Some may find it weird and a bit confusing, but for this abstract student-based theater group, growth and pleasure are born amid new experiences.
By Christina Miller
Staff Writer
Imagine sitting in a dark classroom in the middle of the night. Instead of being surrounded by fellow classmates, bright lights and the sound of your teacher lecturing, you are drenched in darkness and the quite hours of stillness. For only 15 minutes you sit and experience what is known as anagogical learning, or spiritual learning.
It is this kind of learning that one can experience in Cognitive Dissonance, a thought provoking and spiritual experience in experimental theater. This student-run theater company at Pepperdine, founded by T.J. Volgare, Paul Golightly and Elaine Revolinski, gives students the opportunity to express themselves in non-traditional ways.
This Friday and Saturday Cognitive Dissonance will be performing its second annual student theater festival titled “Strange Birds Purring.” This production will feature five different original works: “E-Male” by Kelly Hines, “Oasis” by Golightly, “Three Cliches: Done Rather Well” by Revolinski, “Conversations With Myself” by Ben Matthews and “Stillborn?” by Volgare.
This year’s theme is taken from an E.E Cummings poem titled “Portraits.” It refers to the line: “a street/there is/ where strange birds/purr.” This poem deals with abstract art that is not inspired by form but by the essence of form. The poem alludes to famous artists such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Paul Cezanne who each introduced new ways to view art. The premise behind Cognitive Dissonance is viewing art from a different angle in order to appreciate it, Volgare said.
Cognitive Dissonance is intended to break down the barrier between the audience and the stage actors by challenging them with the ideas that are presented on the stage.
“We create in the theater one collective soul,” Volgare said. “Our theater demands almost as much from the audience as from the artists, if they really want to have the holy experience.”
Volgare grew up performing but he did not grow up creating. He came to realize that he shouldn’t be bound by other people’s successful creativity, but that he had new concepts and creativity to offer.
“I realized a lot of complacency in the world and a lot of dogma in the theater,” Volgare said. “People are subscribing to ideas in the theater just because that is what has been done before, and that is what has been proven effective. Our generation feels like there is nothing left to give. So I dedicated myself to the proposition of unlimited progress.”
Volgare is studying theater and creative writing and hopes to go on to film school and continue creating.
Cognitive Dissonance’s mission statement is that as God is uniquely revealed through Christ, so Christ is uniquely revealed in art. Their art is meant to expose every pretense, and in doing so create a spiritual experience for the actors and the audience, Volgare said.
This year’s festival is freshman Laura Cook’s first performance with Cognitive Dissonance.
“It has made me want to explore different outlets as an actress and try different techniques, not to look to the well known productions but to stretch myself,” Cook said.
Last year Cognitive Dissonance performed its first theater festival titled “Soliciting From Darkness.” This featured six original works, as well as original artwork, music and monologues. All of their original work dealt with questions of what is real.
Cognitive Dissonance continues to express themselves in upcoming projects. “Sin and Shampoo,” written by Volgare and 2002 alumnus Ryan Webber and directed by Volgare, will be premiering at the end of November in Elkins Auditorium. They also plan on having a night of expression in the Sandbar set up as a coffee house next summer.
Cognitive Dissonance formed its name based on the idea of evoking something from nothing, a concept gathered from Milton’s “Paradise Lost.”
On Cognitive Dissonance’s Web site they define the name of their group based on the online medical dictionary, which says that it is a “motivational state produced by inconsistencies between simultaneously held cognition or between a cognition and behavior.”
Cognitive Dissonance is comprised of about 30 people and has open auditions for productions.
Cognitive Dissonance’s second annual theater festival is Friday and Saturday in room 112 of the Pendleton Learning Center Mini Theater. Tickets are free and reserved seating is offered.
October 24, 2002