ROiL
Encyclopedia
ROiL is a performance art troupe started in Portland
, Maine
now also based in Ithaca
, New York
and Baton Rouge
, Louisiana
. "ROiL" is not an acronym; it is a verb meaning "to render (water, wine, etc.) turbid by stirring up sediment" http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/roil
After performing, the young people answer questions from the audience and listen as audience members share their reactions and thoughts.
have resettled. ROiL is partnering with area artists, actors, youth workers and educators to facilitate a performance workshops that will be performed in the area.
. Through brainstorms about issues, improvisational story-telling, and group-building activities, students design and build a performance that addresses the issues they face and educates their audiences as a way of making change within their community.
The process used in workshops has roots in the Theater of the Oppressed techniques developed by Brazilian artist and activist Augusto Boal
. Through movement, games and structured interactions, workshop participants learn to translate their experiences into the physical language of the body. They might explore themes like conflict, power, rejection, and exclusion, as well related themes such as support, alliance, recovery, and relief. The content of eventual performance pieces develops organically as group members bring their own stories to life.
Creating a performance piece together is an alchemical
process that transforms the group participants. Collaborative work challenges each member of the group to take personal risks, to share openly of themselves, and to actively support others. Individual experiences are honored and synthesized to translate into a common group experience and thus a performance topic. With a performance, the group invites an audience to respond to the issues raised in talk-back sessions after the performance, creating a dialogue that may continue long after the performance has come to an end.
(IVAW), Veterans for Peace
(VFP), Peace-Out.com, and the activist theater group, ROiL.
ROiL believes that most Americans
do not understand war or military service. The problems, as perceived by ROil are that:
Veterans’ Truth Project is a collaboration of veterans, writers and performers for social change and creating a performance piece based on the stories of recent veterans that attempts to:
VTP will draft creative adaptations of interviews and testimonies on such subjects as service in a time of war, hazing, military social life, returning from war, post-traumatic stress disorder
(PTSD). Stories and experiences will become vignettes and/or a full-length play. Under ROiL’s artistic direction, a cast of actors will tour with the show to communities in the eastern U.S., including high school
students. Audiences will engage in a talk-back session with the community’s veterans, who can answer questions, discuss the reality of the stories and engage in dialogue.
Portland, Maine
Portland is the largest city in Maine and is the county seat of Cumberland County. The 2010 city population was 66,194, growing 3 percent since the census of 2000...
, Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
now also based in Ithaca
Ithaca, New York
The city of Ithaca, is a city in upstate New York and the county seat of Tompkins County, as well as the largest community in the Ithaca-Tompkins County metropolitan area...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
and Baton Rouge
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge is the capital of the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is located in East Baton Rouge Parish and is the second-largest city in the state.Baton Rouge is a major industrial, petrochemical, medical, and research center of the American South...
, Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
. "ROiL" is not an acronym; it is a verb meaning "to render (water, wine, etc.) turbid by stirring up sediment" http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/roil
Youth workshops
One aspect of ROiL's work is in youth workshops, often held in after-school sessions for two or more weeks. ROiL aims to give young people the opportunity to participate in an empowering, group-building workshop with their peers, write a performance piece about important issues, and ultimately perform for and educate their community.After performing, the young people answer questions from the audience and listen as audience members share their reactions and thoughts.
Portland, Maine
In a recent workshop, ROiL artists worked with young men and women from immigrant families living in a public housing development to create an original play based on their interactions with adults. The play was performed for an audience of adults who hold positions of authority in the kids’ lives, including the public housing management, the Portland City police department and Portland’s mayor. The dialogue that followed was intense, and both the kids and the adults came away with valuable information about each others’ perspectives. During this past winter of 2005, another group of youth wrote and performed an original play about the dynamics of appearances and assumptions in their schools. The principal of one of Portland’s two largest high schools saw the play when it was performed at the housing project. He invited the students to perform for a school-wide assembly, and shared his reaction to the performance with the principal of Portland’s other large high school. As a result, the students will be performing and leading a school-wide discussion at both schools in early February 2006.Baton Rouge
Other workshops include work in Baton Rouge where the population has almost doubled as a result of people evacuated from New Orleans after Hurricane KatrinaHurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...
have resettled. ROiL is partnering with area artists, actors, youth workers and educators to facilitate a performance workshops that will be performed in the area.
Process
ROiL performance development workshops delve into the layers below social issues through expression, communication, and healingHealing
Physiological healing is the restoration of damaged living tissue, organs and biological system to normal function. It is the process by which the cells in the body regenerate and repair to reduce the size of a damaged or necrotic area....
. Through brainstorms about issues, improvisational story-telling, and group-building activities, students design and build a performance that addresses the issues they face and educates their audiences as a way of making change within their community.
The process used in workshops has roots in the Theater of the Oppressed techniques developed by Brazilian artist and activist Augusto Boal
Augusto Boal
Augusto Boal was a Brazilian theatre director, writer and politician. He was the founder of Theatre of the Oppressed, a theatrical form originally used in radical popular education movements...
. Through movement, games and structured interactions, workshop participants learn to translate their experiences into the physical language of the body. They might explore themes like conflict, power, rejection, and exclusion, as well related themes such as support, alliance, recovery, and relief. The content of eventual performance pieces develops organically as group members bring their own stories to life.
Creating a performance piece together is an alchemical
Alchemy
Alchemy is an influential philosophical tradition whose early practitioners’ claims to profound powers were known from antiquity. The defining objectives of alchemy are varied; these include the creation of the fabled philosopher's stone possessing powers including the capability of turning base...
process that transforms the group participants. Collaborative work challenges each member of the group to take personal risks, to share openly of themselves, and to actively support others. Individual experiences are honored and synthesized to translate into a common group experience and thus a performance topic. With a performance, the group invites an audience to respond to the issues raised in talk-back sessions after the performance, creating a dialogue that may continue long after the performance has come to an end.
Veterans' truth project
Veterans' truth project ("VTP") is a project of ROiL, whose aim of the project is "Telling the realities of the military in wartime in order to raise awareness, educate, and promote peace with recent veterans and their communities." The Veterans’ Truth Project is a collection of members of the Ithaca, NY anti-war community, members of Iraq Veterans Against the WarIraq Veterans Against the War
Iraq Veterans Against the War is an advocacy group of active-duty United States military personnel, Iraq War veterans, Afghanistan War veterans, and other veterans who have served since the September 11, 2001 attacks who are opposed to the U.S. occupation of Iraq...
(IVAW), Veterans for Peace
Veterans for Peace
Veterans For Peace is a United States organization founded in 1985. Made up of male and female US military veterans of World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, and other conflicts, as well as peacetime veterans, the group works to promote alternatives to war.-Foundation:The...
(VFP), Peace-Out.com, and the activist theater group, ROiL.
ROiL believes that most Americans
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
do not understand war or military service. The problems, as perceived by ROil are that:
- Kids keep signing up without knowing what it's really like.
- VeteranVeteranA veteran is a person who has had long service or experience in a particular occupation or field; " A veteran of ..."...
s keep coming home to communities that don’t understand what they have been through. - Americans go about their daily lives, oblivious to the fact that a war is being fought on the other side of the world.
Veterans’ Truth Project is a collaboration of veterans, writers and performers for social change and creating a performance piece based on the stories of recent veterans that attempts to:
- raise public awareness about the realities of the military service and current wars;
- help young people make informed decisions about whether or not to serve;
- demystify the military experience, and;
- connect veterans and their communities.
VTP will draft creative adaptations of interviews and testimonies on such subjects as service in a time of war, hazing, military social life, returning from war, post-traumatic stress disorder
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Posttraumaticstress disorder is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event that results in psychological trauma. This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity,...
(PTSD). Stories and experiences will become vignettes and/or a full-length play. Under ROiL’s artistic direction, a cast of actors will tour with the show to communities in the eastern U.S., including high school
High school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
students. Audiences will engage in a talk-back session with the community’s veterans, who can answer questions, discuss the reality of the stories and engage in dialogue.