Workshops CTR

This workshop is aimed at artists with experience in improvisation but is open to anyone who identifies with the premise of the proposal and feels available and comfortable experimenting with composition and improvisation practices with the body.

From 25 to 30 August 2025, from 14h00 to 19h00.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

• • Registration: 150 €;

Pre-registration is done using the form available on our website and will be validated once proof of payment has been received and sent to our email address.

Registration process

1. Pre-register online using the form provided;
2. Wait for our email with payment instructions;
3. Pay your registration fee as indicated in the email sent to you;
4. Send us proof of payment to our email address;
5. Your registration will only be validated once we have received your receipt.

All fields are mandatory.

The workshops are primarily aimed at artists with some experience but are also open to anyone who identifies with the premises of the proposal and feels available and comfortable to experiment with composition and improvisation practices with the body.

All workshops take place after working hours, from 18h00 to 21h00.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

Entries will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. Although participation in these workshops can take place independently, they have been designed to be articulated, like different sides of a cube. To have access to Composition in Real Time is, in a way, to have access to these different ways of thinking and practising it. That’s why we strongly advise you to enrol in more than one workshop by creating a registration fee that is inversely proportional to the number of workshops you enrol in.

• • 1 workshop = 80€
  • 2 workshops = 140€ (70€ each)
  • 3 workshops = 180€ (60€ each)
  • 4 workshops = 200€ (50€ each)
  • 5 workshops = 200€ (40€ each / fifth workshop free)

Pre-registration is done using the form available on our website and will be validated once proof of payment has been received and sent to our email address.

Registration process

1. Pre-register online using the form provided;
2. Wait for our email with payment instructions;
3. Pay your registration fee as indicated in the email sent to you;
4. Send us proof of payment to our email address;
5. Your registration will only be validated once we have received your receipt.

All fields are mandatory.

During the period in which REAL (a structure run by João Fiadeiro from 1990-2019) ran Atelier Real, open sessions were organised for the community to practice Real Time Composition, free of charge. These were unpretentious sessions, somewhere between a jam and a master class, which had an important impact on the community of artists at the time and on research into (and around) this tool. They were also very important sessions as a meeting place and for the creation of professional and emotional networks that continue to this day.

Over the next months, as part of the programme of activity developed within the framework of Forum Dança’s Resident Research Artist position, we will replicate these sessions to share our experience, but also to allow ourselves to be contaminated by discourses, perspectives and practices outside our comfort zone. These sessions are open to anyone – artist or non-artist, with or without experience of improvisation, with a background in practice or theory – as long as the premises and principles of this practice arouse curiosity.

“The ‘object of study’ of Real Time Composition is the interval that emerges when linear time is interrupted and the sense of continuity is suspended (via accident, incident or ‘just because’). The space that opens up as a result of this interruption is where Real Time Composition research takes place. Within this space, time has that rare quality of being simultaneously ‘no more’ and ‘not yet’. Within this space, time is not linear (or even circular), but ‘twisted’ (like the topological surface of the ‘Möbius Tape’), governed by laws that do not respect the conventional notions of before and after, inside and outside or far and near.”

João Fiadeiro

The sessions are aimed at anyone who identifies with the premises of the proposal and feels available and comfortable to experiment with composition and improvisation practices with the body.

Every Monday from 18.00 to 20.00.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

This cycle of workshops is aimed at artist-researchers with experience in improvisation (in dance, performance or theatre).

Maximum number of participants: 16 people.

Summer workshop: From 26 to 30 August 2024, from 14h00 to 18h00.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

• • Registration fee: €100 (one hundred euros);
  • 10% discount: for people who attend or have attended Forum Dança long-term courses (CGPAE/PEPCC/etc.);
  • 25% discount: for people who attend or have attended PACAP.

Pre-registration is done using the form available on our website and will be validated once proof of payment has been received and sent to our email address.

All fields are mandatory.

Registrations are closed.

* Real Time Composition is a term used in a wide range of artistic interactions and contexts, most commonly in the field of electronic music and its relationship with computer science. In the field of contemporary dance, it is used by many artists as a synonym for the practice of “improvisation” (a term somewhat “hijacked” by common sense as an arbitrary, disorganized or chaotic experience), in order to emphasize the complexity and rigor involved in the act of improvising, especially when presented publicly.

When João Fiadeiro began his research into improvisation in the 1990s, the expression most often used to claim this rigor was “instant composition”. Intuitively João Fiadeiro decided to adopt the notion of ” real time composition” to designate his research, because it was the term that best corresponded to the experience of expanded, distended and plastic time that he had when “colliding” with the unknown, whether when improvising or composing. He was later able to better formulate this resistance to the term “instantaneous” when he realized that an important part of the hypothesis he put forward as a researcher, on the performer’s experience with time, was based on the premise that the idea of an “instant” is made by the human being, who has decided, out of interest (and profit) that an instant is the thinnest slice of time and that successive instants replace the previous one.

More recently, by accessing the writings of authors who think about the concept of time, this reasoning has gained even more ground. In particular through the formulation of “operative time” that Giorgio Agamben uses in “The Time That Remains”. To defend his hypothesis, Agamben relies on the linguist Gustave Guillaume (1883-1960) who states (in his book Temps et Verbe) that “all mental experience, however rapid [it may be], requires a certain amount of time, which may be very brief, but is no less real”. What Guillaume defines as “operative time” (and João Fiadeiro as “real time”) is exactly “the time that the mind uses to realize an image-time”. Agamben complements this reasoning when he says that “a careful examination of the phenomena of language shows that languages organize their verbal systems not according to the preceding linear scheme (…) but through the reference of the constructed image in the operative time of its construction.” Operative time (or, as Fiadeiro would say, “real time”) “is neither the line – representable but unthinkable – of chronological time, nor the instant – equally unthinkable – of its end, and even less a segment extracted from chronological time (…). It is rather the operative time that urges on chronological time and works and transforms it from within, time that we need in order to bring time to an end – in this sense: the time that remains.”

When discussing the term “instant” or “real time” to designate the type of “improvisation” João Fiadeiro researches, he is not referring to the time shared between improviser and spectator, but to the internal time of the performer, in the management of the experience that mediates the identification, circumscription and processing of stimuli; the selection and choice of relation possibilities; and their consequent manifestation in the form of gesture and action.

João Fiadeiro’s use of the expression Real Time Composition to describe his research and practice must be understood in the light of this reflection.

This cycle of workshops is aimed at artist-researchers with experience in improvisation (in dance, performance or theatre).

Maximum number of participants: 16 people.

Easter Workshop: From 1 to 5 April 2024, from 14h00 to 18h00.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

• • Registration fee: €100 (one hundred euros);
  • 10% discount: for people who attend or have attended Forum Dança long-term courses (CGPAE/PEPCC/etc.);
  • 25% discount: for people who attend or have attended PACAP.

Pre-registration is done using the form available on our website and will be validated once proof of payment has been received and sent to our email address.

All fields are mandatory.

Registrations are now closed.

* Real Time Composition is a term used in a wide range of artistic interactions and contexts, most commonly in the field of electronic music and its relationship with computer science. In the field of contemporary dance, it is used by many artists as a synonym for the practice of “improvisation” (a term somewhat “hijacked” by common sense as an arbitrary, disorganized or chaotic experience), in order to emphasize the complexity and rigor involved in the act of improvising, especially when presented publicly.

When João Fiadeiro began his research into improvisation in the 1990s, the expression most often used to claim this rigor was “instant composition”. Intuitively João Fiadeiro decided to adopt the notion of ” real time composition” to designate his research, because it was the term that best corresponded to the experience of expanded, distended and plastic time that he had when “colliding” with the unknown, whether when improvising or composing. He was later able to better formulate this resistance to the term “instantaneous” when he realized that an important part of the hypothesis he put forward as a researcher, on the performer’s experience with time, was based on the premise that the idea of an “instant” is made by the human being, who has decided, out of interest (and profit) that an instant is the thinnest slice of time and that successive instants replace the previous one.

More recently, by accessing the writings of authors who think about the concept of time, this reasoning has gained even more ground. In particular through the formulation of “operative time” that Giorgio Agamben uses in “The Time That Remains”. To defend his hypothesis, Agamben relies on the linguist Gustave Guillaume (1883-1960) who states (in his book Temps et Verbe) that “all mental experience, however rapid [it may be], requires a certain amount of time, which may be very brief, but is no less real”. What Guillaume defines as “operative time” (and João Fiadeiro as “real time”) is exactly “the time that the mind uses to realize an image-time”. Agamben complements this reasoning when he says that “a careful examination of the phenomena of language shows that languages organize their verbal systems not according to the preceding linear scheme (…) but through the reference of the constructed image in the operative time of its construction.” Operative time (or, as Fiadeiro would say, “real time”) “is neither the line – representable but unthinkable – of chronological time, nor the instant – equally unthinkable – of its end, and even less a segment extracted from chronological time (…). It is rather the operative time that urges on chronological time and works and transforms it from within, time that we need in order to bring time to an end – in this sense: the time that remains.”

When discussing the term “instant” or “real time” to designate the type of “improvisation” João Fiadeiro researches, he is not referring to the time shared between improviser and spectator, but to the internal time of the performer, in the management of the experience that mediates the identification, circumscription and processing of stimuli; the selection and choice of relation possibilities; and their consequent manifestation in the form of gesture and action.

João Fiadeiro’s use of the expression Real Time Composition to describe his research and practice must be understood in the light of this reflection.

This cycle of Workshops in Composition in Real Time is made up of two different weeks, each one of them aimed at people with different practices:

• • Workshop I / Introduction – artists-researchers with experience in improvisation (in dance, performance, or theater). It is open to anyone but we will prioritise applications from those who have not yet had contact with João Fiadeiro’s Real Time Composition;

• • Workshop II / Immersive Practice – artists-researchers with previous experience with João Fiadeiro’s Real Time Composition.

You can apply for the two-week frequency (Introduction and Immersive Practice), or for just one of them (Introduction or Immersive Practice), bearing in mind that:

• • Anyone who attends Workshop I / Introduction can later attend Workshop II / Immersive Practice, but must submit now the application for the two weeks;
  • If you already have previous experience with Real Time Compositing (you must indicate in your CV or Motivation Letter where, when and with whom you had this prior contact), you can apply directly for the Workshop II / Immersive Practice.

Maximum number of participants: 16 people.

Workshop I / Introduction: From the 21st to the 25th of August 2023, from 2:30 pm to 7:30 pm.

Workshop II / Immersive Practice: From August 28th to September 1st, from 2:30 pm to 7:30 pm.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

• • Until July 15: One week: €90 (ninety euros) / Two weeks: €150 (one hundred and fifty euros);
  • After July 15th: One week: €120 (one hundred and twenty euros) / Two weeks: €180 (one hundred and eighty euros);
  • Discount: 25% discount on the total amount, for people who have already attended any edition of PACAP – Advanced Program for Creation in Performing Arts;
  • Scholarship: A scholarship will be awarded for free attendance of the workshop, to those who provide logistical support to the workshop (opening and closing of doors, preparation of studios, etc.). If you wish to apply for the scholarship, indicate this information in your Motivation Letter.

The application is made using the form available on this page.

You must submit your Curriculum Vitae with updated data and a Letter of Motivation, stating your reasons for attending this workshop (not to exceed one A4 sheet). If you wish to apply for the scholarship, indicate this information in your motivation letter. If you wish to apply for the scholarship, indicate this information in your Motivation Letter.

If you are one of the selected persons, only after receiving proof of payment, which you must send to our email, will your registration be considered validated.

All fields are required. You must send your CV and Motivation Letter in “.pdf” format.

Files cannot exceed 1 MB/each.

Do not forget

1. 1. 1. Applications with a submission deadline of August 4th;
      2. Results communicated to all selected persons by August 11;
      3. Payment must be made by August 15th, after completing the selection process and being accepted to the workshop.

Applications are closed.

This cycle of Workshops in Composition in Real Time is made up of two different weeks, each one of them aimed at people with different practices:

• • Workshop I / Introduction – artists-researchers with experience in improvisation (in dance, performance, or theater). It is open to anyone but we will prioritise applications from those who have not yet had contact with João Fiadeiro’s Real Time Composition.;

• • Workshop II / Immersive Practice – artists-researchers with previous experience with João Fiadeiro’s Real Time Composition.

You can apply for the two-week frequency (Introduction and Immersive Practice), or for just one of them (Introduction or Immersive Practice), bearing in mind that:

• • Anyone who attends Workshop I / Introduction can later attend Workshop II / Immersive Practice, but must submit now the application for the two weeks;
  • If you already have previous experience with Real Time Compositing (you must indicate in your CV or Motivation Letter where, when and with whom you had this prior contact), you can apply directly for the Workshop II / Immersive Practice.

Maximum number of participants: 16 people.

Workshop I / Introduction: From the 21st to the 25th of August 2023, from 2:30 pm to 7:30 pm.

Workshop II / Immersive Practice: From August 28th to September 1st, from 2:30 pm to 7:30 pm.

Forum Dança / Espaço da Penha
Travessa do Calado, 26B
1170-070 Lisboa

• • Until July 15: One week: €90 (ninety euros) / Two weeks: €150 (one hundred and fifty euros);
  • After July 15th: One week: €120 (one hundred and twenty euros) / Two weeks: €180 (one hundred and eighty euros);
  • Discount: 25% discount on the total amount, for people who have already attended any edition of PACAP – Advanced Program for Creation in Performing Arts;
  • Scholarship: A scholarship will be awarded for free attendance of the workshop, to those who provide logistical support to the workshop (opening and closing of doors, preparation of studios, etc.). If you wish to apply for the scholarship, indicate this information in your Motivation Letter.

The application is made using the form available on this page.

You must submit your Curriculum Vitae with updated data and a Letter of Motivation, stating your reasons for attending this workshop (not to exceed one A4 sheet). If you wish to apply for the scholarship, indicate this information in your motivation letter. If you wish to apply for the scholarship, indicate this information in your Motivation Letter.

If you are one of the selected persons, only after receiving proof of payment, which you must send to our email, will your registration be considered validated.

All fields are required. You must send your CV and Motivation Letter in “.pdf” format.

Files cannot exceed 1 MB/each.

Do not forget

1. 1. 1. Applications with a submission deadline of August 4th;
      2. Results communicated to all selected persons by August 11;
      3. Payment must be made by August 15th, after completing the selection process and being accepted to the workshop.

Applications are closed.