By Natica Angilly

The arts are mightily effected with the idea to fuse or combine forms in hopes of creating greater impact or even a new form. Some basic concepts that are lots of fun to experience in our workshop setting can also guide you though your own self taught methods to fuse performance skills. Masks are fun and start the process (we use my own collection of archetypal masks that I created for stage and art showings based on great lines of poetry and poetic dance performances). Courage can be gained by speaking through the mask, as the ancient device is also by definition a persona, otherwise known as actor's mask. Your own "on demand" facial expressions, favorite lines and music, will spark the process. We develop our expressive qualities and come to demonstrative communication with our community and our audience through our own persona.

Movement and facial expressions proven by use of a mirror, helps punctuate the emotion, fill the space, or give action to the scene. If what we think we are saying with our facial expressions, movement and speech do not seem to fuse, or work well together, we can experiment. Remember acting is believing – and that is one of the reasons why we want to create this exercise in making several concepts work together. We are looking to bring our own reality and add impact to our own created mythologies and performances.

Invocation of the Muses helps to define expression and guide exploration of emotions and expressive projection. In learning to share with and sometimes even inspire our audience we must inspire ourselves. The Muses embody a classical standard for inspiring expression. Each of the nine Muses brings a different opportunity for practice. Plato named Sappho the tenth Muse but I call on Mnemosyne for the tenth, as she is the mother of the Muses and the mother of memory. Her name translates to something like "having mental power." We need the ability to recall feeling from our own experience to claim our basic truth for acting and presentation.

Muses (inspirations) come in all forms, centuries, and can be male or female. All Muses, sources of inspiration and guiding spirits, help bestow inspiration, aspiration and intent toward creating ourselves. Enhancing our performance qualities give new directives and guide us in our reason to create, share, perform and become works of art.

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