Rainbows of Desires COPS IN THE HEAD Theatre of Oppressed, Brixton Road Youth Club, London, 4 March to 5 March

Rainbows of Desires (Theatre as Therapy, Cops-in-the-Head) Augusto Boal Theatre of the Oppressed
About this Event

Saturday 1.00pm - 6.00pmSunday 10.00am - 6.00pmThe personal is political, and the political is personal.Rainbow of Desires is the over-arching name given by Augusto Boal to a range of exercises, games and techniques on using the power of theatre to identify, analyse and respond to the “internalised oppressions” we carry within us. The workshop is open to anyone who is interested in exploring oppression through theatre for behaviour and social change. This two day weekend workshop will be an intensive and in-depth exploration of the techniques with a focused theme of conflict. It’s useful for teachers and educators, therapists, social workers, psychologists, youth workers, creative facilitators and mental health professionals who work with disadvantaged populations, and for community activists and organizers who are involved with marginalized constituencies and constituencies which have traditionally been the victims of bias, discrimination, police abuse and systemic disempowerment.

Over two days we will seek to:

Investigate how oppressions are submerged into everyday life and how can we expose and take control of these oppressions whilst discovering and understanding its origins.

Understand ourselves in the world which may help open some doors and remove some blocks. Confront the obstacles to their realization and witness a variety of potential solutions.

Become conscious of the web in which all are implicated, propagating as well as opposing various forms of oppression and powerlessness.

Develop a capacity to balance empathy for the oppressed within the oppressor with a capacity to name and act against oppression.

Tackle your inability or unwillingness to recognise your power or where you stand in various hierarchies.

Identify your behavioural masks and practise taking them on and off. By moving from mask to mask you can create a useful critical distance.

Drawing on the theories of popular education developed by his friend and colleague, Paulo Freire, Augusto Boal, who created and founded the methodology called Theater of the Oppressed, appropriated theater games and exercises for use as organizing tools by communities in struggle. These tools are designed to develop individual skills of observation and self-reflection, and cooperative group interactions and to ultimately be devices that can be used within a mass movement to change the world and bring about social and economic justice, peace and the dismantling of the inequitable system called capitalism.