Laro, Lingap, Laya: Workshops to Rewild the Theater

About


The COVID-19 pandemic caused a significant impact on theater artists, further complicating their vulnerabilities. The team behind Laro, Lingap, Laya seeks to challenge traditional modes of theater production and theatrical knowledge by taking partial inspiration from the behavior and mythological landscapes of games. Their project involves offering co-learning spaces that are more inclusive, playful, open-ended, and collaborative, directed to engage with educational and grassroots communities; charge at a pay-what-you-can price; and integrated with a choose-your-own adventure design.

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a great disruptor of the current social fabric. This disruption manifested in most communities of theater artists, due to the exacerbated vulnerabilities that the sector (and many other sectors) face. There continues to be a marked lack of resources and equitable economic and creative opportunities for many artists, which have only gotten worse because of the pandemic.

Laro, Lingap, Laya is inspired by personal experiences, research, and experimentation, recognizing an urgent need to “pivot” the default mode of artmaking, and thus aims in championing a community and ecologically focused approach, as opposed to the individualist and business-centered models. It is now more than ever an urgent matter for people of different disciplines, including artists and educators, to re-organize and collaborate on tackling systemic issues of injustice that affect all sectors of society.

The team is developing a workshop festival/series that hopes to take the necessary first steps towards reimagining the processes and principles of artistic production. The project seeks to offer alternative skills, insights, and lenses for a diverse participant base of local artists (in the theater or otherwise), leaders of artistic organizations and collectives, student-artists, and even teachers and educators.

Progress


Laro, Lingap, Laya: 1st Quarter 2023 Company Reports

As an organization that describes themselves as a playground for developing thematic, collaborative spaces within the scope of art, innovative games, and social justice, the Jungle Gym Play Laboratory has been busy putting the necessary gears in place upon joining the Areté Sandbox Residency Program earlier this year.