Founded Vienna 2005 · Now in Dubai

Where the actor
learns to be
truthful. — a fine arts institute, from Vienna to Dubai.

For two decades, our institute has trained actors and artists in the tradition of Konstantin Stanislavski. From a single studio in Vienna to a working academy in Dubai — children find imagination, teens find voice, adults find craft. All find truth.

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Театр

— The Institute Acting · Voice · Movement
Fine Arts in Support. Ages 4 → Adult · Jumeirah 1, Dubai

Love the art in yourself, not yourself in the art.

Konstantin Stanislavski, 1936

Vienna · 2005

Dubai · 2026

01. Manifesto

A studio, not
a spectacle.

We do not train students to perform. We train them to be. Acting, in our institute, is not the wearing of masks but the patient work of removing them — until what remains is honest, alive, and unmistakably the student's own.

What began in Vienna as a single studio for the diaspora has, over twenty years, become a quietly stubborn idea: that art-making is a discipline of attention, and that the discipline can be taught. To a six-year-old discovering her first imagined world. To a teenager finding the courage of his own voice. To an adult returning to a craft long set aside.

04. The Stanislavski Method

Why Stanislavski
from 1898?

Konstantin Stanislavski changed acting forever by asking a simple question: how does an actor stop performing and start living on stage? His answer — a system of attention, given circumstances, sense memory, and ensemble work — remains the foundation of nearly every serious acting programme in the world.

We carry his name because we carry the work. Founded in Vienna in 2005 as the first acting academy for the Balkan diaspora, our method has trained over three thousand graduates. Today that tradition continues in Dubai, with international faculty, teaching what has always demanded honesty above all else.

Given Circumstances

The actor begins by accepting the world of the play as if it were their own — fully, specifically, without protection.

ii.

Action & Objective

Every moment on stage is a doing, not a feeling. We train students to play actions and let emotion arrive on its own.

iii.

The Ensemble

No actor exists alone. Our classes are small, our partners are real, and our work belongs to the room.

iv.

Daily Discipline

Talent is common. Discipline is not. Voice, body, and imagination are trained the way a musician trains scales.

05. Faculty

The people who
carry the work.

The institute is led by working theatre artists with international stages behind them. They teach because they have done — and continue to do — the work themselves.

Founder · Artistic Director

Violeta Veljović

Born into a family of actors and on stage from the age of three, Violeta studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London and holds a master's as an audiovisual artist. In 2005 she founded the Stanislavski Acting Academy in Vienna — the first of its kind for the Balkan diaspora — and has personally taught over three thousand students through it.

As a director, her work has been staged across London, Amsterdam, Belgrade, Vienna, and Bratislava. Dubai is her next stage.

RADA London Trained

54 Productions Directed

3,000+ Graduates Taught

Lead Faculty · Acting & Voice

Milan Jelen Pajić

An established Serbian actor known for his roles in series including Sinđelići, Igra sudbine, and Tate, Milan trained at the Belgrade Academy under professors Nebojša Bradić and Andrej Sepetkovski. He is also a graduate of law — a discipline that informs his rigour as a teacher.

Founder of the theatre company Teatar pod stečajem, a sought-after voice and dubbing artist, and a faculty member at TKD Belgrade and Novi Sad, he has taught at the Stanislavski Academy in Vienna for years. He brings that same craft to Dubai.

Belgrade Academy Trained

Stage · TV · Voice Working Across Media

Vienna · DXB Faculty

Faculty · Children & Young Players

Maja Jovanović

Maja's vocation revealed itself early — drama workshops won out over physics and mathematics through her primary school years. By her third year of high school she had formally enrolled in acting, going on to complete her master's at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade, in the Department of Theory of Dramatic Arts and Media.

Since 2011, she has worked as an actress in Belgrade's children's theatres and as a drama teacher at an acting school for young students — guiding them through the same imaginative thresholds she once crossed herself. A member of the Association of Independent Artists of Serbia since 2019, she now brings that craft to Dubai.

FDU Belgrade Master's, Dramatic Arts

Since 2011 Teaching Young Actors

Belgrade · DXB Faculty

06. Now Enrolling

Summer Camp 2026.

Book a Place →

Dates 06 July → 28 July 2026

Length Three weeks · 7 sessions per track

Venue Jumeirah 1, Dubai

— Track I

Balkan-Speaking

Mondays & Wednesdays

Ages 5–7

10:00 → 12:00

AED 2,200

Ages 8–12

13:00 → 15:00

AED 2,500

Ages 13–18

16:00 → 18:00

AED 2,900

Book Balkan Track →

— Track II

German-Speaking

Tuesdays & Thursdays