Because of its humanistic and democratic nature, Theater of the Oppressed (TO) has been used, developed, and adapted in fields of social activities such as education, culture, arts, politics, social work, and health programs around the world, by countless groups and practitioners interested in engaging people within a common space, so as to generate a more dynamic and creative dialogue to address relevant issues within a particular community of people. Moving minds & bodies: Reflecting creatively, will engage participants’ minds and bodies to explore and practice aesthetic games, physical exercises, and image techniques that form the bedrock of TO. Through the “arsenal” of Augusto Boal’s TO techniques, participants will be invited to creatively problem-pose personal, social, political, pedagogical, and aesthetic issues relevant to them in order to collectively reflect and act on them.

Please come dressed to move and ready to play.

Workshop Leader: Javier Cardona is a performing artist and educator originally from Puerto Rico, who began his dance/theater and arts in education career with Los Teatreros Ambulantes de Cayey, directed by Rosa Luisa Márquez and the visual artist Antonio Martorell. He has studied and worked with contemporary theater and dance masters such as Peter Schumann, Bread and Puppet Theater; Osvaldo Dragún, Escuela Internacional de Teatro de América Latina y el Caribe; Augusto Boal, Theater of the Oppressed; Miguel Rubio, Yuyachkani; Viveca Vázquez, Taller de Otra Cosa; Sally Silvers and Jennifer Monson, BirdBrain. 

His own artistic work, which is primarily concerned with issues of race, gender and identity, has been presented throughout the Caribbean, Latin America, and the United States. Javier's theater and dance work forms part of the collection of the Hemispheric Institute Digital Video Library, based in New York City. 

Experienced in the use of the arts as an aesthetic form and as a dialogical medium for human reflection and social action, Javier is currently the Arts & Education Director for Rehabilitation Through the Arts, a non-governmental arts-in-education initiative inside New York State prisons. He is also a teaching artist with The New Victory Theater's education department, and he is an adjunct faculty in New York University (NYU), Educational Theatre Program.

Javier holds a Master's in Educational Theatre from NYU, School of Culture, Education and Human Development.

Location: TBA

Contact for further info: eml2162@columbia.edu