Third-Way Theater's work is underpinned by Theatre of the Oppressed techniques devised by the Brazilian artist and activist Augusto Boal, and the Philosophical framing of anti-binary model that seeks to explore issues outside the circular and warring lens of good/bad - right/wrong.

Forum Theatre, also created by Augusto Boal serves as a tool for researching issues and strategies needed to create change in the world. The main concept of forum theatre is that power is present in all interactions, exchanges and social arrangements. In Forum theatre tensions arising out of the misuse of power are examined, challenged and altered.

The goal of Forum Theatre is to strip back the rhetoric many us of us have come to believe about certain social and cultural 'problems'. Forum theatre scenarios are designed to stimulate engagement through inter/active discussion, the sharing of experiences. Audience members stop a performance replacing characters whose struggles they understand  in order to try out  different actions out on-stage in an attempt to change the outcome of what they wittnessed.

Forum Plays arise out of workshops with communities, the experts on the struggles being investigated. During the workshop communities act as co-researchers. Community members  are asked to 'mold' and 'sculpt' their own bodies or those of others into representations of a particular situation, emotion, or idea. The body is the first and primary method of expression, and by using the body rather than speech, the normal 'blockades' and 'filters' of thought can be bypassed.

Image theatre is dialectic, as those who view the image created are also able to sculpt the bodies of the participants to portray their opinions on the image. In addition, they also communicate their understanding about characters gender, motivation, the location of an image. This act of pluralsing the many ways in which exploitative situations are played out, enables deeper knowings to emerge giving voice and validation to the cultural complexity of the many realities in which we find ourselves.

IN working with communities and as an ensemble 'theatre is a laboratory'. It provides an opportunity to consciously and critically reflect, engage, and act on social and political issues. Collectively we can then explore questions about cultural experiences which have been habituated. This collective questioning assists in dismantling social and cultural silences making visible the way in which certain truths are marginalized, reinforcing the dominance of destructive actions.

We have applied this tool as a social policy technique to support grass roots communities coming together to dialogue about changes that are needed from the perspective of lived experiences.

Theatre, as an embodied process, a critical tool in by passing habituated thinking, supporting the capacity to uncover the depths of our voices, and desires for change.  Working with experiences that are “othered” and denied, we  move beyond the "matrix".

This work in dismantling cultures of dominance is needed, and our participation in it, our willingness to act,  is imperative in the work of restorative justice and peace.

por nuestros sueños de paz y justicia