APATA Managing Director Yolande Smith and pioneer specialist in the psychology of the performing artist Elma Linz Kanefield sit down to discuss performance potential, the theme of Kanefield's new book Hamlet's Mirror: Reaching Your Performance Potential Onstage and Off.
With 40 years experience counselling performing arts students and artists Kanefield understands what makes performers tick. She has dedicated her life's practice to building better understanding around hard-wiring of the performer and just what it takes to definite your own version of success.
"I want the performers with whom I work to gain a conscious awareness of the effect that both their psychological histories and their chosen life as artists have on who they are and how they perform in life, particularly on stage," Kanefield states in Hamlet's Mirror.
"I trust them to find that voice within that moves them to fulfil their special performance potential and create a lifetime of sustainable, successful and authentic performances on and off stage."
About Elma Elma Linz Kanefield, LCSW, CPC, succumbed to debilitating stage fright as a young performer which left her voice… silent. However, rather than remain devastated and at the effect of her fear, she transformed her fright into her life’s calling and became a specialist in the psychology of the performing artist.
So passionate was Elma about addressing the special personal and professional needs, challenges and possibilities of performing artists that she relocated in 1980 from the Midwest to New York City to open the only Psychotherapeutic private practice exclusive to performers. For the last four decades Elma has been healing and empowering artists at all ages and stages of their lives and careers.
Hamlet's Mirror, Reaching Your Performance Potential Onstage and Off
Hamlet's Mirror looks at the stories and experiences of hundreds of performing artists to explain what prevents some from reaching their performance potential and what empowers others to realise it. Kanefield introduces four Performer Personality Profiles: Problem-Ridden, Pugnacious, Promising and Potential-Realised. These personalities reveal and clarify how performing artists move through professional and personal challenges to become the best they can be as people and as performers. You are invited to hold Hamlet's mirror to see how the wisdom and insight that these performers gained can help you too reach your performance potential.
