What We Do

Jet propulsion Theatre (JPT) is an innovative, ground breaking and unique multi disciplinary project of the Arditodesìo Theatre Company dedicated to the theatrical creation connected to science, the people of science and the scientific tale. It lies at the interface between science and art, human beings, society, and the philosophy of science. JPT’s mission is to research, build capacity, and showcase the power of performing arts to communicate science in a wide variety of engaging and inspiring ways. The project involves professional performing artists, researchers, science educators and facilitators to promote science engagement with students and general audiences. Arditodesìo is a well known Italian professional theatre company. The project was started in 2012 by Andrea Brunello and Stefano Oss.

JPT at a glance

Productions

Jet Propulsion Theatre regularly produces original spoken word plays that deal with scientific issues and the way they relate to humans. Our research aims at finding out ways to entangle beautiful scientific ideas with solid storylines resulting in fully realised theatrical productions that can be performed in regular theatre seasons and festivals but also in more educationally oriented situations and events. The science in each production is fully researched and rigorously treated (no science fiction and no metascience). Furthermore, each play comes with an educational toolkit that can be used to access more fully the scientific materials presented.

Theatre of wonder festival

Teatro della Meraviglia is a theatre-science festival organized in Trento (Italy) by Jet Propulsion Theatre / Arditodesìo Theatre Company, Teatro Portland, the University of Trento and the Opera Universitaria. It is a yearly Festival aiming to explore the state of the art in theatrescience in Italy and to produce and showcase novel productions, most notably Augmented Lectures.

The first “pilot” edition was produced in January 2017. A new edition of the festival has been organized each following year since. Thousands of people have attended the various editions for what has been considered a tremendously successful festival whose format can be replicated in other cities and Universities. The expertise gained in organizing the Italian editions and the results that were obtained have given us the confidence that the format has the potential to become widespread throughout Europe.

Collaborations

Jet Propulsion Theatre is a multidisciplinary, multicultural project where collaborations are a natural component of its structure. The project has had many fruitful partnerships over the years, here we list some of the more time-tested ones. Given the nature of our work and mission, we are always looking for ways to further grow our network of collaborations.

Courses and workshops

JPT’s mission is to explore the relationship between art, theatre and the communication science. This has been our core activity for a number of years resulting in a vast and extensive experience. This process finds a natural continuation in the field of professional educational. Over the years JPT has developed an extensive experience in producing courses and workshops dedicated to scientific playwriting, storytelling and public speaking.

Schools

One of JPT’s main missions is working with secondary level Schools. This is done, for instance, by showcasing our plays or Augmented Lectures and following them with a Q&A session. Similarly, workshops and courses can be organized for teaching scientific communication to studens but also teachers.
We have also gained significant experience in devising projects tailored to the needs of the schools themselves: providing coaching for the creation of original plays or directing the works of students.

Conference lectures and special events

At times our plays and Augmented lectures are just not the ideal proposal. They can be too long for the needs at hand, or maybe they cannot be performed because of technical constraints. Whatever the reason we are more than happy to devise original and “site specific” events, talks, conferences, to suit the organizers needs. This is done regularly at conferences where we in the past we have touched wide ranging topics like: “The importance of Wonder in the narration of Science”, “Augmented Lectures: communicate science by triggering emotions”, and “Our most important challenge. Ten years, seventeen global goals for sustainable development”.