Damian Bright and Rowan Blockey
Photo: Rex Foong
Damian Bright CH/GB was born in Ankara/Turkey in 1991. He moved to Lake Zurich when he was four. He was the first acting apprentice at the Hora theatre in Zurich. After 10 years full of highlights at home and abroad, he left the Hora to train as an assistant teacher. At the same time, he completed a CAS at the Accademia Dimitri. In the "Diversity and Inclusive Practice in Performing Arts" course, he learned about the needs of inclusive theatre. Bright performs his own plays. He gives workshops in schools and museums and organizes training courses for the police and other public institutions. He is committed to disability issues and is a founding member and board member of the "Culture for All" association in Eastern Switzerland. With his special identity as a disabled actor, he is not afraid to address sensitive topics. His strength is the observation of his environment and the resulting improvisation. He will be happy to pass on his wide-ranging experience and create something new.
Photo: Tren Guerrero
Rowan Blockey (*1988, Basel), completed his acting training at the Michael Tschechow Studio Berlin in 2014 and has been working as a freelance actor and performer ever since. With his partner Jasminka Stenz, he has created several plays, including "Janein" for LES FAC in St Ursanne 2017, "Viel:leicht Körper" for the Tanztage Potsdam 2018 and "VOL_UTION" at the Cité des Arts Paris 2019. From 2018-20 at the Theater an der Rott, the play was invited to the 45th Mülheimer Theatertage with "Wer nicht träumt" by Jens Raschke and Markus Steinwender. In 2022, he completed his master's degree in Expanded Theatre at the HKB Bern with his solo "fetzen", which deals with the theme of foreignness, in collaboration with Christoph Frick. He has been working artistically and as a coach with people with disabilities since 2016. He is a certified Chekhov theatre trainer and lives and works in the Basel area.
Project
"Group photo" is created in the group.
Together we embark on a theatre adventure and decide how we want to stand, what we want to say and how. We create our own rules. We create our world.
That's what I wrote as an introduction in the application for Double and I hope to do it justice now!
"Group photo" is the name of our first play development. A new theatre workshop is being created at Sonnhalde Gempen as part of the day care centre there. With an average of 8 hours per week, children, teenagers, adults external theatre enthusiasts will have the opportunity to complete an intensive and inclusive year of theatre. This should be repeatable. Together we develop a theatre play, which is then performed in a public space in a professional setting.
For this pilot project, our first year of theatre, I am very grateful that Damian is supporting me and us with his attention and expertise!
