…WAS SHAWN? …IS SHAWN NOW? …WILL SHAWN BE?
Shawn Kinley was born on the east coast of Canada where he dug in the dirt, ran beside the kids who rode bikes, (he didn't learn to ride a bike until he was 14 and still doesn't drive a car) and learned the great and useful skill of misbehaviour.
His style of performance was a blend of physical, visual and conceptual influences he gathered from television, books and life. Aldous Huxley, Herman Hesse, Jim Henson, Red Skelton, Shields and Yarnell and Mummenchanz were a few of his early inspirations.
Awed by the physical work of Robert Shields, Shawn's first professional performance was in store windows in Calgary, Canada as a robotic mannequin. There he caused crowds, car accidents, and the rare psychological breakdown (one 'slightly unique' audience member was ordered by the courts to keep her distance after she became a "little" obsessed.
While performing in the 
Montreal subways as a street performer, the crowd grew so large that Police were about to "detain" Shawn. As they pulled him away, the crowd moved in and one little, wide eyed, 6 year old girl ran up to Shawn, put five dollars in his hat and hugged him. The police let Shawn go and the show continued. Mime, Mask and Mayhem carried Shawn forward as he performed his solo work on 3 continents throughout his twenties.
Not wanting to be limited to one style of performance, Shawn became involved with a world famous theatre which happened to be operating just down the street.
IMPROVISATION
Early in the 1980's, already performing mime, mask work and physical theatre in various countries, Shawn stumbled into the world famous Loose Moose Theatre in Canada.
-
Taken with the magic of the work and the natural connection to misbehaviour and human nature, he started writing for one of the late night sketch comedy groups and performed in Loose Moose's children's theatre. Eventually he stepped onto the improvisation main stage in Keith Johnstone's famous Theatresports which was created at the Loose Moose.
Since then, Shawn has toured with, directed,performed, created and enjoyed his time at the company. When Shawn is in Canada he is still at the Loose Moose as a senior member and all around instigator.
TEACHING
Shawn learned early on that performance was the art of manipulation. He honed that "power", learning quickly that with all powers comes the need for responsibility. Shawn began to formally manipulate (in the classroom) at the age of 16 in a High School in Calgary Alberta where he was asked to teach mime skills in Drama classes.
"To this day I remember the visceral feeling as I pushed the door leaving that school and thinking how amazing it was to have the students hanging on my directions and moving when I told them. And I remember within a step outside thinking, 'This is dangerous. Don't abuse it. The student's should be respected. It's about the work and the student, not the teacher's ego'. I believe that to this day and feel that a good day of teaching is when I've learned something."
.
.
Who is Shawn Kinley NOW … and Why do we keep talking about him?
Shawn travels between 7 and 9 months of the year. Last year he visited 23 countries and needs a new passport.
 |
This year, with a stop in Africa. Shawn will have performed and taught on every continent except Antarctica (there's always time). His major focus these days is on, exploring and developing improvisation.
Every August Shawn teaches at the Loose Moose Theatre's International improvisation school where improvisers have been coming for more than 20 years.
In 2009 Shawn taught a ten day session in Chile. The workshops were attended by Clowns and Improvisers. The experience was great for everyone and Shawn will be heading back to South America very soon to visit groups in Uruguay, Argentina, Colombia as well as returning to work with his friends in Chile and Brasil.
I'm a pretty lucky person. I get to visit theatre groups around the world and PLAY. And for variety I work with the Military (Canadian, British and Norwegian), Olympic athletes, Business managers in all kinds of occupations, various religious groups (I'm agnostic so it's fun to meet with any flavour of belief… or disbelief ), University students and educators, musicians, magicians, dancers, writers, politicians, inventors, brain surgeons, kids and others. This work affects everyone.
Besides the workshops Shawn leads, he is writing a book, developing a "video head theatre show" (see the performance section of this website to see what we mean), exploring ideas on robotics, autism and animal/ human relations.
Life is varied. Life should be fun and fulfilling. Stay challenged, engaged and humble. We can never KNOW it all… we can only explore.
Who Will Shawn Kinley Be?
.
It's funny how we talk about the history of a person and the current activities but we rarely refer to a person's future. Sure, we might not have access to that information but what a person says about their future is an obvious, relevant piece of their picture.
.
We live in a constant state of prediction. We have a vision of what that lovely looking creature across the room could be if we walked across the room and introduced ourself. We have hope that the future will improve when we are in a difficult situation. How else could we go on. So, knowing a bit about the future of the people in your life develops a fair amount of safety and gives us direction.
.
I aim to write a book, or should I say, "books". I like the immediate state of exploration when I'm in a class with students who have inspired me to develop my ideas and thinking in a way that sheds more light where there was murkiness before. I like spontaneous creation BUT… I am constantly losing ideas.
I leave a workshop where a problem has inspired us to create an exercise that solved that problem. Many times after that I will forget the idea. I might stumble on it again in the future or be reminded of it again by one of the participants but many times, it falls back in the mind somewhere and is surrounded by that murkey darkness again.
So, I will write these ideas down… ONE DAY. I'd like to write a book about Improvisation and the mind, Improvisation exercises and theory, Improvisation in the classrooms of schools, and other little reminders of the inspiration that sheds light on this work.
What else? I could be working with animals. I am working with animals. The only thing about the human animal is that I find them far more frustrating than cats, dogs, monkeys, elephants, ravens, gorillas and other earthlings. The great thing about all these other beings that we share the planet with is how much they shed light on who we are.
I mean seriously look at who we are! We begin as these impulse driven 'animals' looking for comfort and safety and growth. We are curious and fearless until we are taught otherwise. We are TAUGHT to be something quite different. Really. We are taught protection, (for both good and bad reasons). We are taught to follow directions that are imposed on us – (how many of you were told at a young age "you will grow up to get a "Good" job"? )
What was I saying? Oh yes, Animals. Teaching in schools, you see the HUMAN ANIMAL most clearly. And you see the loss of the best parts of that human animal. In a class the other day I asked them why they put their hands up in class. They said, "because it is the right thing to do", "Because Ms. Haffer told us to," "Because we always do." Instead of teaching them, we are telling them what to do and in their trust of we teachers, they become the thing we tell them. They don't learn to ask why or to learn. They become us. That's not good enough. They are better than that.
.
What was I saying? Animals… Yes. So Animals as a reflection of who we are inspires me and I'd like to look at that.
Also… Robots. Robots are interesting aren't they? I think one of the things Robotics and Artificial Intelligence investigators are missing, is the integrated sensory approach that humans use in taking the world in. Many experts in the field look at robots from a single sense perspective. Visual feedback, auditory feedback, etc. But integration and context are often left out.
For example, someone touches you on the shoulder and what do you do? You react in context of the situation ("jump" – in the dark back alley where there should be no one, "turn to see who it is" in a crowd, "laugh, turn and run" in a game of tag etc), then you throw another sense at the kinesthetique knowledge of being touched. You LOOK. Then you run through the visual data base and make more of the context (friend, enemy stranger). Then…
.
This again is like improvisation and teaching. How we think, and integrate our world knowledge into contextual behaviour is fascinating. So… I'd like to get involved in some A.I. research.
.
And travel… There are billions of people around the world. I've only met a few of them. I would like to meet more.
.
And more… but we've talked enough about me. What about you?
