History

The Flöz Sommer Akademie has its actual origin in Galicia, where Paco Gonzalez, „the clown“ of Familie Flöz, founded a summer-school in the house where he was born. He was the son of immigrants who moved in the early 60s to the Ruhr Valley, where 20 years later he would meet the first Flöz members and began to work with them. Years later he decided to connect the dots and take back to his beloved Galicia everything he learned in his adopting country, and passed on his clown wisdom to a future generation.
This idea and concept inspired Familie Flöz Company Manager Gianni Bettucci, himself an immigrant to Germany from Tuscany, to do the same. So he organised his first Clown Workshop in the „Mezzano casolare“ in Chianti, lead of course by Paco Gonzalez. It was in 2005, with the help of his friends and family from Florence and the enthusiasm of 15 participants that the soon to be called Flöz Sommer Akademie was born.
In the course of the following years, the Flöz Sommer Akademie has seen many members of Familie Flöz take turn and passed the magic of acting with mask and of mask-making to hundreds of students from all over the world. It became so big that in 2012 a new home for the academy was needed, and it relocated from the Toll House in Chianti to the majestic San Giusto Abbey in Lazio, which provides not only the perfect location and accomodation but also an atmosphere of concentration, isolation, calm and beauty which contribute to approach the world of the mask.
The Academy has its main goal in sharing and promoting the potentials of acting with masks, with which the European Theatre was born 2500 years ago, and still today is one of the most powerful tools on stage!