Virginie Magnat

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Virginie Magnat, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Performance
Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies

Office: ARTS 127
Tel: 250-807-8441
Email: virginie.magnat@ubc.ca

Research and Teaching Interests:
Performance studies, experimental and intercultural theatre, non-Western performance traditions, physically-based performance training, cultural anthropology, experimental ethnography, ritual performance, postcolonial theory, cultural theory

Education:
Ph.D. in Drama and Theatre, University of California, San Diego/Irvine Joint Program, 2003
D.E.A. (pre-doctoral degree), English Department, Sorbonne/Paris III, France, 1993
Masters in English and Theatre Studies, Sorbonne/Paris III, France, 1990
Foundation Year Program, University of King’s College, Halifax, Canada, 1985
International Baccalaureate, Lester B. Pearson United World College, B.C., Canada, 1984

Teaching Approach:
In my teaching, I foreground the influence of non-Western performance traditions on contemporary theatre as well as the development of interculturalism, “théâtre de recherche,” physical theatre, dance contact improvisation, street theatre, devising, and site-specific work, thereby inviting students to explore theatre across conventional disciplinary and cultural boundaries.

For more information about the Interdisciplinary Performance Program, please visit: http://web.ubc.ca/okanagan/creative/options/theatre_option.html and go to the end of this webpage for links to experimental, intercultural, and traditional performances practices, professional theatre associations, and related resources

Performance Training:
I am originally from France and pursued theatre training in Paris, Lyon, and Saint-Etienne for fifteen years prior to conducting doctoral and postdoctoral research in the United States. My physically-based training as a performer is rooted in the teachings of founding members of Jerzy Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre. I also trained with a wide range of international performers, master-teachers, directors, and choreographers.

See PDF for more information about my performance training, academic publications, academic conference presentations, public presentations, grants, awards, fellowships and scholarships.

Current Research: Meetings with Remarkable Women/Tu es la fille de quelqu'un
Meetings with Remarkable Women - Investigating Women's Contribution to Grotowski's Cross-Cultural Performance Research (funded by a SSHRC Standard Research Grant). Tu es la fille de quelqu'un/You Are Someone's Daughter: Cross-Cultural and Trans-Generational Transmission among Women in the Grotowski Diaspora (funded by a SSHRC Research/Creation in Fine Arts Grant).

Online information available on the Grotowski Institute website:
http://rokgrotowskiego.pl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=49&Itemid=37 and on the UBC Okanagan Research Exchange Newsletter:
http://web.ubc.ca/okanagan/provost-research/__shared/assets/RXN_May_2009_V311616.htm

UNESCO designated 2009 as the “Year of Grotowski” to honor the legacy of Polish theatre innovator Jerzy Grotowski. Meetings with Remarkable Women explores the artistic journeys of women from different cultures and generations who share a direct connection to Grotowski’s legacy through their participation in the various periods of his life-long practical research. The main focus of this project is the interrelation of training, transmission, and creativity. By accounting for women’s still unexamined yet vital contributions to the Polish director’s approach, this project promotes a more diverse and inclusive assessment of Grotowski’s legacy, especially in terms of its enduring influence on contemporary performance practice and research.

In the summer of 2009, I organized a month-long Laboratory of Creative Research hosted by the Grotowski Institute, Wroclaw, Poland. This Laboratory included five work sessions led by Rena Mirecka (Poland), Katharina Seyferth (Germany), Ang Gey Pin (Singapore), Dora Arreola (Mexico), and Iben Nagel Rasmussen (Denmark), a paratheatrical project, a three-day theatre festival featuring the current creative work of these artists, as well as two days of meetings with other women whose work was influenced by Grotowski. There were seventeen international participants from eleven different countries who took part in all five work sessions, including myself and four UBCO students.

In 2009, I presented my research project at “Year of Grotowski” conferences held in Krakow, New York, Canterbury and Paris. I also organized a “Year of Grotowski” event in Montreal with the support of the Polish Embassy in Ottawa.

Cross-Cultural Perspective:
I believe that it is the responsibility of university theatre programs to familiarize students with the rich cultural legacy of world performance traditions and foster a shared sense of humanity as well as a genuine respect for diversity. My personal dedication to working cross-culturally is rooted in a foundational life experience: at the age of 15, I was fortunate to receive a two-year full scholarship to study at the Lester B. Pearson United World College of the Pacific, a non-profit institution promoting international understanding through education. My early passion for theatre was deeply informed by this intensely fulfilling time in a “global village” hosting two hundred students from over seventy countries in the coastal forest of Vancouver Island. It was then that I became aware of the infinite potentialities that arise when people with different cultural legacies live and work together. I have since envisioned performance as a powerful site of encounter, exchange, and collaboration.

Professional Affiliations:
American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR)
Founding member of the “Performance as Research” ASTR Permanent Working Group
Performance Studies International (PSI)
Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA)

Teaching Experience:
I have designed and taught courses in the history and theory of world performance traditions, performance studies, avant-garde and intercultural theatre, performance theory, the anthropology of performance, and experimental ethnography, as well as studio courses introducing students to intercultural, movement-based performance work rooted in European experimental theatre and non-Western performance traditions.

Prior to joining the University of British Columbia Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies, I taught theatre and anthropology courses at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where I held a Postdoctoral Faculty Fellowship in Anthropology from 2003 to 2005. As a doctoral candidate, I worked as a Teaching Assistant at U.C. Davis and U.C. San Diego, where I co-taught a movement class with Professor Charlie Oates (Chair of the U.C. San Diego Theatre Department). In Paris, I co-directed an international acting workshop for four years with Robert Ornellas (M.F.A. in Acting, University of California, Irvine), an American actor mentored by Professor Robert Cohen (author of Acting Power) and selected by Jerzy Grotowski to participate in the Polish director’s “Objective Drama Project” and Master Class at U.C. Irvine.

UBC Okanagan Courses:
IGS 501Y: Cultural Theory (Interdisciplinary Graduate Seminar)
THTR 411: Performance Studies
THTR 485: Directed Studies (Recent Topics: Drama Therapy, Education in Drama)
THTR 211: Performance, Embodiment, and Creativity (History of Devising)
DRAM 200: Key Directors in Contemporary Theatre
THTR 111: Introduction to Theatre and World Performance Traditions
THTR 102/202: The Actor’s Process I and II (studio courses)
THTR 170: Introduction to Voice and Movement (studio course)

UBCO Student Supervision:
I am currently supervising three graduate students (Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies). I am providing two of these graduate students with Research Assistantships funded through my SSHRC grants. In the summer of 2009, I supervised and provided funding for three graduate students and two undergraduate students involved in “Meetings with Remarkable Women/Tu es la fille de quelqu’un” that took place in Canada in June and in Poland in July-August (SSHRC-funded research project).

UBCO Performance Research and Creation:
I direct a UBCO-based Performance Laboratory dedicated to training, research and creation; participants include invited artists as well as selected graduate and undergraduate students. Previous collaborative work at UBCO include co-directing with Performance Professor Neil Cadger a site-specific ensemble piece based on seven short plays by Pulitzer prize winner Suzan-Lori Parks and performed for the 365 Days/365 Plays Theatre Festival by the twenty-two students enrolled in my “Introduction to Voice and Movement” studio course; co-creating with Visual Arts Professor Byron Johnston the site-specific, interdisciplinary event Illuminations performed by forty of our students (see photos and video documentation on FCCS website).

Links to experimental, intercultural, and traditional performance practices,
professional theatre associations, and related resources:

Konstantin Stanislavski http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konstantin_Stanislavski

Vsevolod Meyerhold http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meyerhold
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUUgaQqgBS0&feature=related

Jerzy Grotowski
http://www.culture.pl/en/culture/artykuly/os_grotowski_jerzy
http://info-poland.buffalo.edu/web/arts_culture/theater/grotowski/link.shtml

Grotowski’s Theatre Laboratory Training
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7IG6c8D73c&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VCyGPm1VJM&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TI-p3KmpfDM&feature=related

Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre: “The Constant Prince”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c97uQ6VSau0&feature=related

Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre: “Akropolis”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cjg3xwn1gLU&feature=related

Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre: “Apocalypsis cum Figuris”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BZynobrYzM&feature=related

The British Grotowski Project http://www.britishgrotowski.co.uk/

Eugenio Barba http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenio_Barba;
http://academic.evergreen.edu/curricular/fopa/theatre/texts/barba.htm

Odin Teatret, Holstebro, Denmark. http://www.odinteatret.dk/

International School of Theatre Anthropology
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjQdD5xUM_8&feature=related