“The difference between the “courtesan actor” and the”holy actor” is the same as the difference between the skill of the courtesan and the attitude of giving and receiving which springs from true love: in other words, self-sacrifice.

But the decisive factor in this process is the actor’s technique of psychic penetration. He must learn to use his role as if it were a surgeon’s scalpel, to dissect himself. It’s not a question of portraying himself under certain given circumstances, or of “living” a part; nor does it entail the distant sort of acting common to epic theatre and based on cold calculation. The important thing is to use the role as a trampoline, an instrument with which to study what is hidden behind our everyday mask – the innermost core of our personality – in order to sacrifice it, expose it.

The body must be freed from all resistance. It must virtually cease to exist.

Ours then is a via negativa – not a collection of skills but an eradication of blocks.”

Jerzy Grotowski, “Towards a Poor Theatre”