The Icarus Project – Overview
Icarus Performance Project (Malta) is an ongoing research project that focuses on the space between training and performance processes as a self-contained and integral phenomenon. Set up in 2001 by Frank Camilleri, the Project follows an evolving process of technical and performance structures within a context of laboratory practice.
Cain Project (2001-2005)
The first Icarus performance project led to the presentation of Lamentations of Cain – A Vocal Structure (2005). The Cain Project evolved in three phases.
The First Phase, entitled ‘The Roots of Performing (2001-2003)’, was marked by the presentations of the solo pieces Amargo – The Tragedy of the Man Doomed to Die (2002-2003) and ICARUS 4 (2003).
The Second Phase, ‘Performative – Improvisational – Structural (2003-2004)’, was characterised by the crystallisation of two branches within the Project. Whilst Tekhne Sessions explored the fluid space between technique and performance structures by means of a codified sequence of tasks, the performance presentations of TWO, TWO.2, and Amargo TWO continued the work on an evolving dramaturgical structure.
The Third Phase, ‘Dramaturgy of Action (2004-2005)’, explored the possibilities of a shared dramaturgy by building on the individual dramaturgies of the First Phase and on the dramaturgy of textures and dynamics which informed the montage of individual dramaturgies into duos and trios in the Second Phase. This research led to the presentation of Lamentations of Cain.
Queen Project (2005-2008)
In 2006 a new performance process was launched. Taking the cue from the previous project’s point of arrival, a vocal structure was devised as a point of departure.
La Reina, Spanish for ‘The Queen’, was inspired by Cervantes’s masterpiece Don Quixote. Material from Cervantes’s work was fused with other literary sources to provide a dramaturgy that explored the carnivalesque. La Reina tapped Maltese and Mediterranean sources in terms of sound patterns and vocal textures by way of traditional songs as well as multi-tiered linguistic configurations pertaining to the Semitic origins of the Maltese language.
RISK: El Riesgo de La Reina (‘The Risk of the Queen’, 2007) marked the second step in the evolving performance structure. Based on La Reina, RISK explored liminal areas of theatre performance. Apart from the multi-tiered vocality of the songs and texts, the process incorporated digital/video projections and an installation-type spatial setting in its performative weave. Structured improvisation and choral work were also explored.
Duration 56 (2008) announced a new departure. The third phase was named ‘Eternal Queen’ due to the dramaturgical and vocal research on Eternal Feminine by Teilhard de Chardin. However, the work on daily actions and spatial patterns within a ‘risk’ (improvisational) structure led to the formulation of a ‘performance installation’ that can be located between training and performance configurations. In exploring the practice of duration, repetition, and improvisation, the ‘Queen’ of Duration 56 can be said to be the temporal dimension of space and action shorn of plot, character, and text.
Canterbury (2008-current)
Since 2008, the Project has been deepening its research on the area between training and performance processes by developing the work on Tekhne Sessions and Duration 56. Dynamics of improvisation are a crucual aspect of this research which is supported by the School of Arts at the University of Kent. The Project is also involved in the MA in Physical Actor Training and Performance at the University of Kent.
For more information on any aspect of Icarus Project please email contact@icarusproject.info or visit the contact page.