The Bridge of Winds is an ensemble of actors and theatre artists from South America, Europe and Asia, that has since 1989 researched the actor's physical and vocal training. Guided by Iben Nagel Rasmussen, the Odin Teatret actress, the group explores the variety and complexity of the actor's presence through a psychophysical training based on 5 different kinds of exercises developed and researched by the master Rasmussen and her pupils during their 25 years of existence.
This January we had the chance of witnessing their yearly practice meeting, something quite exclusive and special to be part of. This paper intends to analyse a few aspects of the group´s training methodologies in relation to contemporary politics of knowledge within their pedagogical system. We want to discuss the ways actors are learning nowadays, the contact with masters, aspects of collective (self)education and production of shared knowledge, in opposition to new ways of auto-didactism, coming from the relation with new media technologies (youtube, MOOC’s, live-stream, skype).
We will begin by looking at the Bridge of Winds knowledge transmission systems, their very particular way of understanding the master/pupil relation, their group dynamics in time, the transformation of its structure and the aging process of its members throughout the existence of the group. After that, we will relate these notions to contemporary Politics of Knowledge, particularly Ranciere’s approach to it, in order to re-read and actualize the notion of the ‘master’. Then we will discuss and question aspects related to new methodologies of learning theatre training, which engage with new media paradigms, in the light of Ranciere and Agamben’s contemporary works, as well as of digital material and online learning tools available. We want to ask how is the paradigm of new technologies in performance affecting the ‘ethos’ of the performers’ training. In which ways are the learning technologies influencing the content of the work of the actor in opposition to being simply learning tools that eventually are replacing books and teachers? The paper will also make use of a series of interviews we made with the group in relation to the theme and our own observations of the 2015´s meeting activities
