Myths and Masks of the Future

ongoing

"In the first years of the second post-war period, at Teatro dell’Università of Padua, Amleto Sartori modeled on the face of pedagogue and actor Jacques Lecoq the first Neutral Mask that revolutionized the western theatre. According to the ideas of J. Copeau and E. Decroux the Neutral Mask was created to help the actor to recover the archetypal dimension of theatre, save him from hyper-realistic acting, valorise the body and the gesture rather than the speech. Continuing the family tradition, Donato Sartori, son of Amleto, will develop in a broader sense the role of the mask in contemporary theatre, through the creation of ""gestural structures"" and ""urban masking"". This enormous theoretical and theatrical practice heritage, today represented by the Sartori Centre of Masks and Gestural Structures, is the basis of a cooperation project that aims to promote an innovative approach using mask in the European theatre, rediscovering its anthropological origins and relaunching its use in the popular performing arts, in order to restore the collective ritual dimension of theatre in which the community can find a new strong relationship with the myth. A program of scientific research, seminars, creative residences, festivals and showcases, developed over three years, which intends to direct contemporary theatrical creation on the trail of new myths, to strengthen its European dimension, allowing it to make its contribution to some of the most important challenges of our time, like social inclusion and sustainability. Issues that discount sometimes controversial narratives on which our society urgently needs to find authentic spaces for reflection and awareness. So the mask and the physical actor’s training become instruments of social action in the experimentation of inclusion paths for physical and mental disabilities, as well as urban environment perturbed by archetypal forms become a way of suburbs revitalization and to imagine a new balance between humans and environment."