Our founder and head of the Drama Studio Ines Škuflić – Horvat received the award for her continuous contribution to the development of drama and theatre pedagogy and education in Croatia through her many years of work in drama and theatre pedagogy!
The award is presented by HCDO – the Croatian Centre for Drama Education. The 2018 awards were announced on Saturday, January 12th at the HCDO Annual Meeting in Osijek.
Here is the full rationale of the professional committee:
Our colleague Ines has dedicated her career to the education of children and young people, first as a professor of Croatian language and literature, then as a drama pedagogue in the Zagreb Youth Theatre and later in the Tirena Theatre. She staged many plays with children and young people participating in numerous meetings and festivals in Croatia and abroad, from the Children’s Festival in Šibenik and the ASSITEJ meetings of professionally staged theatre for children and young people, to the International Festival of Authors’ Poetics in Mostar, to the World Youth Festival in Vienna, the World Children’s Festival in Cuba and the European Drama Encounters EDERED. In addition to plays, she has led a number of workshops at international festivals and events and participated in the activities of the International Amateur Theatre Association AITA/IATA, where she is currently a member of the Artistic Council for Youth.
In 1996, Ines was one of the founding members of our Centre, where she was a member of the Presidency for several years and is now a member of the Professional Titles Committee. Within the framework of the Centre, during the first decade of its existence, she conducted numerous workshops on basic theatre pedagogy for teachers and educators throughout Croatia.
In 1997, she founded the Tirena Theatre, where she and her younger collaborators (usually former members of her drama groups) developed a study of theatre pedagogy and designed a repertoire of plays for children and young people, including, most importantly, a series of educational plays that introduced this important genre of contemporary theatre pedagogy for the first time in Croatian theatre and educational space. Within the framework of Tirena, she is also the founder and editor of the Library, where she publishes anthologies of plays written by the participants and collaborators of the Drama Studio and Tirena Theatre.
As a participant of several EDERED Encounters, the most important creative gathering of young European theater artists, Ines initiated holding the Encounters in Croatia and in 2003, together with the young team of Tirena in Pazin, realized, under almost impossible conditions, one of the best European drama meetings to date, with the participation of more than 200 young participants from 18 countries. One of the results of the Encounters was Tirena’s Summer Theater Camp, which Ines launched in Pazin the very next year, where dozens of participants have acquired and developed their own theater pedagogical knowledge and experience over the course of ten years.
Since 200? Ines Škuflić -Horvat has been teaching the courses of Performing Culture and Drama Education at the Faculty of Teacher Education in Zagreb as an external associate, and since 2016 she has been teaching practical courses within the postgraduate specialist studies in Drama Pedagogy at the Faculty of Teacher Education in Zagreb.
Although this description thoroughly illustrates the obvious lasting contribution of colleague Ines Škuflić-Horvat to drama education and pedagogy, we conclude with the following statements from her nomination, written by her slightly younger colleagues:
“(…) It is difficult to speak neutrally about Ines without adding a personal impression. For us, Ines is a teacher, director, expert, collaborator, and role model. Her workshops have inspired and encouraged us to actively explore and engage in drama pedagogical work. However, we have learned not only in the workshops, but also at roundtable discussions where Ines has always understood how to acknowledge our efforts as directors, to understand the conditions in which we work, to perceive and praise successes, but above all to explain in an understandable, positive and expert way (…) what can be improved and how to do it.
By her example, perseverance, work and research approach, Ines Škuflić -Horvat testifies again and again that theater pedagogy is valuable, even if it does not yet occupy the deserved and recognized place in the school system and in society, and she has encouraged many of us to strengthen and build our profession of drama pedagogy.”
© Sva prava pridržana
