|
Showing 1 - 15 of
15 matches in All Departments
'Tender and rigorous, this book invites readers to linger with
difficult pasts and consider how best to grasp their hauntings,
demands and manifestations in the present. This is a book about
mourning as well as holding, a simultaneous act of exhumation and a
laying to rest.' anna six, author of Madness, Art, and Society:
Beyond Illness ‘This is an extraordinary book, in which queer
theatre and performance become sites of celebration and resistance,
as well as holding the potential for performers and audiences to
work through painfully felt yet difficult to articulate experiences
towards feelings of hope. Replete with rigorous, generous and
creative readings, it is also a meditation on Walsh’s own
emotional engagement with queer theatre and performance, and how
our cultural attachments can sustain, enliven and contain us.’
Noreen Giffney, psychoanalytic psychotherapist and author of The
Culture-Breast in Psychoanalysis Why do contemporary queer theatre
and performance appear to be possessed by the past? What aesthetic
practices and dramaturgical devices reveal the occupation of the
present by painful history? How might the experience of theatre and
performance relieve the present of its most arduous burdens?
Following recent legislation and cultural initiatives across many
Western countries hailed as confirming the darkest days for LGBTQ+
people were over, this book turns our attention to artists fixed on
history’s enduring harm. Guiding us through an eclectic range of
examples including theatre, performance, installation and digital
practices, Fintan Walsh explores how this work reckons with complex
cultural and personal histories. Among the issues confronted are
the incarceration of Oscar Wilde, the Holocaust, racial and sexual
objectification, the AIDS crisis and Covid-19, alongside more local
and individual experiences of violence, trauma and grief. Walsh
traces how the queer past is summoned and interrogated via what he
elaborates as the aesthetics and dramaturgies of possession, which
lend form to the still-stinging aches and generative potential of
injury, injustice and loss. These strategies expose how the past
continues to haunt and disturb the present, while calling on those
of us who feel its force to respond to history’s unresolved hurt.
Offering one of the first scholarly examinations of digital and
distanced performance since the global shutdown of theaters in
March 2020, Barbara Fuchs provides both a record of the changes and
a framework for thinking through theater's transformation. Though
born of necessity, recent productions offer a new world of
practice, from multi-platform plays on Zoom, WhatsApp, and
Instagram, to enhancement via filters and augmented reality, to
urban distanced theater that enlivens streetscapes and building
courtyards. Based largely outside the commercial theater, these
productions transcend geographic and financial barriers to access
new audiences, while offering a lifeline to artists. This study
charts how virtual theater puts pressure on existing assumptions
and definitions, transforming the conditions of both theater-making
and viewership. How are participatory, site-specific, or devised
theater altered under physical-distancing requirements? How do
digital productions blur the line between film and theater? What
does liveness mean in a time of pandemic? In its seven chapters,
Theater of Lockdown focuses on digital and distanced productions
from the Americas, Europe, and Australia, offering scholarly
analysis and interviews. Productions examined include Theater in
Quarantine's "closet work" in New York; Forced Entertainment's
(Sheffield, UK), End Meeting for All, I, II, and III; the work of
Madrid-based company Grumelot; and the virtuosic showmanship of EFE
Tres in Mexico City.
This interdisciplinary volume offers new insights into the
connections between populism and performance. As a driving force of
the contemporary left, the populist logic offers a way for
progressive politics to radicalize actions against the elite,
fostering greater democratization of societies at a time of
socio-political and environmental crisis. Exploring the populist
roots of a number of performances, the contributors to this study
analyze the potentials and limits of the new forms of left populism
for more democratic ways of living together. Combining performance
studies and political theory, Performing Left Populism demonstrates
how various performance practices give rise to populism. It shows
how both civic performances (including grassroots, civil movements,
political speeches, state policies and media campaigns) and
artistic performances (such as theatre, dance, music and artistic
activism) contribute to these processes. By these means, the book
examines the processes of constructing ‘a people’ through both
the real/civic and imaginary/artistic perspectives. Offering
scholars and practitioners a thought-provoking analysis of the ways
in which performance can be viewed politically, as a social
practice capable of mobilizing alternative ways of living and
invigorating democracy, this study expands the debate about left
populism towards strategies of mobilization, collectivism and
democratic politics.
How are Black artists, activists, and pedagogues wielding acts of
rebellion, activism, and solidarity to precipitate change? How have
contemporary performances impacted Black cultural, social, and
political struggles? What are the ways in which these acts and
artists engage varied Black identities and explore shared
histories? Contemporary Black Theatre and Performance investigates
these questions to illuminate the relationship between performance,
identity, intersectionality, and activism in North America and
beyond. It features contributions from scholars, artists, and
activists from across disciplines who explore the nuances and
varied forms of Black performance in the 21st century while
incorporating performance-based methodologies and queer and black
feminist theories. Among the many topics addressed by contributors
are antiracist pedagogy, Black queer identity formation in Black
playwriting, digital blackface, and Black women's subversive
practices within contemporary popular culture. It encompasses
dramatic analysis of Lynn Nottage's Sweat, Tarell Alvin McCraney's
Choir Boy, and acts of resistance during the Black Lives Matter
summer 2020 highway protests. A series of conversations with
artists and scholars are woven throughout the book’s three
sections, including with playwrights Christina Anderson and Donja
R. Love, and Willa Taylor, Director of Education and Community
Engagement at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago.
This is the first book to examine how the concept and disagreements
around post-truth have been explored in the world of theater and
performance. It covers a wide spectrum of manifestations and
expressions-from the plays of Caryl Churchill, Anne Washburn, and
David Henry Hwang, to the inherent theatricality of press
conferences, FBI interviews and protests that embrace the confusion
created by post-truth rhetoric to muddy issues and deflect blame,
to theatrical performance, where the nature of truth is challenged
through staged visuals which run counter to what the audience
hears, provoking a debate about where the truth actually lies. With
contributions by scholars from around the world, Theater in a
Post-Truth World considers a wide array of examples from American
and British drama and politics, Australian theater, and the work of
performance artist Marina Abramovic. Together these provide a
glimpse into how the theater in its many forms provides a venue to
raise awareness and encourage critical thinking about the
contemporary ubiquity of post-truth.
The crafts of governance and diplomacy are spectacular, theatrical,
and performative. Performing Statecraft investigates the
performances of states, their leaders, and their citizens on an
expanded field of the global arts of statecraft to consider the
role of performance in the domestic and international affairs of
states, and the interventions into global politics by artists,
scholars, and activists. Treating theatre as both an art form and a
practice of political actors, this book draws together scholarship
on the embodied dimensions of governance, the stagecraft of
revolution, arts activism on the world stage, sports performance by
heads of state, the performativity of national dress, speechmaking
and colonialism, war and medicine, singing diplomats, indigenous
sovereignties, and performed nationalisms. It brings the
perspective and methods of performance studies to bear on global
politics, offering exciting new insights into encounters between
states, sovereigns, and people. Whether one is watching a campaign
speech, a nightly news broadcast, a sacred dance, or a play about
global conflict, these chapters make clear the importance of
performance as a tool wielded by amateurs and professionals to
articulate the nation in global spaces.
This book revisits In-Yer-Face theatre, an explosive, energetic
theatrical movement from the 1990s that introduced the world to
playwrights Sarah Kane, Martin McDonagh, Mark Ravenhill, Jez
Butterworth, and many others. Split into three sections the book
re-examines the era, considers the movement's influence on
international theatre, and considers its lasting effects on
contemporary British theatre. The first section offers new readings
on works from that time period (Antony Neilson and Mark Ravenhill)
as well as challenges myths created by the Royal Court Theatre
about the its involvement with In-Yer-Face theatre. The second
section discusses the influence of In-Yer-Face on Portuguese,
Russian and Australian theater, while the final section discusses
the legacy of In-Yer-Face writers as well as their influences on
more recent playwrights, including chapters on Philip Ridley, Sarah
Kane, Joe Penhall, Martin Crimp, Dennis Kelly, and Verbatim Drama.
Of the many dynamic, young playwrights to be associated with the
"In-Yer-Face" burst of creative talent on the British stage in the
mid-1990s, Joe Penhall has challenged Britain's status quo the
most. Penhall believes his plays should constantly provoke and
enrage not only the institutions he targets, but also his audience.
This critical book discusses the argumentative nature of Penhall's
plays, while also placing them within the context of contemporary
British society and the modern dramatic tradition. His eight plays
are discussed in detail, and particular attention is paid to male
identity, the nature of grief, the variety of females in his
oeuvre, domestic drama and the role of autobiography in his work.
Written in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis, this book brings
the past, present and future of theatre-going together as it
explores the nature of the relationships between performance
practitioners, arts organisations and their audiences. Proposing
that the pandemic forced a re-evaluation of what it means to be an
audience, and combining historical and current cultural sector
perspectives, the book reflects on how historical conventions have
conditioned present day expectations of theatre-going in the UK.
Helen Freshwater examines the ways in which developments in
technology, architecture and forms of communication have influenced
what is expected by and of audiences, reflecting changes in
theatre’s cultural status and place in our lives. Drawing on the
first-hand experiences of festival director and performance
practitioner Kate Craddock, it also contends that practitioners now
need to turn their attention to care, access and sustainability.
Together Freshwater and Craddock argue that it is possible to draw
meaningful parallels between the attachments that can develop
between performance and audiences, and those we value elsewhere in
our lives. Theatre and its Audiences argues that the pandemic
taught us, above all, that it is possible to do things differently.
Part vision, part provocation, part critical interrogation, it
offers an insightful appraisal of past norms and assumptions to set
out a bold argument about where we should go from here.
Offering one of the first scholarly examinations of digital and
distanced performance since the global shutdown of theaters in
March 2020, Barbara Fuchs provides both a record of the changes and
a framework for thinking through theater's transformation. Though
born of necessity, recent productions offer a new world of
practice, from multi-platform plays on Zoom, WhatsApp, and
Instagram, to enhancement via filters and augmented reality, to
urban distanced theater that enlivens streetscapes and building
courtyards. Based largely outside the commercial theater, these
productions transcend geographic and financial barriers to access
new audiences, while offering a lifeline to artists. This study
charts how virtual theater puts pressure on existing assumptions
and definitions, transforming the conditions of both theater-making
and viewership. How are participatory, site-specific, or devised
theater altered under physical-distancing requirements? How do
digital productions blur the line between film and theater? What
does liveness mean in a time of pandemic? In its seven chapters,
Theater of Lockdown focuses on digital and distanced productions
from the Americas, Europe, and Australia, offering scholarly
analysis and interviews. Productions examined include Theater in
Quarantine's "closet work" in New York; Forced Entertainment's
(Sheffield, UK), End Meeting for All, I, II, and III; the work of
Madrid-based company Grumelot; and the virtuosic showmanship of EFE
Tres in Mexico City.
This book revisits In-Yer-Face theatre, an explosive, energetic
theatrical movement from the 1990s that introduced the world to
playwrights Sarah Kane, Martin McDonagh, Mark Ravenhill, Jez
Butterworth, and many others. Split into three sections the book
re-examines the era, considers the movement's influence on
international theatre, and considers its lasting effects on
contemporary British theatre. The first section offers new readings
on works from that time period (Antony Neilson and Mark Ravenhill)
as well as challenges myths created by the Royal Court Theatre
about the its involvement with In-Yer-Face theatre. The second
section discusses the influence of In-Yer-Face on Portuguese,
Russian and Australian theater, while the final section discusses
the legacy of In-Yer-Face writers as well as their influences on
more recent playwrights, including chapters on Philip Ridley, Sarah
Kane, Joe Penhall, Martin Crimp, Dennis Kelly, and Verbatim Drama.
How are Black artists, activists, and pedagogues wielding acts of
rebellion, activism, and solidarity to precipitate change? How have
contemporary performances impacted Black cultural, social, and
political struggles? What are the ways in which these acts and
artists engage varied Black identities and explore shared
histories? Contemporary Black Theatre and Performance investigates
these questions to illuminate the relationship between performance,
identity, intersectionality, and activism in North America and
beyond. It features contributions from scholars, artists, and
activists from across disciplines who explore the nuances and
varied forms of Black performance in the 21st century while
incorporating performance-based methodologies and queer and black
feminist theories. Among the many topics addressed by contributors
are antiracist pedagogy, Black queer identity formation in Black
playwriting, digital blackface, and Black women's subversive
practices within contemporary popular culture. It encompasses
dramatic analysis of Lynn Nottage's Sweat, Tarell Alvin McCraney's
Choir Boy, and acts of resistance during the Black Lives Matter
summer 2020 highway protests. A series of conversations with
artists and scholars are woven throughout the book’s three
sections, including with playwrights Christina Anderson and Donja
R. Love, and Willa Taylor, Director of Education and Community
Engagement at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago.
Written in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis, this book brings
the past, present and future of theatre-going together as it
explores the nature of the relationships between performance
practitioners, arts organisations and their audiences. Proposing
that the pandemic forced a re-evaluation of what it means to be an
audience, and combining historical and current cultural sector
perspectives, the book reflects on how historical conventions have
conditioned present day expectations of theatre-going in the UK.
Helen Freshwater examines the ways in which developments in
technology, architecture and forms of communication have influenced
what is expected by and of audiences, reflecting changes in
theatre’s cultural status and place in our lives. Drawing on the
first-hand experiences of festival director and performance
practitioner Kate Craddock, it also contends that practitioners now
need to turn their attention to care, access and sustainability.
Together Freshwater and Craddock argue that it is possible to draw
meaningful parallels between the attachments that can develop
between performance and audiences, and those we value elsewhere in
our lives. Theatre and its Audiences argues that the pandemic
taught us, above all, that it is possible to do things differently.
Part vision, part provocation, part critical interrogation, it
offers an insightful appraisal of past norms and assumptions to set
out a bold argument about where we should go from here.
This is the first book to examine how the concept and disagreements
around post-truth have been explored in the world of theater and
performance. It covers a wide spectrum of manifestations and
expressions—from the plays of Caryl Churchill, Anne Washburn, and
David Henry Hwang, to the inherent theatricality of press
conferences, FBI interviews and protests that embrace the confusion
created by post-truth rhetoric to muddy issues and deflect blame,
to theatrical performance, where the nature of truth is challenged
through staged visuals which run counter to what the audience
hears, provoking a debate about where the truth actually lies. With
contributions by scholars from around the world, Theater in a
Post-Truth World considers a wide array of examples from American
and British drama and politics, Australian theater, and the work of
performance artist Marina Abramovic. Together these provide a
glimpse into how the theater in its many forms provides a venue to
raise awareness and encourage critical thinking about the
contemporary ubiquity of post-truth.
|
|