April 16 2021, 14:00 CET, 21:00 Japan

Renowned Japanese stage director and author Tadashi Suzuki will receive the Thalia Prize from the International Association of Theatre Critics (AICT-IATC). Due to the pandemic, the award ceremony will be presented online April 16, 2021, in conjunction with an international conference on the works of Mr. Suzuki, whose performance theories and practice have had a profound impact on critics globally. His actor-training methods, which focus on the language of the body on stage are widely taught an continue to grow in influence.

The Thalia Prize honor given to Tadashi Suzuki is the eighth of the IATC Thalia Prizes. Earlier prizes were given to Eric Bentley (2006), Jean-Pierre Sarrazac (2008), Richard Schechner (2010), Kapila Vatsyayan (2012), Eugenio Barba (2014), Femi Osofisan (2016) and Hans-Thies Lehmann (2018). The prize trophy is a cane crowned by a silver pommel in the shape of Thalia’s head, sculpted by the Romanian artist Dragoș Buhagiar and a gift of the Romanian critics. 

The English-language conference gathers scholars and critics from around the globe and will be generously illustrated with the assistance of Suzuki Company of Toga (SCOT), the theatre company of Tadashi Suzuki. The IATC is pleased to note that the conference will include participants from China, India, Argentina, the United States and Europe. The online presentation platform for the conference is Critical Stages/Scènes critiques, the journal of the International Association of Theatre Critics (AICT-IATC). 

Program

Thalia Prize Ceremony (30 min)

  • Mrs. Margareta Sörenson (Sweden), IATC President
  • Mrs. Mariko Anazawa (Japan), IATC Executive Committee member
  • Mrs. Anne Bogart (USA) – Laudation of Mr. Tadashi Suzuki
  • Mr. Tadashi Suzuki (Japan) – Honoree’s Address 

First Panel (60 min): Theory and Intercultural Dialogue
Moderator: Mr. Savas Patsalidis (Greece)

  • Mrs. Alison Findlay (UK), “Technique and Spirit”
  • Mr.  Shoule Li (China), “Contemporary Activity of ‘Culture is Body’ Theory” 
  • Mrs. Penelope Chatzidimitriou (Greece), “Tadashi Suzuki: Reinventing the Greek Classics, Reinventing the Post-War Japanese Identity”
  • Mr. Tadashi Uchino (Japan), “On Decoloniality: Suzuki Tadashi in Japan” 
  • Discussion

Intermission (15 min) – Video material about the work of Mr. Suzuki

Second Panel (60 min): Practice and Intercultural Dialogue 
Moderator: Mrs. Deepa Punjani (India)

  • Mrs. Ana Woolf (Argentina), “How to Get Away From the Technique Entering the Technique?” 
  • Mrs. Dijana Milošević (Serbia), “Power of Theater Techniques” 
  • Mr. Akhshay Gandhi (India), “Discovering a Culture of Working-in-Theatre in an Indian Cityscape with the Suzuki Method for Actor Training”
  • Mr. Octavian Saiu (Romania), “A Sense of Place: Tadashi Suzuki, Toga, and the Nature of Theatre” 
  • Discussion 

Discussion and Closing remarks (15 min)
Mr. Ivan Medenica (Serbia), IATC Director of Conferences

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