Disintegration and integration processes of German culture of the end of XX and beginning of XXI are analyzed by giving examples of stage interpretations of mythological plots in theatres of present-day Germany. It is stated that pluralism and multidimensionality of the spiritual experience of modern cultural workers, both writers (such as V. Braun, S. Schutz, B. Strauss etc.) and leading producers (D. Dorn, S. Nubling and others) contribute to the drawing up of a special syncretic style of theatre staging, (...) first of all with the use of the ancient material which is appropriate for it. Ancient myth, as one of the steadiest constants of the European literature, gives a universal key to the interpretation of various cultural and ethic-aesthetic phenomena that are irredundant to nothing else. There is a sociocultural context in which German spectators nowadays try to comprehend these dramaturgy phenomena; and there is a genuine stage director interpretations of them (in Aachen City Theatre, Dramatic Theatre of Hannover, Munich Chamber Theatre etc.) that not only lead to the decanonization of the classic model, but also pinpoint problematique of these performances. (shrink)

This article addresses concerns about the relationships between practice and theory in today's theatre and examines the discipline's analytical methodology. This contribution re-introduces Yuri Lotman's concept of semiosphere as an anthropological and social space of communication, in which every participant maintains their existence concurrently across temporal, linguistic, and cultural zones. Finally, by launching the notion of a theatrical semiosphere that embraces the dynamics of cognitive impulse in the tripartite proximity of the space of the stage, the space of the (...) audience, and the space of the “in between,” this study seeks to demonstrate how the transitory nature of theatrical communication directed at the multiple audio-visual, cognitive, and cultural sensors of actors and spectators can still be considered and studied from the perspective of semiotic exchange as the primary device of human cognition. (shrink)

Avant-garde theatre is often invoked as the bellwether for a society that has become postdramatic – fragmented, alienated, and critical of efforts to create collectively shared meanings. A theatre whose sequenced actions have no narrative (so the story goes) mirrors a social world where the most conflictual situations no longer appear as drama but merely as spectacle: a society where audiences look on without any feeling or connection. Because only half right, these theses about postdramatic (...) class='Hi'>theatre and society are fundamentally wrong. As modern societies have expanded and differentiated, the elements that compose performances have become separated and often fragmented in both theatre and society. If they can be brought back together again, performances are viewed as authentic and meaningful. If (re)fusion cannot be achieved, performances fail to communicate meaning. The aim of this essay is to demonstrate that a shared ambition to (re)fuse fragmented performative elements has defined the most important strain of avant-garde theatre over the last two centuries. Most radical theatrical innovation has sought to open live drama back up to the telos of myth and ritual. Neither in theatre nor social life can the world transcend dramaturgy; it is fundamental to the search for meaning in a world beyond cosmological religion. (shrink)

As one of the most influential feminist theorists in Western academic circles, Hélène Cixous is often associated with écriture feminine, a term she coined in 1977, and with a fluid, poetic style both in her essays and in her fiction. This article investigates how Hélène Cixous uses the concept of the ‘feminine’ in her plays as a container for heterogeneity, liminality and difference, mobilizing it to animate feminist strategies that interrupt male, white and/or hegemonic forms of subjectivity. If for Cixous (...) the practice of feminine writing is fundamentally characterized by the desire to create a mode of expression in which difference and otherness would retain their alterity, in dramatic writing she found an especially conducive medium for the realization of that desire. This article examines Cixous’s anti-realist postdramatic works, from her first produced play Portrait of Dora to her works for Ariane Mnouchkine’s Théâtre du Soleil, in the context of a feminist aesthetics of estrangement, and considers how her plays enact feminist theory’s own movement away from the psychoanalytical discourses of the 1970s and 1980s to postcolonial and materialist critiques. The article employs a range of intersectional critical methodologies for situating Cixous’s dramatic writing within a broader feminist praxis, using the work of feminist performance scholars like Elin Diamond, Rebecca Schneider and Jill Dolan to consider the liminal Other as a precarious feminine figure that Cixous re-inscribes into discourse. Feminine writing, the progressive movement away from realism towards postdramatic theatre, and Cixous’s artistic collaboration with Mnouchkine are each considered as feminist strategies towards a rendition of the subject that can reiterate its otherness on stage. The central argument is that it is the enactment of these strategies in live performance that makes Hélène Cixous’s concept of femininity as liminal difference so relevant for feminist politics today. (shrink)

La cultura digital nos plantea una nueva relación entre teatro y sociedad impulsada por el impacto de las nuevas tecnologías, con el consecuente desplazamiento de sus códigos representacionales: texto y puesta en escena. Modelos híbridos, virtuales y presenciales emergen como perfiles experimentales de creación escénica. Sin embargo, estas relaciones entre virtualidad, tecnología, innovación y teatro han estado presentes a lo largo de su historia, siendo la virtualidad un factor consustancial al hecho escénico tanto en lo dramatúrgico como en lo espectacular.

A new critical reading of Aristotle’s Poetics help us to focus in a different way the debate about Aritotleism and anti-Aristotleism in XX century’s theatre. The Author thinks that a new reading of Poetics could help to understand that contemporary theatre is going towards a “neodramatic” stage and not a “postdramatic” one, that the theory of «essential actions» could not be referred only to prose and realistic theatre, and, first of all, that the question concerning the (...) dynamic arts should be considered as a central educational topic. (shrink)

I should like to begin this paper by thanking Anik Waldow for drawing my attention to a debate between Jean Jacques Rousseau and the philosophes about the proposal to build a theatre in Geneva, wit...

In the context of the blurring of boundaries between club and theatre, game and theatre, and party and theatre, experiential spectatorship is spilling into the mainstream. This article starts from the recognition of the rapid rise of the experience economy as a turning point in consumer culture towards a specific appeal to the sensory body. The definition of experience in this analysis is key and a distinction is made between experience as it passes moment by moment, erlebnis, (...) and experience as something that is cumulatively built up over time, erfahrung. This paper asks, in a society defined by the crisis of experience, does this rise of the experiential in theatre simply reflect the reduction of experience to a series of consumable sensory moments or is there a mode of experience modelled through performance interaction which moves both beyond this established mode of experience and also beyond the notion of experience as cumulatively formed wisdom? Drawing a parallel between established popular cultural practices of the body and those of the spectator in spectacular promenade performance, Fuerzabruta is used as an illustrative example of popular experiential performance and Hwang’s The Road as an example of experiential performance in which a transformative aesthetic is made possible. (shrink)

Machine generated contents note: -- List of IllustrationsAcknowledgementsIntroductionImmanent authorship: From the Living Theatre to Cage and Goat IslandDisorganizing language, voicing minority: From Artaud to Carmelo Bene, Robert Wilson & Georges LavaudantImmanent imitations, animal affects: From Hijikata Tatsumi to Marcus CoatesPaying attention, participating in the whole: Allan Kaprow alongside Lygia ClarkEthical durations, opening to other times: Returning to Goat Island with WilsonIn-Conclusion: What 'good' is immanent theatre? Immanence as an ethico-aesthetic valueCodaBibliographyIndex.

The London‐based Oily Cart theatre company aims to produce shows that are suitable forallyoung people. This paper closely examines one of their productions,Splish Splash, which was developed for children with profound and multiple learning difficulties. The paper's central purpose is to understand the value of this type of theatrical experience for these children. It argues that Winnicott's conception of play, and his account of the conditions that enable the capacity for play to unfold, provide a persuasive theoretical framework that (...) makes sense of Oily Cart's achievement. Winnicott's framework can integrate the views expressed (in interviews) by adults who were involved with or observed the show; arguably it is also corroborated by more recent infant research. (shrink)

This paper explores the power of theatre to engage the public and my personal journey using theatre as a research tool in reproductive science. I argue that the capacity of theatre to simultaneously engage the minds and hearts of audience members qua research participants affords audience members the capacity to provide researchers with insightful comments informed by the scientific, social and tacit knowledge derived from the performance, integrated with their lived experience. Theatre is a particularly important (...) research strategy when investigating public understandings and desires about complex issues such as those related to reproductive and genetic science. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION Is the theatre good? A reply is likely to come back: 'That is not the point, the question is what does it mean?' But here I want to reassert ...

En focalisant notre attention sur l'atelier comme lieu de formation des improvisateurs et improvisatrices de théâtre, cet article vise à réintroduire le Théâtre d'Improvisation dans le processus d'apprentissage qui l'accompagne. Dirigé par un·e chef·fe d'atelier chargé·e de la gestion des exercices, des consignes ainsi que des retours, l'atelier se construit comme un jeu interactionnel et discursif visant à transmettre des compétences à improviser. Ce processus suppose des modalités d'ajustements collectifs et de compréhension mutuelle entre les comédien·ne·s qui s'exercent et le·la (...) chef·fe d'atelier qui prend le rôle de conseiller·ère, d'évaluateur·rice et d'enseignant·e. En ce sens, le travail d'atelier relève d'une dynamique particulière en tant que performance avant la performance publique, impliquant d'élargir la notion d'exercice à ses débordements interactionnels. Au sein de ce cadre pédagogique, le retour, moment d'échanges en aval de l'exercice, devient un phénomène primordial. S'il recouvre différentes fonctions telles que l'évaluation, la critique ou le conseil, le retour offre aussi la possibilité de déréférencer le propos de l'exercice en question pour traiter du Théâtre d'Improvisation comme pratique. Le retour dans sa dimension épisémiotique permet dès lors de saisir le passage de l'exercice, comme phénomène éphémère et localisé à la pratique du Théâtre d'Improvisation, comme discipline stabilisée et collective. (shrink)

This book provides both a historical analysis of the philosophical problem of individuation, and a new trajectory in its treatment. Drawing on the work of Gilles Deleuze, as well as C.S. Peirce and the lesser-known Gilbert Simondon, Alberto Toscano takes the problem of individuation, as reconfigured by Kant and Nietzsche, into the realm of modernity, providing a unique and vibrant contribution to contemporary debates in European philosophy.

It is the thesis of the paper that the arts of the twentieth century have gone much further in the criticism of customary modes of thought than have both the sciences and the various critical philosophies which exist today. Moreover, they have not only developed an abstract principle of criticism, they have also studied the psychological conditions under which criticism can be expected to become effective. Some plays and the theoretical essays of Ionesco are analysed as an example. It is (...) pointed out that Ionesco resembles Bacon in that he believes in an unchangeable basis of humanity from which all ideologies proceed. An attempt is made to free Ionesco from these dogmatic elements, theoretically, as well as practically (i.e. as regards the performance of his plays) and to utilize to the full his contributions to a theatre that is free of prejudice, and fully critical. (shrink)

The subject of intercultural exchange is complex and demands that we keep the basic issues that shape our views of the world in mind. And one of these basic issues is what we mean by “European identity.” The ideological concerns over the norms of identity became necessarily entangled in the post-1989 interests and agendas of Europe’s various nations. So the great challenge for us as academics as well as for the policymakers in Brussels and Strasburg is to focus on these (...) dialectics. European identity is too varied to be a unitary and homogenous thing; indeed, one of the battles within it is between the advocates of a unitary identity and those who see the whole as a complex that is irreducible to a unified identity. In this article I explore how the theatre, in the aftermath of the Second World War, served as a laboratory for the investigation, analysis, and constuction of dramatic models that became a means of transcultural communication. As attested by the continuing success of the experimental approaches of Brecht, Grotowski, La Mama, and Suzuki, this endeavour reflected the struggle of people from different cultural backgrounds to understand and accept each other. One of the reasons the theatre continues to have the potentiality to promote transcultural integration is that it deals in concrete particulars with universal resonances. As I will demonstrate with examples from my own work in various countries, the production and directing of plays by these and other dramatists shows that it is only in the performance—by transforming the familiar into the unfamiliar, by making the habitual and customary seem strange and unexpected—that the motives, relationships, and events enclosed in the written play are released so as to stimulate the audience to re-examine their own contemporary realities. Transcultural theatre thus creates dramatic experiences that are adequate and responsive to the changing world of migration and mobility in which both practitioners and audiences actually live. As such it offers the kind of transcultural education that promotes communication and understanding and that fosters an open-eyed and open-hearted attitude to the changing realities of Europe. (shrink)

What is ethics and what has it got to do with theatre? Drawing on both theoretical material and practical examples, Ridout makes a clear and compelling critical intervention, raising fundamental questions about what theatre is for and how audiences interact with it.

Προσόψεις θεάτρων και Νυμφαία θεατρικής πρόσοψης. Η σχέση μεταξύ τους Το άρθρο αυτο μελετά τις ομοιότητες ανάμεσα στις προσόψεις των θεάτρων και των μνημειακών νυμφαίων. Η συζήτηση αφορά κυρίως στα λεγόμενα νυμφαία με ευθύγραμμη πρόσοψη, τα οποία συγκρίνονται άμεσα με τη scaenae frons ενός ρωμαϊκού θεάτρου. Η έρευνα βασίζεται σε τέσσερις παραμέτρους : α. τη μορφολογία, όπως φαίνεται μέσα από τις ομοιότητες των δύο μνημείων, λ. χ. τη χρήση συγκεκριμένων αρχιτεκτονικών στοιχείων, β. τη λειτουργία και τη χρήση αυτών των δημοσίων (...) μνημείων εντός του αστικού τοπίου – σε σχέση με την κοινωνική, πολιτική και πολιτισμική ζωή των πολιτών, γ. την εικονογραφία, δηλαδή τη μελέτη του γλυπτού διακόσμου, ο οποίος αναπτύσσεται στις μνημειακές προσόψεις και των θεάτρων και των νυμφαίων · και τα δύο αυτά μνημεία φιλοξενούν παρόμοια εικονογραφικά προγράμματα, τα οποία ακολουθούν συγκεκριμένους κανόνες, αποβλέποντας ταυτόχρονα στην προβολή συγκεκριμένων μηνημάτων, δ. τη σχέση με το ιερό στοιχείο, το οποίο ενέχεται τόσο στα θέατρα όσο και στα νυμφαία · ένα μεγάλο μέρος των θεάτρων και των νυμφαίων έχουν κατασκευαστεί εντός ή πλησίον ιερών, ενώ πολλά θέατρα φιλοξενούν νυμφαία στους χώρους τους. (shrink)

Theatre & the Visual argues that theatre studies' preoccupation with problems arising from textual analysis has compromised a fuller, political consideration of the visual. Johnson examines the spectator's role in the theatre, exploring pleasure, difficulty and spectacle, to consider the implications for visual experience in the theatre.

From oral culture, through the advent of literacy, to the introduction of printing, to the development of electronic media, communication structures have radically altered culture in profound ways. As the first book to take a critical realist approach to culture, Theatre, Communication, Critical Realism examines theatre and its history through the interaction of society’s structures, agents, and discourses. Tobin Nellhaus shows that communication structure—a culture’s use and development of speech, handwriting, printing, and electronics—explains much about why, when, and (...) how theatre has transformed. (shrink)

This chapter examines the relevance of Gilles Deleuze's work for the works of Italian director Carmelo Bene. It argues that Deleuze's One Less Manifesto conceived the theatre of continuous variation, particularly Bene's theatre, as one that is initiated and sustained by subtraction. It also questions the compatibility of Deleuze's vitalist concept of subtraction with Bene's own concept of the subtractive.

Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 56, Issue 2, Page 329-341, April 2022.

Chemosensory communication as a form of time-based performing art has occurred in form of ideas in literary fiction and in occasional concepts of art or entertainment in the past. The history of patents on devices for such purposes since the beginning of the 20th century is full of failures and abandoned approaches, mainly because of chemical, technical, social, or cultural misunderstandings. With the project Smeller, we started to realize an artistic performative practice of storytelling with distinct and rapid sequences of (...) scents and smells, of and on during some thirty-five years. Only since 2012 could we introduce this practice with our novel technology Smeller 2.0 in public performances and enhance its possibilities ever since. Perfumistic algorithms can now generate endless variations of olfactory signals and smells, electronically controlled, and digitally composed for collective experience on a larger scale: Osmodrama. The practical application has soon ignited collaborations of neuroscientific research and therapeutical implementation with surprising discoveries. This essay is a personal review of the genesis and emergence of Osmodrama. (shrink)

This book discusses spaces of performance from formal opera houses to parks and graffiti around the world and is a companion toTheatre in Passing: A Moscow Photo-Diary. Drawing once again on Michel de Certeau's notion of a “second poetic geography,” this new volume examines prominent theatrical destinations —New York, London, and Paris—along with others that are often overlooked, including Canada, Mexico, and Turkey. In addition to indoor theaters, the book covers a variety of outdoor theatrical spaces, as well as street (...) theater. Like its predecessor,Theatre in Passing 2 is richly illustrated with photographs by the author and provides fascinating insights on the intersection of performing arts, visual culture, and photography. (shrink)

The Piraeus were certainly leased out to private individuals in classical antiquity. It has been suggested that this was common and was true even for the Theatre of Dionysus in Athens, and that this model was true for impermanent wooden theatres. This article argues a contrary position: that there is only one certain example of a leased theatre, which may for all we know have been unique. The other alleged parallel, the deme theatre in Acharnae, is argued (...) to be wrongly supplemented and explained. Some other epigraphical examples of theatres are cited for different funding mechanisms, and it is also argued that wooden theatres were neither leased nor necessarily impermanent. We have especially no reason to think that the Theatre of Dionysus was leased in the time of Theophrastus. (shrink)

Can we make progress exploring consciousness? Or is it forever beyond human reach? In science we never know the ultimate outcome of the journey. We can only take whatever steps our current knowledge affords. This paper explores today's evidence from the viewpoint of Global Workspace theory. First, we ask what kind of evidence has the most direct bearing on the question. The answer given here is ‘contrastive analysis’ -- a set of paired comparisons between similar conscious and unconscious processes. This (...) body of evidence is already quite large, and constrains any possible theory . Because it involves both conscious and unconscious events, it deals directly with our own subjective experience, as anyone can tell by trying the demonstrations in this article. (shrink)

Plato has a negative vision of art and of the tragedy. The "irrationality" of the artistic practice is in the base of that denial. His vision is contrary to the perspectivism humanist of Eurípede and of the sophists. In the renaissance philosophy the subject observer presuppose the multiple and the infinite. The perspectivism is in the base of that orientation and Shakespeare is the best artistic expression of that presupposition defended in the philosophy by Giordano Bruno.Platão tem uma visão negativa (...) da arte e da tragédia. A "irracionalidade" da prática artística está na base dessa negação. Sua visão é contrária ao perspectivismo humanista de Eurípedes e dos sofistas. Na filosofia renascentista, o sujeito observador pressupõe o múltiplo e o infinito. O perspectivismo está na base dessa orientação e Shakespeare é a melhor expressão artística desse pressuposto defendido na filosofia por Giordano Bruno. (shrink)

In view of the enormous and expanding body of literature on Sartre the best one might expect of a new study would be a profound new insight or a significant new systemization of existing insights; the worst would be either a rehash of old opinions or a deliberate effort to be ‘new’ at all costs If Mrs McCall’s book falls somewhat short of the first category she certainly avoids most of the pitfalls of the second.

RESUME Jean-Paul Sartre débute comme dramaturge durant la Seconde Guerre mondiale alors qu'il est prisonnier de guerre en Allemagne, dans un camp de 25.000 détenus. Durant sa captivité, le philosophe écrit une pièce de théâtre réunissant des victimes et leurs bourreaux, des juifs, des prisonniers et des allemands. Bariona est la toute première pièce de Sartre et elle restera une référence pour le théâtre de situations que l'auteur ne cessera de réaliser pendant toute sa vie. Traditionnellement la pensée sartrienne est (...) analysée, dans un premier temps, sous le prisme de la philosophie abstraite et individualiste dont L'être et le néant est l'expression fondamentale, puis, dans un second temps, après la Seconde Guerre mondiale, à travers le marxisme dont la Critique de la raison dialectique serait le principal ouvrage. L'objectif essentiel de cet article est de mettre à l'épreuve cette idée en analysant les concepts de l'homme seul et de la collectivité dans la première pièce dramaturgique de Sartre. On verra que l'interprétation que divise la pensée de Sartre en deux n'est pas si juste. RESUMO Jean-Paul Sartre estreia como dramaturgo durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial, quando é feito prisioneiro de guerra na Alemanha em um campo de concentração com outras 25 mil pessoas. Durante seu cárcere, o filósofo escreve uma peça de teatro reunindo vítimas e seus algozes, judeus e alemães. Bariona é a primeira peça de Sartre e permanecerá a referência do teatro de situações que o autor continuará a perseguir por toda a vida. Tradicionalmente, o pensamento sartriano é considerado, em um primeiro momento, sob o prisma da filosofia abstrata e individualista, que teria na obra O ser e o nada a expressão fundamental; em seguida, em um segundo momento, depois da Segunda Guerra Mundial, o é por meio do marxismo, do qual a Crítica da razão dialética seria a obra principal. O objetivo fundamental do presente artigo é o de colocar à prova essa ideia, analisando os conceitos de homem solitário e de coletividade na primeira peça de teatro de Sartre. Veremos que a interpretação que divide o pensamento de Sartre em dois não é, com efeito, justa. (shrink)

For the past 5 years I have been photographing and interviewing men who play games based on contemporary conflicts. The games attempt to re-create scenarios that the US military is engaged in around the world like the "Hunt for Osama Bin Laden" that took place three years ago on a campground in Northern, Virginia. On a sociological level, the work speaks about the way that trauma and conflict penetrate a culture sheltered from the horrors of war. Many of the scenarios (...) are created and inspired from news reports and images and the stages where the games are played are often a poor imitation of the original scenes from photographs. The book will bring together the series of 24 photographs with essays discussing and analyzing the influence of the media, particularly photographs and video, on the culture at large and how conflict is "discussed" in the visual realm. (shrink)

This supplement to Prudentia 2003 contains a series of papers written by previous students and colleagues of professor Chris Dearden, former professor of classics at Victoria university of Wellington.

We’d like to do a little hypnosis on you. Imagine that you’re ensconced in your own family room, your study, or your queen-sized bed. Settling back, you pick up the remote, flick on the TV, and naturally you turn to PBS. This is what you hear:Host 1: Good evening. Welcome to Masterpiece Theatre. Because Alistair Cooke is away on assignment in Alaska, we’ve agreed to host the show tonight, and that’s both a pleasure and a privilege because our program (...) this evening marks the beginning of a fascinating new series, a first on television: Masterpiece Theatre will present you with a docudrama entitled “Masterpiece Theatre.”Host 2: Like “The First Churchills,” this show analyzes the situation of real-life people—tonight, people in the academy. Names have not been changed to protect either the innocent or the guilty, but all the situations are fictive and at times words that may never have been spoken are put into the mouths of people who did not speak them. Other lines, however, are direct quotations from various written sources, although none of the characters, as we depict them, should be confused with any “actual” persons, whether or not those persons would scribe to the idea of their own reality. Like “Upstairs/Downstairs,” this program will introduce you to a spectrum of characters from many walks of life. What’s different about tonight’s episode, though, is that all these characters have passionate opinions about the show itself. Why, the very idea of Masterpiece Theatre drives some of them to Guerrilla Theatre, others to Theatre of the Absurd. Yes, you’ve always already guessed it: we focus tonight on a drama involving what we used to call humanists—now for some a dirty word—and most of our characters are in deep trouble. Sandra M. Gilbert, professor of English at the University of California, Davis, and Susan Gubar, professor of English at Indiana University, are coauthors of No Man’s Land: The Place of the Woman Writer in the Twentieth Century, Volume 1: The War of the Words and Volume II: Sexchanges , the first installments of a three-part sequel to their Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination . They have also coedited The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women: The Tradition in English. (shrink)