Physiological performing exercises by Jan Fabre: an additional training method for contemporary performers

Abstract

Jan Fabre (Antwerp, 1958) is one of the creative minds of the so-called ‘Flemish Wave’ in the performing arts of the 1980s, a generation of directors, choreographers, actors and dancers who have developed a highly individual language on stage, breaking through the purist boundaries of theatre, opera, dance and performance art. Fabre, who started his career as a performance artist (1976–1981), was especially interested in working with and from ‘the harsh reality’ of his own body, thereby exploring what he has termed physiological performing. From his desire to create a performative language that takes the body and its physical sensory apparatus as the main instrument, he has developed a practice-based method through which to train his company of performers. This articles underscores how his physiological training method can be a relevant and enriching addendum to the training of contemporary actors, dancers and performers of various educational backgrounds. This claim is supported by going in depth into the specificity of Fabre’s training method and analysing how it reformulates the classic paradox of acting (as described amongst others by Aristotle and Diderot) via the introduction of a ‘performance art quality’, or what Fabre calls the transition between act and acting. A selection of exercises is also illustrated by means of the underlying performative principles, such as ‘spacing’, ‘anatomical awareness’, ‘transformation’ and ‘duration’. The article concludes by formulating some arguments in order to pinpoint the relevance of Fabre’s training method within the broad field of contemporary performance training.

Keywords:

• exercise
• actors training
• physiological performing
• physicality
• pedagogy
• Jan Fabre

Notes

¹ Born in Antwerp, Belgium, in 1958.

² As a multidisciplinary artist Fabre has not only produced a considerable and significant oeuvre in the fields of performing arts, but also in the visual arts. In this article however we will focus on his stage works.

³ By ‘physicality’ we mean the use of the complete body – in contrast to gestures and mannerisms alone – to communicate. The body refers in the first place to itself, before it supports any external meanings or messages (for example spoken words). The materiality of the body is emphasised. The second term, ‘viscerality’ can be defined on two levels. On the one hand, there is the psychological interpretation that understands viscerality as the irrational, illogical and instinctive emersion of strong emotions. The physical interpretation, on the other hand, addresses viscerality as relating to the viscera or internal organs of the body. In this context, we can comprehend ‘viscerality’ as a combination of both, as well as an expanded notion of physicality. As will be seen, Fabre strives for an integration of both terms, a visceral physicality. According to Fabre, the complete body exists of a collision of both body and mind, both inside and outside. Thus, for Fabre, physicality implicates not just movements (the use of joints, skeleton and muscles) but also the visceral notion of the internal anatomy of blood circulation, excrements and organs (this latter notion operates more within a metaphorical sense). The result is an Artaudian ‘cruelty’ towards the bodies of the performers and the audience alike. This sometimes aggressive confrontation with a hyper-realistic and non-idealised body creates an immediacy of experience with the audience. The spectators undergo intense emotions, often of shock and revulsion.

⁴ By ‘performing arts’, we refer to the amalgam of art disciplines (theatre, opera, dance) that are intended to be performed for a live audience. ‘Performance art’ as a historical art form, on the other hand, emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, and is just one segment of this framework.

⁵ Here we can clearly also recognise a reference to Duchamps’ conceptualisation of ‘Naming Art’, which is based on the idea that the nomination of something as art is tantamount to the actual making of art (Foster et al. 2004, p. 128). By positioning his early work in line with earlier ‘canonical’ work Fabre reflects on the idea of canon and on how something enters this canon.

⁶ Impulse can be defined as incentive to produce movement, as a small amount of energy travels from one area to another. An impulse as motivation for physical activity can be psychological or physiological. Within Fabre’s exercises impulses need to be physical and thus come from the body. Through an enhanced awareness, his performers can respond to external impulses (as for example an action of the audience or a fellow performer). These stimuli can also emerge from imagination, but this imagination must not be steered by emotion. Fabre rather wants his performer to imagine physical processes or sensations, as for example physical pain, pleasure, and so on.

⁷ ‘The Plot, then, is the first principle, and, as it were, the soul of a tragedy: Character holds the second place’ (Aristotle 1986, p. 39).

⁸ ‘Mich interessiert nicht so sehr, wie sich Menschen bewegen, als was sie bewegt’ (Pina Bausch in Schulze-Reuber 2005).

⁹ See Roussel et al. (2014) for a description of the control of movement of Fabre’s performers.

¹⁰ Throughout the twentieth century, other theatre pedagogues developed methodologies to enhance the (use of) physicality to rethink the actor training of their times. Fabre’s set of exercises is a collection of invented exercises, effective scenes from his oeuvre and exercises he borrowed from other such acting methods, for example those of Grotowski, Meyerhold and Artaud.

¹¹ Also modern choreographers such as Martha Graham (Freedman 1998) have underscored the importance of abdominal breathing. At its turn, it was incorporated into the field of contemporary dance (Franklin 2004).

¹² Kendo is a form of Japanese sword-fighting, which history can be traced back to the tradition of the Samurai.

¹³ Fabre has a predilection for long performances. Theatre as it was to be Expected and Foreseen (1982) and The Power of Theatrical Madness (1984) had durations of four and eight hours, respectively. His newest production, Mount Olympus (2015), will be a 24-hour marathon.

¹⁴ In collaboration with the Department of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Sciences (REVAKI), Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences (University of Antwerp), Department of Radiology (University Hospital Antwerp), Department of Translational Neurosciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences (University of Antwerp), Pain in Motion Research Group, Belgium, Research Centre for Visual Poetics (University of Antwerp) and Royal Conservatoire of Antwerp. See for an outline of the research project Van den Dries (2011).