The Art of the Encounter

As the archives from the second half of Grotowski’s life were made available, this text focuses on the Polish master’s conceptions of theatre where he describes theatre as the art of the encounter. This paper simultaneously places this proposition in the context of questions of a specific time period, and reveals how this encounter is the anathema that will revert viewpoints both about the art of acting and the creation of theatrical relations. These researches on theatre as the art of the encounter continue today through the Open Program, one of the two groups of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards, and, notably, their creations around American poet Allen Ginsberg, an author whose poetry intends, in a similar way, to encounter the other and the world.