[1] Włodzimierz Staniewski was a former collaborator of Jerzy Grotowski, and in his choice of just such an isolated environment, Staniewski may have been inspired by his work with Grotwoski in Brzezinka,[2] but with an important difference: rather than emphasising an isolating escape from urban existence, Gardzienice represented for him a pursuit of integrative existence within a community, albeit of a different sort.

From the outset, Gardzienice sought to work with the local people, taking interaction with them as both inspiration for a way of life, and for a way of developing performance.

This may not constitute a strict anthropological exercise in the purely academic sense, and Staniewski may insist on a less clinical term, but at its heart is arguably an interest in the study of people.

According to Richard Schechner, Gardzienice constitutes "the very heart and essence of Polish experimental and anthropological performance.

Staniewski does not look for professional theatre actors (he himself studied Polish language), but what matters is the personality of the candidate.