The MAP-D is a 1.5 calendar year full-time programme of 90 credits, consisting of 3 semesters with a total of 63 weeks. The course is project based with taught elements. The projects in the first and third semester are interdisciplinary team projects, which directly involve the outside environment and the audience. The project in the second semester provides you with a laboratory situation where you can concentrate on your individual research question. The third semester is entirely dedicated to the launch of your work to the professional field, alongside with a solid artistic and business plan that will serve you for the years after graduation.
MAP-D brings together a diverse student population in terms of cultural, educational, and professional backgrounds. There are students who have recently finished their BA studies and professionals from the field, Dutch students and international students. This diversity suits the work we do and increases the number of connections with a variety of contexts in society. In this course, diversity is used as a vehicle for creativity.
MAP-D closely cooperates with theatres and festivals in Utrecht, with MA programmes at the Utrecht School of the Arts and Utrecht University, with theatre and festival house Huis aan de Werf, and with other current and new partners of the HKU: cultural partners such as museums, festivals, community arts organisations, city-initiatives, schools, housing corporations, and commercial partners.
The MAP-D programme is a practice-based research programme. It creates a learning environment, which gives you the opportunity to learn how to design, produce and manage performance design practices. The learning environment of MAP-D is wide. It consists of the Faculty of Theatre with its projects, classes, premises and facilities. It extends to the input and premises of our Utrecht theatre partners Huis/Festival aan de Werf and Lab/Dox (an organisation for talent development in theatre) and those of our external partners in society. Your work is informed and sometimes dictated by situations and problems from a wide and diverse field. There are periods in this course where you study with one leg in practice. You learn by doing and reflecting, making and thinking.
Reflective practitioner
In MAP-D you research through practice, with a close connection between making and thinking. You develop, experiment, design, and make work while reflecting on your creative process. Your research is driven by your personal engagement with the role of arts in society. In the design of your research you combine your personal artistic fascination with given outside factors.
The following areas form the theoretical framework of the course:
a) Post-dramatic dramaturgical principles and practices of site-specific theatre and scenography, applied theatre and community arts, writing for performance and storytelling, game & interaction design and technology which take an integral approach towards the involvement of, and interaction with audiences, partners, and contexts.
b) Creativity theory: at HKU the study of creative processes is a key area of research. The myth of the artist working in isolation with his inspired talents is demystified by the study and practice of strategies and tools which look at the phases in the performance process of the different partners, as well as the ingredients (varying roles, tasks, working methods, codes, sources) which characterize their complex mutual influences.
c) Theories, in the field of arts management, which acknowledge the typical characteristics of this type of innovative work in context, including organisation and finance design and models of co-creation and co-ownership.
1. Interdisciplinary Project:
In the first semester you design produce and manage a performative event or experience, working in context. You work in interdisciplinary teams of 4 to 6 students and in cooperation with an external partner selected by the course team and HKU Project Office (X-change). The partner may be a cultural organisation, a governmental organisation or a partner from the industry. Outcomes of the first project are: 1) a public performative event or experience; and 2) a research seminar for professionals in the field which reflects on the principles and impact of the work produced. The HKU School of Theatre hosts the first project.
2. Individual Research in Practice:
In the second semester you work on your individual research question by literature study, laboratory work in the studio and a study visit abroad. You are coached in small teams by experts and support each other in collegial consultancy sessions. You may invite a small audience in to test your ideas. Outcomes of the second project are: 1) three experiments based on an individual research question; 2) written and visual report on the research; and 3) presentation during the Festival aan de Werf in Utrecht. The Research Centre for Theatre Making Processes at the HKU Faculty of Theatre hosts the second project.
3. Production and Launch:
In the third and last semester you and your colleagues form teams and make your final collaborative performance work. This work is informed by your specific expertise and research outcomes from the project in the second semester. Besides, you will write an artistic and business plan that outlines your future practice.
The results of this project are:
1) production of the final collaborative performance in a graduation festival; and 2) public launch of you as performance designer with your individual artistic and business plans (If you want to start or continue as a collective, you present your joint plans). The third project is hosted in cooperation with Production House & Festival Huis aan de Werf.
There are four theoretical modules that support the project work.
The supporting studies are:
• Management of interdisciplinary creative processes.
• New audience strategies.
• Intervention and interaction.
• Management and entrepreneurship.
