“Legend has it that when the founders of this company prayed to the muse to give them a theater, the muse said ‘Only if you astonish me.’ They did and have for the last several seasons. Only rarely have I seen performances where all the elements were so tightly knitted into one artistic whole.”
–Raleigh News & Observer
Archipelago Theatre/Cine is a Phoenix. She rises when the call is heard from the world, the inner whispers of the collective that are asking a seemingly sphinx-like question to the current human condition. As the Director of this amazing and visionary
group of artists, that comprise Archipelago (‘a group of islands connected by water’), it has been my job to listen to the murmurings around me, to create my own work but also to report what I hear and have been writing about to this inner circle to see if it resonates with them; it usually does and the kernel of a piece begins. With my approach to acting born out of my research in voice and gesture folded into my directing work, and with the design and musical elements that the team brings to the vision, that kernel grows into a performance.
We have created with a fierce burning in the arts scene and then our big productions/films disappear for a few years. This does not mean the group will not create together again, that as individual artists we are dormant: shows are being directed for others, music composed, songs sung, sets and costumes are created, movement choreographed, films shot, research done, lectures given, and awards won. But even if we do these side journeys individually or with other “artistic families,” we will continue to work as creative team under the Archipelago umbrella.
I am in debt and eternally grateful to this team: Nor Hall, Jan Chambers, Jim Haverkamp, Terry Beck, Allison Leyton-Brown and all the collaborators: actors, dancers, musicians, designers, who have come before in the past 35 years and who have inspired us and given of their talents to make this unique theatre and film company shine: in the Triangle community of North Carolina, nationally and internationally beginning with Archipelago Theatre’s early years in Southern France.
You can see our work here on this website and on our YouTube channel.
With gratitude,
–Ellen Hemphill
