Francisco Zaiden
- Actor
I am an artist who moves between acting, writing, painting and music, driven by a deeply humanist and contemplative vision of art. My academic research focuses on the tension between contemplation, time and creation in the contemporary world, marked by technological acceleration and financial capitalism, and how this affects the artistic experience.
As an actor, I began my career in the world of physical and post-dramatic theatre, where the body was the centre of creation. Over time, I moved on to dramatic theatre, finding in words and narrative a fertile field for experimenting with the archetypal, symbolic and emotional density of acting.
My approach can be described as minimalist, both in terms of aesthetics and acting. Strongly influenced by the thought and practice of Yoshi Oida and Peter Brook, I believe in the power of the contained gesture, the measured word, and formal economy as a path to depth. I'm also an artist who praises the shadow. For me, the shadow is not the absence of light: it is where art breathes, where the unspoken and the sensitive are revealed.
My artistic thinking is aligned with meta-modernity, recognising that today's art doesn't have to choose between tradition and rupture; it's an opening in which the sensibility of the past is recovered in order to think about the present and the future.
I bring with me the philosophy contained in the books Praise of the Shadow, where beauty is revealed in the shadows and the unfinished; the rigour and lightness of The Chivalric Art of the Zen Archer, where artistic making is confused with the spiritual path; and the surrender of The Invisible Actor, where stage presence emerges from emptiness, not from display.
As an actor, I began my career in the world of physical and post-dramatic theatre, where the body was the centre of creation. Over time, I moved on to dramatic theatre, finding in words and narrative a fertile field for experimenting with the archetypal, symbolic and emotional density of acting.
My approach can be described as minimalist, both in terms of aesthetics and acting. Strongly influenced by the thought and practice of Yoshi Oida and Peter Brook, I believe in the power of the contained gesture, the measured word, and formal economy as a path to depth. I'm also an artist who praises the shadow. For me, the shadow is not the absence of light: it is where art breathes, where the unspoken and the sensitive are revealed.
My artistic thinking is aligned with meta-modernity, recognising that today's art doesn't have to choose between tradition and rupture; it's an opening in which the sensibility of the past is recovered in order to think about the present and the future.
I bring with me the philosophy contained in the books Praise of the Shadow, where beauty is revealed in the shadows and the unfinished; the rigour and lightness of The Chivalric Art of the Zen Archer, where artistic making is confused with the spiritual path; and the surrender of The Invisible Actor, where stage presence emerges from emptiness, not from display.
