Malcontenta, Italy. The Italian trio of Enrica Dal Zio (speech formation artist), Cristina Dal Zio (eurythmist), and Juri Lanzini (pianist) performed their play Threshold of Courage during the Theater Festival held at the Goetheanum from July 10 to 14. An interview with Enrica Dal Zio.
What is the performance about?
Using speech, eurythmy, and music, we are exploring the theme of courage. On a one-hour journey, we explore four qualities of listening: the usual one, where we stay in our comfort zone; the one where we open our minds to what is outside of us; the one where we empathically immerse ourselves in the other; and the one where we listen to the absolute present and its generative potential.
What topics and questions are you exploring?
How do we define the powers of courage? How do we awaken and strengthen them through art? We are currently being flooded by waves of fear on various levels of being. We, therefore, require a performance that does not use sterile clichés but activates and strengthens our powers of courage, practically and concretely! We want to engage and answer new questions in a generative flow of thought; our performance should have a regenerative and healing effect. By choosing epic, lyrical, and dramatic pieces, we realized in the development of the performance that the healing element is achieved when all parts of the human being, thought—epic, will—drama, feeling—lyric, are present and working together.
What influence does Rudolf Steiner’s Drama Course have on your work?
Through eurythmy, we can understand the value of gesture in creating a lively, expressive word; the accompanying music elevates the word to an inspiring dimension. With the in-depth implementation of these insights, we were able to confirm and expand the constituent elements of Rudolf Steiner’s Drama Course.
More Theater Festival at the Goetheanum
Translation Charles Cross
Image Scenes from the play, Photo: Diego Landi
