Joanna Settle

Has a book ever knocked you out? Has a story stuck with you for years? Has an image stopped you cold? Are you changed by these encounters? This course explores, examines, and activates the elusive and subjective motor for creative work. It begins with material that has directly impacted the professor's life and work as a theater artist. Later, students will share igniting materials from their own experiences. The aim: to incite the imagination, culminating in an original work. Where do you turn for inspiration? Can you engage your fears in pursuit of your goals? How do you flip your script to make progress? Departure points include artists, writers, filmmakers, thinkers, and theater makers such as Judith Malina, Allen Ginsberg, Art Spiegelman, Francis Bacon, Edmund White, Anne Carson, David Markson, Italo Calvino, Pedro Almodovar, Jean Genet, Andy Goldsworthy, Banksy, CG Jung, Franz Fanon, Aimé Césaire, Patricia Peters, theoretical physicists, Black Lives Matter, and even occasional recipes. When it comes to inspiration, can a good meal change everything?

3 credits

Make Art Here: How does location provoke an Art Action? In addition to the location we are in, what about the previously experienced locations do we carry with us? How might the sound of the wind impact your writing? Does the view out your window instigate how depth perception is represented in your work, or color palette? MAKE ART HERE in Prague will center a consideration of public space, and how history might serve as a resource for contemporary art making practices. We will visit public parks and gardens, performances, museums, neighborhoods of interest and arts institutions generating contemporary work across mediums. Students may switch mediums between projects, and are invited to explore time based art (music, performance, etc.) as well as fine arts (painting, drawing, collage, etc.). Students enrolled in this class can expect to walk a great deal and to attend evening and morning events. This course offers a curated, immersive experience in art-making, woven inextricably into the city of Prague.

This course will be offered in June-Term 2025 in Prague, Czech Republic.

This class develops a practical and conceptual work process for making theater that is assembled through investigation of researched models of practice, consideration of the elements involved, and the student's own intuition, interests and drive. We will explore: why make theater? For whom? With whom? How? When? About what? In this class, "Theater" is defined as a story told in the third dimension to a live audience. This course is extremely rigorous and hands-on. It involves independent creative work, a readiness to collaborate and profound curiosity. All students are expected to engage actively in class discussions and projects.

What brings a play to life? What story do you most want to tell? Who is your audience, and why? What is the collaborative environment you seek? This course explores conceptual and practical approaches to directing a play. In addition to script discovery and analysis, emphasis is placed on the development of each student's unique and subjective point of view on the material at hand. Students will journal regularly, share work in-progress with the class, create image banks, and engage in vigorous experimentation and conversation centered around the nature and art of directing theater.

Restriction for THEAT-UH 2115: Cannot take THEA-UT 139

2 credits

This course continues the work begin in Directing in a Lab setting. Students will work with material from Susan-Lori Parks 365 Plays/Days, Samuel Beckett's short plays or bring in material of their own choosing. Our weekly sessions will include sharing work in process, discussion of major issues both ethical and practical in the field of Directing, and the building of comradery as we explore the form.

Prerequisite: THEAT-UH 2115, THEAT-UH 3110 or instructor permission

2 credits

These two mandatory and sequential 2-point courses provide seniors with a clearly articulated, year-long work process and support structure within which to bring their theater capstone projects to fruition. The course sequence includes regular meetings and group discussions of topics such as process, research, and collaboration in art practice and scholarship. The Capstone Project Supervisor who oversees the course sequence works in tandem with capstone advisors and (as applicable) theater program production staff. Students are further supported in the development of their capstone writing, presentation, and digital archiving skills.

Prerequisite: THEAT-UH 3090

2 credits

These two mandatory and sequential 2-point courses provide seniors with a clearly articulated, year-long work process and support structure within which to bring their theater capstone projects to fruition. The course sequence includes regular meetings and group discussions of topics such as process, research, and collaboration in art practice and scholarship. The Capstone Project Supervisor who oversees the course sequence works in tandem with capstone advisors and (as applicable) theater program production staff. Students are further supported in the development of their capstone writing, presentation, and digital archiving skills.

Prerequisite: THEAT-UH 4001