Personal Statement

My personal background is that I am a fourth-year undergraduate student who has been studying musical theatre for four years.

During the past four years of undergraduate study, almost every performance was carried out in collaboration with classmates. From my first days as a freshman to the graduation ceremony, after numerous collaborations, I finally brought my college life to a successful conclusion. What left the deepest impression on me was an elective course in my junior year. It gave us the opportunity to collaborate with students from the music major. We provided the music and they accompanied us. This was the first time for us to engage in collective cross-disciplinary cooperation. At that time, we chose “The Murder Ballad” as our final work. After many rounds of adjustments, the final end-of-term presentation was successfully concluded.

In the same year, we participated in the “Musical Night” event, combining the songs “Ex-wives” and “Six” from the musical “Six”. We each did our own job. Some were in charge of the dance part, some were responsible for editing the music, and some were in charge of coordinating the costumes… I was responsible for the harmonization part. From reading the sheet music to dividing the parts and finally the synthesis, I was a “pioneer” in these fields that I had never touched before. At the end of the performance, I was filled with tears – we made it!

Also in the same year, I participated in the school’s original musical production – “Don’t Say Goodbye”, and played the role of a mother who had lost her daughter in the play. At first, this scene didn’t have any songs. Later, after discussion by the director team, they decided to add a song for me. This was my first time collaborating with the music composition teacher. At first, the composition teacher sent me the demo. Both of us thought that this song still had a lot of room for improvement. He asked for my ideas, so I hummed out the melody I envisioned for the second half based on the accompaniment, providing him with some inspiration. Later, we made many revisions and finally, during the performance, we received many tears from the audience.

Line of Enquiry

As a performer, the aspect that interests me in collaboration is “how to combine my skills with character development, respond to the suggestions of the collaborators, and engage in mutual cooperation.” In my view, a performer is a combination of skills and cooperation. Because a play cannot be performed by just one person. Although this statement is quite absolute, it is true that independently completing a play from conception to presentation is extremely challenging. It requires a significant amount of time and effort, and often one may feel completely at a loss as to where to start. As a performer, I believe that the first step is to enhance one’s personal skills, because the core techniques are the foundation upon which an actor stands on the stage. However, at the same time, actors also need to possess creativity, teamwork skills and adaptability.

As Anthony Rowe (cited in Candy ,2019) writes:

Each one of us has got a core skill whether it is music, coding, graphic

design, interaction design… But also, you need a whole bunch of other

qualities: you need to be creative, you need to work with a team, you need

to be able to fit in which not everybody can into the kind of structure where

there isn’t really a boss.

Based on my personal experience, the performer’s skills are the foundation for making a contribution to the stage, but they must also be integrated into the collective common vision. The most crucial aspect is that we need to understand the “principles and practices” in the area of collaboration, such as the director’s intentions and ideas, the suggestions given by the technical director, and the pacing of other actors, etc. Only in this way can one better integrate one’s skills and works together.

As Anthony Rowe (citied in Candy ,2019) writes:

We are equals. I want people who will challenge my ideas and come up with

better one… There is also a fair amount of compromise- it’s not one per

son’s singular vision that governs the whole thing.

During the process of collaboration, collaborators often put forward many suggestions. Sometimes, their suggestions can be helpful to us, but sometimes, due to the different starting points of each person, the suggestions they put forward at certain times may confuse us. During my university years, I experienced many collaborations. Sometimes, out of politeness, I was reluctant to express my own ideas, thus making the collaboration turn into a situation where one party was the leader and the other party followed passively. In the ICP course, what I learned more was to be brave enough to express my inner thoughts, to regard myself as one of the equal co-creators, and to provide timely feedback.

As David Clarkson (citied in Candy ,2020) writes:

The golden rule is if you smell something’s going wrong, you talk to it, you don’t pretend it’s not there. If there’s tension between people… it’s better to go ‘how are you feeling? What’s going on?’ The sooner you deal with those things the more efficient the team is, and the healthier the team is.

During the course, I learned about “family-style collaboration”.

As Candy (2019) writes：

Being back in that group was kind of like family in a way, and collaboration gets deeper and more real in that kind of circumstance because you know everyone and there are shortcuts through conversation and levels of trust where we know one another’s work.

It is undeniable that if the relationship with one’s partners is closer to that of family members, there will be much less sense of estrangement. Because they have a clear understanding of each other and have established mutual trust, there is no need to explain the reasons for their actions, which can better promote cooperation.

As Candy (2019) writes：

The collaboration between Stalker and the technology researchers exemplifies a family pattern of mutual support and cognitive empathy combined with complementary thinking and practice… The benefit comes through dialogue and mutually agreed activities leading to novel, leading edge works.

The article mentions “cognitive empathy”, and I completely agree with this concept. Deep cooperation often relies on mutual trust and empathetic understanding. In collaboration, one can trust each other like family members, understand others’ thinking and working methods, and not avoid conflicts but work together to solve them. Only in this way can the health and efficiency of team collaboration be maintained to the greatest extent.

Documentation

Over the past few weeks, I have been involved in several collaborations with my classmates. They come from different majors but are all working towards the same goal.

New Work Lab W2 —Making stuff in a group

This week, we need to collaborate on a work titled Tomorrow. Laura suggested we frame the topic as What If There Were No Tomorrow—each of the five of us has different ideas. Everyone in the company can go off and write a short piece about the character they envision: it could be a small story snippet or a character portrait. Laura will be in charge of weaving these parts together, and Luke will handle the final creation. It’s a shame that one of our group members dropped out midway, which left our team unable to proceed with the project.

ICP Lecture W3— Workshop

The purpose of this class is to create a small work using several different working methods. I am in a group with Beth and Lucy. We first chose “Yes, and… ” 。This method is to accept any idea proposed by anyone; one should not say “No”. Each of us will say one sentence, because of this “Yes, and…” It has made all the unreasonable things completely reasonable. Whether it’s going out for a boat ride for fun or three people turning the alien dye into semi-permanent makeup…

Subsequently, the teacher suggested that we choose another method to create another work. So we chose the second option – “Rotate Leadership”. This method is that each person is responsible for a part of the work. Beth is in charge of writing the plot, Lucy is responsible for the action direction, and I am responsible for filling in the dialogues.

Reflections/Analysis

Jo Butterworth Didactic-Democratic Specturm

This class covered Joe Bartowes’ “Teaching-Democratic Spectrum Model”, through which we can identify the different roles of collaborators and their similarities.

Process One is a relatively traditional creative model, where the instructor/dancer determines the concept, style, content, etc. It is a widely adopted teaching approach. This model places high demands on the dancers’ abilities. They need to promptly adjust the choreography according to the dancers’ individual conditions.

Process Five is a process led, shared, negotiated and decision-making process provided by the choreographer. At the same time, dancers participate in shared decision-making, creative development and responses. In this model, the role of the choreographer shifts to coordinator, which is more suitable for collective decision-making.

In the table, we can see that the role of the choreographer in these processes has gradually shifted from the traditional leadership model to a collaborative model. In Process One, the choreographer has absolute control over the work and is responsible for all decisions. In Process Two, the choreographer still retains the main creative decision-making power as the author, but begins to establish an interactive relationship with the dancers. In Process Three, the choreographer acts as a navigator, exerting leadership by assigning tasks and guiding the creative direction. In Process Four, the choreographer assumes the role of a facilitator, mainly responsible for coordinating and promoting the progress and creation process of the work. In Process Five, the choreographer acts as a co-owner, sharing the same creative rights and responsibilities as the dancers.

Similarly, the role of the dancers has also undergone a transformation from being passive recipients to active creators. In Process One, the dancers act as tools, mainly engaging in imitation and replication. In Process Two, the dancers serve as interpreters, personally understanding and expressing the intentions of the choreographer. In Process Three, the dancers act as coordinators, actively participating in the creative process and contributing their own ideas. In Process Four, the dancers function as co-creators, being able to further express their own thoughts and having greater creative rights. In Process Five, the dancers act as co-owners, enjoying an equal creative status with the choreographer.

These five modes are not merely five cooperative models suitable for different situations; they also demonstrate the dynamic mechanism of role transformation. We can choose different modes for cooperation and also adjust to each other. For me, I believe the most suitable cooperation model for me is Model Three, where I exist as a dancer. Because after receiving the main information, I can express myself based on my own understanding, and present my ideas, and work together with everyone to create. This work will have a part that belongs to me. Undeniably, this can bring me a sense of achievement.It can be said that in most of the collaborations, the mode I like the most is Mode Three.

This chart can clearly illustrate the five different distributions and patterns of role relationships. Each of the five patterns has corresponding scenarios suitable for their application, which is of great help to me. Because in cases where the allocation is unreasonable or the roles are not clearly defined, it is difficult to achieve a successful collaboration.

Furthermore, I have learned that timely feedback during collaboration is extremely important. Timely and accurate feedback is necessary to let the partners know my true thoughts. Although this might bring more challenges, timely communication and exchange, as well as discussing solutions together, can overcome any difficulties.

Conclusion

Based on all the above, my current understanding of collaboration is that it is much more than the addition of skills or the allocation of tasks; it is a dynamic co-creation process built upon individual skills, a common vision, and deep trust. As a performer, I understand that the core skills are the foundation that enables me to stand on the stage, but true art emerges when these skills are integrated into the collective pursuit. In this process, I and my collaborators are equal co-creators. We challenge each other, inspire one another, and are willing to make necessary compromises for the larger overall vision.
I have come to realize that the most efficient collaboration often emerges in an atmosphere resembling a “family”, where there is a great deal of cognitive empathy and unspoken understanding, allowing us to use the “shortcuts” of communication. At the same time, I have understood that we must bravely confront the inevitable frictions and tensions in the creative process, because timely communication and resolution are the golden rule for maintaining the health and vitality of the team. Ultimately, for me, collaboration is a practice of integrating and elevating my skills and role-playing into the artistic work of “we”. This is a journey of continuous reflection, adjustment, and mutual growth.

Moving forward from here

I hope to further study more methods on how to better promote cooperation, as well as more cooperation systems or models. I hope that in the next stage, I can create more interesting and novel works. I also hope to break through myself, actively communicate with all partners and express my own ideas, and contribute my strength to the cooperation.

Bibliography

Patterns of Creative Collaboration(Candy 2019)