ISTA is over but not forgotten

ISTA is over but not forgotten Our whole school community pulled together to mount the first ever ISTA Drama Festival at BISB last week. The scale and complexity of organising such an event necessitated students, teachers and parents pitching in to do their part. None of this would have been possible of course without the help of our wonderful host families, cleaners, bus drivers, cooks, admin staff and technical gurus. It truly was a joint effort. Our whole school community pulled together to mount the first ever ISTA Drama Festival at BISB last week. The scale and complexity of organising such an event necessitated students, teachers and parents pitching in to do their part. None of this would have been possible of course without the help of our wonderful host families, cleaners, bus drivers, cooks, admin staff and technical gurus. It truly was a joint effort.

But why all the fuss? Well 42 students and 8 teachers came to Budapest to help us devise a new piece of theatre around the theme of The Quest. They all needed a bed and food as well as artistic inspiration.

Here is what BISB theatre-lovers Elise, Benedicte, Isabel and Joanna had to say about their experiences:

“ISTA is an organisation that visits different schools and puts on drama festivals. We were joined by 4 different schools, which were International School of the Hague, Moscow Anglo-American School, Dusseldorf International School and Frankfurt International School. The festival kicked off on Thursday after school from 4 o’clock until 20.30 in the evening. We were separated in to two Ensemble Groups where we started to get to know one another and our leaders Rebecca Applin and Pete Benson. Our theme for the festival was a lost Hungarian horror film of which only 2 stills exist.

We started brainstorming what the lost horror film might have been like and eventually built up the piece. On Friday we went out into the city centre of Budapest. We visited the smallest art cinema in Europe where we saw 20 minutes of one of the first horror films made. Next, we  jumped on the No. 2 tram and metro. Lunch was in the vaults of the Owl’s Castle Restaurant. In city Park we spend some time in an old folly where we filmed our own 30 second horror story clip using an app called 8mm.

The next day we had 2 workshop sessions. The choices were:  Mime, Physical Theatre, Music and Storytelling, and Take it Slow. All of which were great. The final day there was one final practice and the final performance.”

If you didn’t manage to see the final show you can catch up on the BISB Student YouTube channel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uciNV9aZfk&feature=youtu.be

ISTA, we can’t wait to host you again!