Workshops

Lectures

Residencies

The Hinterlands have taught workshops at: Ko Festival, University of Vermont Burlington, University of North Carolina Charlotte, Kalamazoo College, University of Michigan Ann Arbor and Dearborn campuses, Hope College, Trinity College, Marquette University, Alverno College Economics Department, University of California Davis Classics Department, Muskingum University, Shanghai Theatre Academy, University of Pristina Theatre Department, Sichuan Vocational College of Art, College of Creative Studies, Cranbrook Photography Graduate Program, Milwaukee Public Schools, Mosaic Youth Theatre, Double Edge Theatre, and more. The Hinterlands lectures have been shared at Hochschule für Bildende Kunst (Hamburg, Germany); White Night (Chengdu, China); Zigong Cultural Palace (Zigong, China); University of Michigan Institute of Humanities; AICAD Social Practices Conference; Perform Midwest Conference; Network of Ensemble Theatres; Allied Media Conference; and Cranbrook Art Museum, among other spaces and contexts.

Workshops

Creating in The Hinterlands

This practical workshop provides an overview of devising methods used by The Hinterlands to create our layered, actor-driven work and referencing training practices in the lineage of Grotowski, Lecoq, and traditional Chinese performance (xiqu). Working off of shared source material for inspiration, students will participate in our process of using object, costume, and play to create images, environments, character, and scenes in ensemble; work with our strategies for embodied dramaturgy; and experience our approach to musicality and dynamic play. Ideal for acting/performance students or designers open to embodied practice.

Recommended for undergraduate - graduate students. Duration: a single 3-hour class - five 3-hour sessions

Building Blocks for Building Ensemble

The Hinterlands uses a variety of strategies for building ensemble among performers with different levels of performance experience, as well as across disciplines, and cultures. This workshop provides invaluable shared experience and embodied listening techniques to any kind of group working together, be it a collection of performers or co-workers in an office. Using physical and vocal approaches alike, this workshop introduces participants to our go-to platforms for play and improvisation.

Recommended for all ages. Duration: 1.5-hour class - semester-long course

Games and Ferocious Play

How can we use existing and newly created games as a kind of preparation for performance (or other kinds of creatively demanding) work? This workshop uses a variety of ways of playing to explore group dynamics, playful ways to structure difficult tasks or scenes, and the myriad ways that we need to prepare ourselves for work. Ideal for acting/performance students, directors, or working groups of all kinds.

Recommended for all ages. Duration: 2-hour class to 5-hour series

Sound and Fury: An Embodied Approach to Voice, Text, and Sound Design for the Theatre

The Hinterlands’ unique approach to voice, text, and sound design sees theatre as a place for radical sonic exploration. Using the voice, everyday objects, instruments, technology, and architecture, participants will take a holistic approach to sound design and performance. Workshop attendees will use movement, song, and text to break out of habitual vocal patterns in order to use the voice as a tool for sonic exploration, create soundscapes from everyday objects and actions, and explore the possibilities for integrating technology into performer-centric theatrical work. Ideal for acting/performance students, designers, directors, or musicians.

Recommended for undergraduate - graduate students. Duration: 3-hour class to three 3-hour sessions

Lectures

From Studio Practice to Public Practice

This lecture shares The Hinterlands approach to working in public spaces, from our Porous Borders Festival to our Take Out, Take Down project, to the on-going work at our neighborhood-embedded studio. We share how we started to regularly make work beyond the boundaries of theatre, and how this practice intersects with our highly detailed theatrical work.

1-1.5 hour lecture

Place-based Practices

From international projects designed to link communities and artists in two locations at the same time to the work that we create for and about our Detroit neighborhood, where we are is important to The Hinterlands’ creative practice. We share not only our history of work linked to place, but also the history of some of our greatest inspirations in this work, as well as strategies we’ve used to engage various publics.

1-1.5 hour lecture

From Research to Performance

This lecture-demonstration details the processes and evolution of our performance material from research to the stage, including integration of found text into performance work, adaptation of historical material and reenactment, song and performance, and our strategies for framing a performance in historical and cultural context. The lecture presents moments from four Hinterlands works: The Radicalization Process, Manifest Destiny (there was blood on the saddle), The Circuit, and Will You Miss Me?

1-1.5 hour lecture

Making Utopias

Making Utopias is an iteration of The Hinterlands’ utopian dinner series: a laboratory for exploring contemporary social issues important to that particular group of diners at that particular moment. Part-lecture, part-conversation, part-meal, Making Utopias participants learn to use The Hinterlands question-driven training practice in a playful and practical manner, building bonds between participants while engaging in deep and meaningful conversations.

3 hour participatory lecture/conversation and meal.

Residencies