22 November 2018
On the evening of 18 November 2018, the 2nd STA International Forum on Actor Training and Education was successfully concluded in the New Space Theatre of Shanghai Theatre Academy (STA). During the three-day forum, the participants had a heated discussion on the "inheritance and innovative development" of the acting methods that have influenced the various countries in the 20th and 21st centuries.
The last academic seminar of this forum was chaired by Professor Lu Ang, Dean of Directing Department of Shanghai Theatre Academy. Seven experts from China Theatre Association, Beijing People's Art Theatre, Shanghai Theatre Academy, National Defense University College of Military Culture and Beijing Film Academy spoke at the seminar. Their talks on the inheritance and innovative development of Chinese theatrical performance found an echo with many foreign scholars on and off the site, who expressed that the greatness of Chinese theatre is worth learning by all. In the afternoon, a theatre master from New York University in the USA and a senior teacher from Laban-Bartenieff Institute of Movement Studies in the USA conducted an actor training workshop on and around Viewpoints and Laban Technique respectively. Students and guests learnt a lot from the training instructions provided by the two experts.
After the workshop, the organizers held a closing ceremony at the New Space Theatre of Shanghai Theatre Academy. At the closing ceremony, Professor He Yan, the founder of the forum and Dean of Acting Department of Shanghai Theatre Academy, expressed his sincere greetings and thanks to the leaders and guests. He thanked the leaders at all levels for their strong support for the forum, thanked the guests and friends for their active participation and selfless sharing of the guests, and thanked the co-workers and volunteers for their great efforts. He expressed that the forum would not have been a success without the great help of all involved. At the same time, Professor He Yan also revealed that the results of the first forum have been published one after another, and it is expected that the results of this forum would also come out in the near future. These achievements will surely have far-reaching impact on actor training and education in China and even in the world.
At the closing ceremony, Professor Yang Yang, Vice President of Shanghai Theatre Academy, expressed sincere thanks for the enthusiastic participation of guests and friends from home and abroad. He fully affirmed the results of the forum and said that Shanghai Theatre Academy would make persistent efforts in advancing the STA International Forum on Actor Training and Education as a platform to bring together the practical experience and research results in acting of various countries for exchange, thereby making its own contribution to the development of performing arts in China and internationally. Senior representatives from Communication University of China School of Theatre, Film and Television, Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in the UK and Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance in the UK delivered speeches. They highly praised the STA International Forum on Actor Training and Education as an open and high-level international platform which had brought together the theoretical and practical achievements of performing arts from all over the world with a broad mind and, at the same time, had broadened the international perspective of all participants through exchange and achieved the inheritance and innovation of performing arts in the course of exchange and integration. The two professors from the UK also expressed their feelings about the forum with a poem respectively, and looked forward to meeting up again at the forum next year.
Finally, Lou Wei, Party Secretary of Shanghai Theatre Academy, summarized the forum this year and looked forward to the next forum. Party Secretary Lou Wei also received the donation of books by a professor from Florida State University to Shanghai Theatre Academy. The forum ended successfully in the warm applause of all participants.
The three-day forum featured a series of wonderful sessions of wisdom sharing and thought collision. As a continuation of the first forum, this forum expanded the scale and deepened the theme on the basis of the former. It brought together a wealth of experience and wisdom in performing arts from all over the world. It realized the further opening, exchange and integration of performing arts at home and abroad, and carried forward the past into the future, and made a unique contribution to the development of the actor training and education internationally.
