Educational workshops

Starting this year, the Macedonian theatre festival “Vojdan Chernodrinski” in cooperation with
“Theatre for All” began its Educational programme within the framework of the festival. The
programme lasts for eight months and is intended for the teachers and students from various
schools in Prilep that lead Drama segments and/or teach the Dramatic Arts.
The goal of this educational programme is to give support, directions, and skills related to the
theatre education sphere to the teachers and students from schools in Prilep. WIth this, it aims
to create dramatic anchors which will be able to operate and create theatre art independently,
as well as its aim to generate a new wave of future theatre artists and viewers.

The contemporary group that monitors the educational programme consists of 20 participants:
two teachers and eight students from two Prilep elementary schools (“Kliment Ohridski” and
“Kocho Racin”), as well as two teachers and eight students from two Prilep high schools
(“Gjorche Petrov” and “Mirche Acev”). Next year, a new selection of schools that display interest
in it will take part in the educational programme. The plan is to go over all schools local to
Prilep, after which the programme is intended to expand outside the city. More information for
schools interested in taking part will be available during the festival itself, and the application
form is available here.

Participants meet three times a month, at one main workshop which lasts three hours, alongside
two accompanying workshops that last an hour and a half. The main workshops are helmed by
Milosh B. Andonovski, who is a director, professor, and founder of “Theatre for All”, whereas the
accompanying workshops are helmed by actors from the Prilep Theatre Ensemble.
When the programme commenced, in November, the participants were introduced to the
fundamentals of the acting game; in December, they were introduced to the fundamentals of
drama writing and dramaturgy; January was dedicated to theatre directing; February – to
scenography, with Martin Manev as a guest lecturer; March was costume design with guest
lecturer Irina Tosheva, who is a costume and fashion designer; and April was dedicated to
theatre critique and the more subtle professions of the sphere. For this workshop, we had the
honor to host two guest lecturers: Ana Stojanoska, professor at the Faculty of the Dramatic Arts
– Skopje and art director at MTF “Vojdan Chernodrinski”, as well as Stojan Damcheski,
longrunning director of Prilep’s theatre. The final May workshop will be dedicated to the
preparation of the finished presentations. To the teachers and students, the Festival gives them
the space and provides the opportunity to display what they’ve learned over the past eight
months in the Festival zone “Chernodrinski for Kids”. The agenda for the day’s performances
can be seen here.

We are especially glad that this programme is approved by the Ministry for Education and
Science of the Republic of North Macedonia with the professional opinion nr. 408/3, issued by
the bureau for the development of education. The time spent by the teachers at these
workshops will be valued as time dedicated for professional development and, of course, the
students will receive certificates for their presence.