Karen Anne Light is an actress, teaching artist, and consultant who creates devised physical theatre.
She seeks a theatre - and a world - which is for every kind of body, every kind of artist; a theatre which invites a dazzling multitude of forms and expressions to come out, to be seen, and to play.
Productions include Prowling the Abyss (NYC); Unblinking Eye (NYC); Sisters of Rapture (NYC); Portals, and Alice Down the Rwong Wrabbit Whole (San Francisco). Karen was part of the ensemble which created and performed Different with Theater Grottesco (Santa Fe, NM).
Screen credits include Nancy 3 in The Fae, a queer web series (PrideFLIX, Philedelphia Independent, OUTstream, and Big Apple Film Festivals), and The Fury of Frau Frankenstein by George Kuchar, the godfather of underground queer cinema.
She is in ongoing collaboration with playwright Justin Anderson Taylor, directors Elizabeth Baron and Jessi Hill, and artist Amos A.
As a teacher and consultant, Karen helps artists to achieve their creative visions and find more freedom as performers. She works with individuals and collaboratives on developing or existing creative projects and theatrical training, and leads groups in physical theatre workshops.
Her work in Shakespearean and contemporary theatre from an early age inspired her to seek the origins of the art form through physical theatre and dance, especially Clown, Mime, Epic Rhapsodic text, and devising from improvisation.
Her training and apprenticeship since 2014 with Elizabeth Baron has included Formwork (one of Baron's many contributions to the field), Red Nose Theatre Clown, performance creation, pedagogical research, Reichian breathwork, Wu Tao, Giovanni Fusetti's Polarities, and Vocal Pedagogy for Physical Theatre. Karen also trained in Bouffons with Giovanni Fusetti, Tragedy with John Flax of Theatre Grottesco, and Commedia dell'arte with Giulio Vanzan - all within the lineage of Jacques Lecoq.
She is currently pursuing her Masters Degree in Mental Health Counseling, focusing on counseling methods which overlap with applied movement theatre research.
Previous training includes devised physical theatre, Mime, Clown, and Mask with James Donlon & Leonard Pitt through the Flying Actor Studio Conservatory, Théâtre du Soleil (Paris), Theater Grottesco, John Gilkey, and John O'Keefe; International Dance with Lorna Zilba of Life Dance Theater (San Francisco), and Butoh with Hiroko Tamano (San Francisco). At San Francisco State University she earned a degree in Theatre Arts and trained in Suzuki Method and Meisner Technique, as well as Shakespearean Theatre through the British American Drama Academy (UK).
You can view Karen's résumé by clicking here.
Prowling the Abyss
at "Down to Clown" (Pine Box Rock Shop, NYC) 2023
photo: Gontran Durocher
Futtonna Butonna
photo:Kenny Yun
