ISTA reflection

During the ISTA workshop, despite the limited duration, I have experienced new things and  accumulated abundant knowledge that I can apply to my future study. Also, I am the only one from CA in my group which I was worried about at first, but it actually enables me to step out of my comfort zone and socialize with people I have not met before. This also contributes to my confidence which is significant to being a successful theatre student.

We’ve done various activities in three days, one of the activities that stands out to me the most is called the relation circle. To begin with, we divide ourselves into groups of two, and one of us starts a scene without initiating the conversation; then the rest of us join the scene with conversation, deciding a relationship with the partner in advance. This activity is really intriguing because the one who starts the scene have to clarify the activity clearly with only movements and the partner have to indicate the relationship between through only a few lines so that the scene can move on smoothly. When I was doing it, I did not get the activity that my partner was doing precisely so the relationship did not quite make sense in that scene; however, because the entry of the ridiculous relationship, the scene actually became more humorous. In addition to the fun, I also understood how essential the relationship is to the scene because it determines how the characters react with each other and how the dynamic between them works even though the situation is not changed because the intention of character will be differed. 

What’s more, during the Tectonics master class, we talked about how moments contribute to the success of a play. Moments that are memorable are not related to texts, instead, they are all associated different elements of stage including gesture, lighting or even pauses. We tried to create small moments with only gestures and it was amazing to see how powerful the physical state can be. The elements of the moment are essential to the message that is going to be delivered to the audience, and different elements can change the intentions and emotions of the text profoundly. So when I perform, I can try to utilize stage elements in different ways to explore which works the best. 

Another thing that I learned from this experience is that how to give effective feedback. Giving and receiving feedback is extremely important to theatre works because it not only helps others to improve, but also enables ourselves to analyze work pieces objectively which is beneficial. Feedback can be categorized as interpretative feedback and structural feedback. Interpretative feedback means opinions about what message we receive from the play which is vital to determine whether the way that director or actor delivers the message effectively or not. And structural feedback is about how the stage image is presented to the audience. 

Overall, it is really beneficial for me to attend such a workshop and I hope to corporate the experience to my future theatre journey.