2. The First Lesson (10 Jan, 2024)

The first lesson was a gentle and brief start, mainly dealing with logistic issues, an unavoidable formality in the context of the university “institution”. However, the design of the course outline, the way/manner of the teaching, and the media materials we went through delivered a tone and created an atmosphere that felt not typically usual, or say, like a “gesture” questioning the usual…

Looking back, this helped to build an ethos of exploration and experimentation, and promoted a healthy sense of collaboration and co-creation, which have been the grounds of later steps in this course.

Dramaturgically speaking, it can be considered as a strategy of starting with the familiar while making it just a little bit “off” to gently initiate a process of estrangement/de-familarization (Verfremdung), an important component in Brecht’s theatre praxis.

This reminded me of the paradoxical effects coming from puppetry, mask and clowning, in which the constant co-existence of semblance and difference also create a sense of “off” that catches attention and induces questioning…