The Ember: 7th Summer School of Studio Kokyu: 2nd group
You need attention, care, focus and effort to coax a fire from a smouldering ember to heat a house.
The Studio Kokyu Summer School will span 10 days of intense physical and vocal training in the forest base of the Grotowski Institute in Brzezinka, where Jerzy Grotowski led his paratheatre and Theatre of Sources work in 1971–1981. Participants will be working and building a community in the indoor training space and in the surrounding nature.
Workshop participants will explore the performer’s action within a group through regular group training incorporating Studio Kokyu’s day-to-day practice.
Key elements of the work will include:
- Kokyu training: Studio Kokyu’s original training inspired by aikido and Theodoros Terzopoulos’ method, it combines individual and chorus training with body, breath and voice work
- Elements of aikido: aikido is a martial art that redirects the energy of the opponent; the work will involve both physical training and weapons training with the Japanese wooden sword (bokken) and the Japanese stick (jō)
- Partner work, based on aikido’s understanding of contact, emphasizing whole-body listening and readiness to attentively follow and lead; we treat partner work as a tool for studying the physicality of a dialogic situation
- Contact run, an intensive group practice that develops awareness, mutual listening and dynamic spatial relationships.
- Global resonator: exercises designed to discover the full vibrational qualities of a performer’s voice within their body
- Text work, which involves deconstructing text, treating it as a living process, breaking interpretive patterns and focusing on finding the physicality of text
By studying these tools and practices, we aim to guide participants through a journey into the inner source of individual energy. Participants will also explore relations with partners in partner work and deepen the quality of collective action as a chorus. The workshop practice will also work on improvisation.
The forest environment bolsters creative processes and will help us achieve a unique quality of the work and experience in an ecosystem we will be part of.
The Studio Kokyu Summer School is aimed at professional or experienced performers. Be ready for intensive training.
More Information
Transfer
The fee includes transfer from Wrocław to Brzezinka and back.
Departure from Wrocław: 25 August 2025, 6 pm; meeting point: Na Grobli Studio.
Return to Wrocław (drop off point: Na Grobli Studio): 5 September 2025, 10 am.
Daily schedule
8 am, breakfast
9.30 am – 1.30 pm, work session
1.30 pm – 4 pm, lunch break
4 pm – 7 pm, work session
7.30 pm, dinner
Work sessions
Work sessions will be at least 7 hours long per day.
Take comfortable workout clothes (including long trousers/bottoms with no buttons, belts or zips). Most exercises will be performed barefoot.
Accommodation
We provide accommodation in shared rooms (4 or 5 beds per room). The rooms are modest but cosy. There are bathrooms and toilets in one of the wings of the building. A washing machine is available. The house in Brzezinka has a large kitchen, a dining room and a meeting space.
Workshop participants will undertake daily chores to keep Brzezinka clean – they will clean the kitchen, dining room, bathrooms and work space and they will feed the stoves.
Food
The fee includes shared meals: breakfast, hot lunch, dinner and healthy snacks. Meals will be prepared by summer school participants.
We recommend bringing mosquito and tick repellent as some of the work will take place in the woods
Fee and Application
Fee: 700 EUR if you apply and pay by 30 June 2025.
Fee: 815 EUR if you apply and pay on or after 1 July 2025.
The fee includes transfer from Wrocław to Brzezinka and from Brzezinka to Wrocław, full board and accommodation.
Workshop participants will prepare meals together and undertake daily chores to keep the house clean – they will clean the kitchen, dining room, bathrooms and work space, and they will feed the stoves.
Please email your completed application form to studiokokyu@gmail.com by 31 July 2025.
Places are limited. Applicants will be accepted on a first come, first served basis.
A non-refundable deposit of 50% of the fee is required to secure your booking.
Payments should be made following application approval by the workshop leader to a bank account he designates.
Contact: Przemysław Błaszczak, +48 661 927 323
Leader:
Przemysław Błaszczak is an actor with a degree in philosophy who has been associated with the Grotowski Institute since 1995.
From 1996 to 1999, he worked with the Song of the Goat Theatre, where he performed in Song of the Goat – Dithyramb. In 2002–2003, Przemek created the solo performance Ecco Homo and in 2004 he joined Teatr ZAR, a resident company of the Grotowski Institute, with whom he performed in the Gospels of Childhood: Overture and Anhelli: The Calling, and in Armine, Sister. Przemek also performed in Heiner Müller’s Mauser, directed by Theodoros Terzopoulos (Greece), which had its Polish premiere in 2012. He studied the original actor training method developed by Theodoros Terzopoulos at Attis Theatre, Greece, and is its certified teacher. Przemek is the founder and leader of Kokyu Studio, a group established in 2016 and working under the auspices of the Grotowski Institute.
Since 2005 Przemek (2nd Dan) has studied the Japanese martial art of aikido under Sensei Piotr Masztalerz (6th Dan). In 2011, he studied with Juba Nour Shihan (6th Dan) in Mexico. Przemek is a founding member of Na Grobli Aikikai Dojo, where he teaches regular sessions. The Dojo works under the auspices of the Birankai Poland. In 2005, at the invitation of Toshi Tushitori, he went to Japan where he practiced shintaido, a Japanese system that integrates voice and body through training based on traditional karate.
From 2013 to 2016, Przemek was one of the leaders of the Two Paths Studio, which was part of the Grotowski Institute’s BodyConstitution research programme. In 2016 Przemek formed Kokyu Studio. He is also a co-founder of Wrocław Theatre Offensive (WrOT). He has run workshops in Poland and abroad.