Second year BA Acting and Performance student Juraj Benko has secured an exciting apprenticeship opportunity with avant-garde theatre group Odin Teatret, based in Holstebro, Denmark.
Juraj became involved with Odin Teatret after he attended a masterclass with actor and director Roberta Carreri, who leads workshops with the company annually, and has been working with a team of actors on a co-production of Moon of Asia.
Growing up in Slovakia, Juraj’s roots in performance can be found in dance. Juraj spent most of his childhood years practicing ballroom and Latin-American dances – which built a strong foundation of theatre disciplines and transferable skills. Building on these, acting has become his passion and area of interest as an artistic practice.
We caught up with him to find out more about his experience working with Roberta Carreri and his time on the BA Acting and Performance course so far.
I grew up in Slovakia and my beginnings as a performer are more connected to dance than theatre. I have spent all my childhood and teenage years practising ballroom and Latin- American dances, which for me undeniably created a solid base and discipline for communicating with an audience in physical theatre.
Just a few years ago, I decided to change my career path to follow my dreams in studying theatre and acting. That’s what brought me to participate in several international workshops and later to London to study at UAL.
On the course I have met many great friends and classmates who share the same interest in theatre. We all share a will to experiment and challenge ourselves and to create unique content and professional theatre performances. We have also created our own theatre company, Psychonaut Theatre
I believe that whoever identifies themselves as a theatre performer has a responsibility to look at the world beyond just the viewpoint of the theatre. Life is about music, art, politics, psychology, science and so much more. I will never stop being fascinated by the diversity of human beings – from their passions, their experiences and perspectives on life. This is what inspires me and discovering different fields of life should be an inseparable part of our creative process as artists.
In terms of theatre, I would say Sir Ian McKellen’s artistic as well as non-artistic work has been a huge inspiration for me. Italian actor and director Roberta Carreri has also had a big influence on me as a performer. To every performer, I would highly recommend reading books by author and spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle or clinical psychologist Jordan B. Peterson who both challenge you to look at life from a unique perspective.
'To Hell And Back, Or Maybe Not' by Juraj Benko BA Acting and Performance
Last year in October I was chosen as one of the participants for Roberta Carreri’s workshops entitled The Dance of Intentions at Odin Teatret in Holstebro, Denmark.
After the workshop, I returned to London and sent her an email expressing my huge respect and admiration for her work and pitched for the opportunity to continue following her more closely as an apprentice. Thankfully she saw a lot of potential in me and was willing to help, however, the pandemic situation in Europe made it a lot more complicated.
In March 2021 she contacted me again with the opportunity to join a production and team of actors on a project with Per Kap Bech Jensen, a theatre director of Nordisk Teaterlaboratorium, Odin Teatret and Søs Banke, a director of the co-production Moon of Asia.
Odin Teatret is really unique place: I like to call it an island of theatre where hard work and discipline meets passion and beauty. Being in an environment surrounded by so much talent enabled me to gain a fountain of wisdom and inspiration.
The first 2 weeks of my stay were dedicated to getting to know my peers in the project group Moon of Asia, which consists of incredible young artists and performers from all over Europe. We spent long days working with masters of Odin Teatret, training and creating content for a performance under the leadership of our amazing director Søs Banke. After this seminar, we had individual tasks to complete, which gave me more time to focus on work with Roberta Carreri and my individual performance under her direction, which is still in its early stages.
We are still in the middle of the creating process, so I can’t give any specific details about the production. But we have a legendary creative team which is leading us in this incredible journey, and a wonderful team of actors where everyone is coming from different backgrounds of music, acrobatics or circus skills. Everyone is bringing something different, we are sharing and learning from each other to create a spectacular performance.
Covid and whole pandemic situation made things very complicated. Traveling to work in a theatre we had to consider all our steps. But it is the world we are living in now and we had to deal with it. Thankfully there were always ways around which didn’t affect the creative process – so rehearsals, research, and work are currently all in progress.
Trailer: The Disenchantment of Two Women in a Separate Place - performance by Psychonaut Theatre
Trailer: The Disenchantment of Two Women in a Separate Place - performance by Psychonaut Theatre. Psychonaut Theatre is a collective of second year students from BA Acting and Performance and BA Contemporary Theatre and Performance at Wimbledon College of Arts. Credits: Jaya, Lavinia, Teck Krol, Juraj Benko and Karola Kosecka.
There is no doubt that last year was challenging for anyone working in performing arts. I found the most important thing was staying in a positive mind set, and not looking at what I cannot do, but what I can do to make the best out of the circumstance. I believe there is always a way, we just have to find it and focus on it.
I really used last year to focus on building my skillset in areas I felt I was weak in. I created my own routine of physical and vocal exercises to increase my performing abilities, read lots of plays, books and looked for new inspirations. Doing this helped me to keep focused and allowed me to create new content with my fellow classmates from Psychonaut for our new performance.
So far on the course, I have really enjoyed the collaborative group exercises with my classmates which have allowed me gain the confidence to explore personal projects of my own such as the Psychonaut Theatre Company. It’s truly been a fascinating experience which has shaped and enriched my life as a performer and as a human being.
Find out more about BA Acting and Performance