing?
Because we want to
build a community not only amongst our InterPlay performance group but also in
our wider Atlanta community. InterPlay performance groups are a form of
activism.
YES! Artful play is Activism—making
positive change in our communities! So,
right now, we Atlanta InterPlayers are needing to ask ourselves this important
question:
What are the needs of
our community?
For now, that is all
the time I have to talk about the first workshop of Atlanta InterPlay
performance group. Stay tuned if you are curious about us. Maybe you will want
to join us!
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