Research - ciasargantana

ciasargantana

[cos + espai] + tecnologia

menu

cat /eng

foundations and principles
Foundations
At ciasargantana, we understand research as an active practice that runs through creation, performance and the relationship with the audience. Art is not an end in itself, but a vehicle for questioning how we inhabit time, space and the world.
Research does not seek to provide closed answers, but to generate the conditions in which the performative experience can open real questions for the audience. Our work focuses on constructing performative dispositifs that enable a direct, honest and living relationship between performer and spectator.
As creators, we take responsibility for constantly revisiting the language, forms and tools with which we work. This research implies continuous development—both human and artistic—and sustained attention to the context in which each creation takes place.
The dialogue we seek to establish with the audience is fragile and cannot be guaranteed. For this reason, research is centred on the development of tools, procedures and practices that make it possible to sustain this dialogue with rigor, availability and respect for the present moment.
Principles
The research practice of ciasargantana is grounded in the following principles:
Commitment is an essential condition of creative work.
Courage and honesty must accompany all phases of the process.
Imagination is built and trained on a daily basis.
Knowledge defines the framework, limits and rules of each working process.
Body and spirit must be trained to become vehicles, not obstacles.
The actor’s work is inseparably linked to the present state.
The actor-creator must become a physical channel capable of embodying what is necessary in each moment of the performative action.
Deep knowledge arises from lived experience and cannot be transmitted in abstract form.
Impulses and their management form the basis of performative life; only through action is it possible to truly live on stage.
Art and audiences change with the world; only through cultural perception is it possible to arrive at shared values.
iam system
iam system
The iam system (impulse–action–movement system) is the methodological framework developed by the research group of ciasargantana, based on performative practice and sustained work with performers and creators. It is an open system, in constant evolution, which structures the creative process through definitions, procedures and lines of research applicable to different performative contexts.
The system is grounded in the relationship between impulse, action and presence, and understands action as a generating element of meaning and transformation on stage. The iam system does not propose a specific aesthetic form, but rather a way of organising the creative process from the body, decision-making and the relationship with the environment.
Impulse: an internal drive that generates the need to act.
Action: an act that produces a real change in the performer and in the relationship with space, material and others.
Impulse–action: an action executed at the necessary moment, in direct relation to the context.
The research of the iam system engages in dialogue with different fields of contemporary knowledge and practice, such as:
physical action systems
theories of perception and the observer
body–space–energy relationships
the integration of technology in performative processes
the use of music and tradition as action-based dispositifs
These connections do not function as a closed theoretical framework, but as fields of exploration that nourish the ongoing evolution of the system.
Lines of research
Living through action
A line focused on the growth of the performer through physical and vocal work. It investigates the conditions of presence, attention and availability required to sustain a living and continuous performative dialogue with the audience.
The dramaturgy of action
Explores the application of the system within performative creation processes. It analyses the relationship between performer, material, space and audience, as well as the role of context and the performative dispositif in the construction of meaning.
la Cuina
la Cuina
La Cuina (2009–2018) was the research and creation laboratory of ciasargantana, the space where the scenic, methodological and conceptual foundations that define the company today were established.
The research carried out at La Cuina focused on two main axes: the preparation of the actor-creator and the relationship with the audience.
Through continuous work with performers from diverse backgrounds and contexts, the laboratory developed tools, exercises and procedures that would later give rise to the iam system, as well as to the lines of work living through actionand the dramaturgy of action.
La Cuina functioned as a work-in-progress space, where performative practice, reflection and the public presentation of materials coexisted as part of a single process. The works shared with audiences were not final results, but research dispositifs that allowed the group’s questions and hypotheses to be tested in real conditions.
Between 2009 and 2013, the research was organised in periods that alternated between the two main axes. This phase made it possible to establish the foundations of a solid and sustained practice.
Between 2014 and 2018, the laboratory deepened the interrelation between both lines of work, consolidating the system and its procedures.
During this period, La Cuina also initiated a collaboration with GRECS (Research Group on Culture and Society) at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), with the aim of expanding the dialogue with audiences through a more analytical and interdisciplinary approach.
The final public presentation of La Cuina took place in May 2018. Although the laboratory closed as a specific research space, the knowledge, tools and procedures developed continue to form the foundation of ciasargantana’s current work and guide its new creation and research projects.
transborders english
Transborders
International work sessions
Trans-: «across», «beyond», «through»
+ Borders
Transborders is ciasargantana’s international laboratory programme, a space for shared research with creators from around the world that explores the boundaries—physical, cultural, political and perceptual—of contemporary performative practice.
It emerged after the closure of La Cuina as a natural continuation of the company’s research work, with the intention of opening the process to external perspectives and diverse contexts. Transborders is not a closed project, but a flexible framework for encounter, experimentation and dialogue.
The laboratories begin from questions rooted in the present: how we inhabit the world today, how identities are constructed, which borders shape the ways we relate to one another, and how performance can generate spaces for shared thinking and experience.
The working sessions are based on practice, exchange and applied research. They do not aim for immediate final outcomes, but rather seek to activate processes, languages and methodologies that can nourish future creations, collaborations and lines of research.
The work developed within Transborders is in dialogue with the iam system, with the dramaturgy of action, and with the relationship between body, space, time and audience. It also opens the field to hybrid practices, performative technologies and modes of transmission that allow for a rethinking of creation within a global context.
Transborders is an open space for artists, researchers and institutions interested in sharing research processes, activating new collaborations and exploring forms of creation that cross disciplines, territories and perspectives.