Portland Stage Company and Maine College of Art (MECA) have recently announced a new partnership to offer a Theater Arts Track during MECA’s three-week residential Pre-College Program.

Running July 12 to Aug. 1, Pre-College is an immersive creative experience for high school students with a passion for the performing or visual arts. Registration is now open for applications with a deadline of April 20 at meca.edu/precollege.

MECA’s Maine College of Art's three-week residential Pre-College program in the Visual Arts has run since 1980 and provides high school students with an immersive and authentic experience of being an art school student.

The program attracts students seeking an opportunity to enjoy creative freedom in a setting that is rigorous, fun and challenging — both personally and professionally. Guided and mentored by accomplished MECA faculty, Pre-College students are passionate about their creative expression and eager to achieve new artistic heights, regardless of form or medium.

This year Portland Stage Company is collaborating with MECA to develop the MECA Pre-College Theatre Arts track designed to expand the outreach of the original Pre-College Program.

“Portland Stage’s immersive theater training program applies a storyteller’s approach to: the actor, the audience, the text, the room,” said Carmen-maria Mandley, Education and Literary Manager. “Participants will focus on the relationship between the actor and the audience, the resonant voice, a heightened sense of play, and an active body. Classes will include Kristin Linklater’s voice progression, movement work, stage combat, theatrical clown, scene study, design, audition techniques and more.”

This track will culminate in two 30 minute Shakespeare Bare-Bard performances.

“We couldn’t be more excited about this partnership and the opportunity to work as a team with the faculty of MECA in the Theater Arts Track. It is a wonderful collaboration,” Executive Artistic Director Anita Stewart said. Theater students will work daily at Portland Stage, a three minute walk from MECA, while housing, meals and all extracurricular and weekend workshops will be provided on the MECA campus.

This unique partnership between two great Portland arts institutions will bring together students from the visual and performing arts, creating cross-pollination through interdisciplinary evening workshops, shared downtime and weekend activities.

“We believe at this age, the creative impulse should be allowed to inform (and be informed by) other areas of artistic expression, capitalizing on the creative synergy that exists between the two art forms,” Director of Continuing Studies Courtney Cook said.

High school students who complete Pre-College acquire the skills to embark on a rigorous study of the arts.

For more information or to schedule an interview, contact Eileen Phelan, marketing director at Portland Stage: 207-774-1043, ext. 108 or ephelan@portlandstage.org.