2022 Summer Intensives

André Casaca is one of the most popular professionals of physical theatre and clown in Italy. He’s Brazilian and a resident of Italy since 1995. The Lume Teatro (Lume Theatre – Campinas, Brazil) and Yves Lebreton were fundamental to his preparation and formation. Actor, theatrical researcher, clown, director, and founder of the method called “Body Comic Identity”.

Engaged in theatre for more than 25 years, his artistic and pedagogic method is recognized in Italy and abroad in university theatrical studies. He is the artistic and pedagogic director at the Teatro C’art Comic Education Onlus (Castelfiorentino, Italy) and he collaborates with many theatre schools. www.teatrocart.com

Actor, director, scholar, and theatre educator, Giangiacomo Colli received his formal acting and directing training with two of the major figures of post-World War II Italian theatre, Vittorio Gassman and Orazio Costa. An accomplished practitioner of Commedia dell’Arte, he was introduced to this popular form of theatre by his father, a renowned theatre and television director, and then perfected his skills under Carlo Boso. His theatre formation also includes workshops with Joseph Chaikin, Shiro Nomura, Jerzy Grotowski, and Chuck Mike, among others.

Alongside his professional career, Giangiacomo graduated from the University of Rome in theatre history, received an M.F.A. in directing from the University of Hawaii, and a Ph.D. in drama from the University of Toronto. He has taught in Canada at the University of Toronto, Sheridan College, and Brock University, and in the US, at Franklin & Marshall College, Texas State University-San Marcos, Middlebury College, and Coastal Carolina University. Since 2014, in Italy, he has taught history of directing at the University of Bologna, and has collaborated with the Master of Social Theatre at the University of Rome, the Training Course for Actors “Orazio Costa” at the Pergola Theatre, in Florence, and the Rome–based association Teatroavista. Giangiacomo has developed his own devising technique, Il F-Attore Umano, based on collaborative dramaturgy, and is also the author of a volume on Orazio Costa’s holistic acting training, a few articles, and an educational play on Commedia dell’Arte.

Chiara D’Anna is an Italian actor, director, lecturer and Commedia dell’Arte specialist. She teaches Movement on the MA Theatre Lab at RADA and works as Associate Lecturer at E15 Acting School, Goldsmiths University and Rose Bruford College in London. Chiara holds a BSc and MSc in Geology from the University of Turin, an MA in Physical Theatre from Royal Holloway University and a PhD in Performing Arts from London Metropolitan University. Her practice-led research on the legacy of Commedia dell’Arte in Post-Dramatic Theatre focusses on the centrality of the actor in devised performance. Chiara is co-founder of Natural You Dance, a movement meditation practice that draws on Yoga, dance, physical theatre and meditation. As Associate Artist of Alison Hodge’s research group ‘The Quick & the Dead’, she worked for over eight years in developing a new methodology for Actor Training known as the ‘Core Training’. The outcome of this research was documented by Peter Hulton for the Exeter Arts Archives and published by Routledge in the DVD-pamphlet: ‘Core Training For the Relational Actor’ (2013). As founding member and artistic director of the award-winning physical theatre company Panta Rei Theatre, Chiara’s mission is to inspire, challenge and entertain audiences with humour, irony and powerful imagery. Her productions integrate physical theatre, dark surreal comedy, storytelling and political satire. As a screen actress she is best known for her collaboration with writer and director Peter Strickland in Berberian Sound Studio and The Duke of Burgundy.

Originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, Scott McGehee moved to Italy as a Fulbright Fellow in 1995 and has lived in Italy since. He received his Doctorate in European Intellectual History from Boston College in 1996 and is the President and Founding Director of the Accademia dell’Arte.

Scott’s research interest centers on the convergence of radical social thought with the organization of aesthetics perception and artistic expression. He has been active in the formation of the CrisisArt Festival and contemporary social movements including Occupy Wall Street. He continues to work on projects that explore the potential for collective and collaborative creation and has written on the subversive character of the Commedia dell’Arte. (Link Essay: the-pre-eminence-of-the-actor-in-renaissance-context-2.)

Scott gives lectures and seminars throughout the year at the Accademia on various topics including the history of cabaret, understanding Commedia politically, the commodification of artistic experience and related topics.

Hobbies are many, none of which are well developed, but he does have a knack for writing bad pop-songs.

Alessio Trevisani, Germanist, Choreographer, Director, Performer. Recently founded his international company: the Freies Tanz Ensemble. Former member of Tanzfabrik Company, co-initiated in 2000 the Sox36 in Berlin Kreuzberg. 2003 won the German dance prize for best solo. He gained important artistic experience with the composer K. Stockhausen at Leipzig Opera and working in NY in 2005. 2007 was resident choreographer at Palucca Schule/ Tanzplan Dresden. 2006-10 created 4 works for the mixed able Theater Thikwa. 2011-18 created 8 successful works directing Leipziger Tanztheater.

Sašo Vollmaier is a pianist, composer, performer and teacher. He graduated from the Academy of Music in Ljubljana (Slovenia) in 2008 – professor of piano. In 2005 he met PanTheatre (France). He joined the Slovenian avant-garde music group Laibach in 2007 – 2013 as a keyboard player. In 2013 he moved to France where he meets Viviane Gay, an actress with whom he started developing his presence on the stage as a performer trough his voice, movement and music. The voice work brought him to Malérargues (France) again where he started to give classes, collaborating with other voice teachers and giving the concerts and performances. In the same year he begins to direct the performance called “Generation”. This project allows him to meet the Roy Hart Theatre in terms of the power of the presence, fragility, expression, authenticity, curiosity…

Vollmaier teaches musical aspects, encourages the students to invent their own language, working on presence, voice and movement. In 2014 he started to collaborate with Susanne Weins – performance artist, giving the voice/movement workshops in Düsseldorf and creating their own theatre productions (Bewegte Oktaven, Fragile Breath, Melancholia,…) most of them directed by Sabine Seume. He works as a voice teacher mainly in France, Germany, Italy and Brazil.

“Electric Unicorn” is the name of electro-acoustic project created by three completely different personalities (I. Leitinger, L. Jamnik, S. Vollmaier) in 2013 with different musical backgrounds.

Vollmaier’s accomplishments include theatre and cartoon scores, choral arrangements, marching orchestras, big bands, playing as a studio musician (Laibach, Bratko Bibič, Silence, Funtango, radio/TV broadcastings,…)