John Martin

John is the founder and director of London’s Pan Intercultural Arts, one of the first and leading Arts for Social Change companies in the UK. In the UK Pan Intercultural Arts works with asylum seekers and refugees, survivors of human trafficking and young people close to criminality.

Having studied drama at the University of Bristol and l’Ecole Jacques Lecoq in Paris John has always looked for new ways of creating theatre, from experimental drama with the LaMama company in New York to lakeside settings of anti-war plays in India. In worldwide situations Forum Theatre has been the centrepiece of his projects against girlchild abuse in Indian slums; against ethnic rivalry in South Sudan; against farmer suicide and against post conflict difficulties in Sri Lanka; against societal breakdown after typhoons and against lack of access to justice in Myanmar and against HIV/AIDS ignorance and prejudice in Pakistan. These and other similar projects have convinced John that theatre, while always being engaging and entertaining, is also, and more importantly, a deep and necessary way for people to tell their stories, express their fears and imagine alternative and better futures for themselves.

Ngoài những dự án hợp tác cùng Hội đồng Anh, John cũng cộng tác cùng với Chương trình Phát triển của Liên Hợp Quốc (UNDP), Tổ chức Lao động Quốc tế (ILO), Hội Chữ thập đỏ và các tổ chức quốc tế khác. Bên cạnh đó, John là giáo sư thỉnh giảng tại Đại học Rose Bruford của Vương quốc Anh, Phó Giảng viên tại Đại học Truyền thông London. Ông có nhiều bài thuyết giảng về sức mạnh của trí tưởng tượng, nhu cầu sáng tạo và sức mạnh của nghệ thuật sân khấu.

John’s training concentrates on re-introducing boundless imagination and creativity to enable participants to reflect on their lives and access more complete futures. In extreme situations this even leads to saving lives by stopping suicides, finding ways out of deadly poverty or avoiding conflict. He is delighted to be collaborating with artists and training course participants in Vietnam.

Đặng Minh Thư

Dang Minh Thu is a person who is passionate about practising applied arts, especially applied theatre, in education and community development. Her career began in 2002 when she was chosen out of over 300 potential candidates to be one of the Forum Theatre/Interactive Theatre team members – a six-year peer education project which led by World Population Foundation, David Glass Ensemble and Vietnam Theatre Artists Association to raise awareness of Hanoi youth about reproductive health. Active performance in the theatre team and being guided by many famous domestic and international artists such as David Glass, Robert Hale, Xuan Bac, Vu Long & Thu Lan ,Phuc Di, etc. formed a solid foundation for her later success.

Since 2004, just two years after joining the Forum Theatre troupe, some non-profit organizations began to invite her to conduct short-term training programs for their target audience (students, teachers, staff, youth in the community, etc.) in interactive drama application to communicate about topics of interest to the community, such as prevention of school violence, prevention of domestic violence, raising awareness about human trafficking, child protection from child marriage, infection prevention and anti-discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS, etc.

In 2010, she was one of the first members of Life Art, a social enterprise specialising in the application of art in education and community development, where she later became its director. Realising the potential of teachers as inspirations and contributing to social change, from 2018 to present, Life Art's contribution has focused on the field of education and provide short-term training courses for teachers. The group of Inspiring Teachers that she founded after only 12 months has reached a number of 24,000 members including teachers across Viet Nam.