About
Our Dream
To ensure our success, ArcheDream will continue to bring in the young and talented in the field of performing arts with a view to developing their abilities into concrete, well-structured productions, and to launch their careers through grounded experience. In this way each member directly participates in the promotion and advancement of arts and culture. The integrity of ArcheDream is founded on the quality of the individual artist participating in a collaborative effort. This remains our ongoing quest.
ArcheDream uses archetypal characters that perform allegories, or dreams, to personify vital issues pertaining to our lives. Psychologically speaking, an archetype is a primordial mental image inherited by all. For example, personifications of Anger, Death, Love,War and Peace all play their part in our visions of life. ArcheDream’s costumes are illuminated with ultra-violet light, which accentuates the supernatural aspect and reveals the dreamscape as the action unfolds.
Company Summary
ArcheDream For HUMANKIND has performed for and taught workshops to thousands of adults and children across the United States. It seeks to influence the development of audiences, inspiring them to create their own archetypes, which will remove the alienation and isolation and contribute to a culture that celebrates the diversity and vibrancy of human culture. Our repertoire consists of five shows, each revealing and telling the stories of different archetypes, resonating with adult and young audiences.The ArcheDream for HUMANKIND troupe is an ensemble core of ten talented artists all of whom perform and supervise workshops. These performances, which often occur in tandem with one another, startle our audiences with beauty and then give them an experience to create, discover and express their creative spirits.
In addition to its community workshops, the company has performed at over 200 venues, both local and worldwide including the Red Rocks Ampitheater in Denver, CO, Kennedy Center in Washington DC, the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, Dream Community in Taiwan, Preservation Hall, New Orleans for Mardi Gras and at the recent TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Conference – an invitation-only event where the world’s leading thinkers and doers gather to find inspiration.
Inspiration
ArcheDream For HUMANKIND is the vision and voice of South African native Alan Bell. Growing up in the age of Apartheid, he resolved to find an art form that would unify the racially divided audience in an ecstasy of wonder.In 1976, Alan fled to Amsterdam where he discovered the power of the tradition of mask theater to convey stories and unifying truths in a dreamlike and mythological way, resonating with the audiences’ subconscious perceptions and outward expressions. By combining the bold subtleties of mask theatre with the medium of black light, Alan has discovered a method to bridge his African roots and inherited European and American culture to create archetypal theatre that transforms by relieving audiences of suppressed feelings that is at the root of our alienation from one another.
In 2000, Alan and Glenn Weikert, a musician and multimedia artist, founded ArcheDream For HUMANKIND and established itself in Philadelphia. Through the use of black light, mask and dance to touch the human heart, to communicate universal emotions, and to inspire the soul, ADHK brings transformative performances and workshops to diverse audiences throughout the city and its surrounding communities at venues such as the Annenberg Center, the Fringe Festival, International House and the Rotunda.
