One very significant similarity between avant-garde theatre and performance art was that they both heavily interacted with the audience through their bodies. It my own analysis, there seems to be three different types of the audience involvement: First, performers and audience are both actively engaging with each other. Second, performers are passive, whereas audience actively executes performance pieces. And for the last, performers are active while the audience is unaware that they are a part of it. Assuming that, only the first type can be seen in avant-garde theatre, whereas performance art varied across all these three types. In avant-garde theatre, performers are the ones who carried out the entire productions and guided the participating …show more content…
Unlike the first type, the audience involvement is automatic and unintentional so that the spectators were unaware that they were a part of the performance art. Vito Acconci, in his Following Piece (1969), followed random strangers in the street and stopped doing so once they entered a building. People who were being followed did not know that they were followed, and would not know because nobody knew it except Acconci. Acconci made several other pieces that were equally private, such as Seedbed (1971). In this notorious piece, Acconci dealt with “power-field between himself and others.” He said, “The fact is, I'm masturbating in public, but this ‘fact’ can't be seen, can't be verified; it has to be taken by the viewer on faith.” Although in this piece the audience was, to a certain extent, aware that they were in performance art as they entered the gallery space, they were not entirely sure what was going on. Here Acconci questions the authority and power dynamics between performers and the audience, for the audience had no power to ban this piece. This reminds us of the power dynamics in avant-garde theatre mentioned as the first type; however, in the third type, the audience had no other choice but to be a part of the piece, whereas in the first type the audience had will to come see the theatre production, knowing what to
Every theatergoer may consider the question: What is it about performance that draws people to sit and listen attentively in a theater, watching other people labor on stage and hoping to be moved and provoked, challenged and comforted? In Utopia in Performance, Jill Dolan “argues that live performance provides a place where people come together, embodied and passionate, to share experiences of meaning making and imagination that can describe or capture fleeting intimations of a better world (p.2)”. She traces the sense of visceral, emotional, and social connection that we experience at such times, connections that allow audience members to sense a better world, and the hopeful utopic sentiment might become motivation for civic engagement
Canadian identity has always been difficult to define. This definition is essential in order to evaluate theatre in Canada. French Canadians appear to have no difficulty in establishing their own identity, both on and off the stage, as they share a distinct tradition. We, as English-Canadians, have continued to define ourselves by reference to what we are not, American, rather than in terms of our own national history and tradition. For English Canadians, this tradition comes not from the nation but instead from community and region. Because English-Canada has such a great cultural diversity, nationality and relevance to our outstanding values and attitudes must define the Anglophone Canadian identity, both on and off the stage.
This essay will investigate a variety of different approaches to using film by both Forced Entertainment and Frantic Assembly. Both companies claim to produce energetic, memorable and contemporary theatre and have both incorporated the use of film in their works. Although Frantic Assembly and Forced Entertainment both produce work that is placed under the umbrella of physical theatre, their ways of working and the work they produce differs from other theatre companies which also adopt this title. The two companies I will discuss have differences and similarities in their approaches to using film and have both incorporated it into their practices in groundbreaking ways. From the use of actual moving film in their stage performance, to exploring the different elements of film and exploring ways in which those same principles can be adapted unto the stage. Frantic Assembly and Forced Entertainment make claims of creating innovative theatre that offers to lure and shock spectators. Their works demonstrate that they are both in constant exploration to push and break the boundaries of how theatre is viewed today. Both Frantic Assembly and Forced Entertainment have always created theatre that is influential and relevant with the times, so it comes as no surprise that the use of film has been a big influence on the their works.
In each and every culture theater exists. However, they are not always portrayed in the same way and could take up many different forms. What differ them from others is influenced by the convention of what governs them. What happen on stage depends on the conventions of the theater. Convention is define as “Rules governing a given style of theater, such as fourth-wall verisimilitude or bare stage. These rule should not be violated, but often are, as when actors “break” the fourth wall by delivering a line directly toward the audience” (Altshuler and Janaro 208). The condition governing the staging and performance are known as theatrical conventions, in which what the audiences agree to accept as what is real (Altshuler and Janaro 173). In comparing an Elizabethan and a modern theater to each other there are many differences and similarities between the two. By comparing William Shakespeare “Hamlet” to Lorraine Hansberry “A Raisin in the Sun”, we can see that there is a major difference between the two
Putman, D. (1990). THE AESTHETIC RELATION OF MUSICAL PERFORMER AND AUDIENCE. British Journal of Aesthetics. 30 (4), 1-2.
At a hundred and four years old, the State Theatre still stands as one of Bay City's most recognizable landmarks. Despite floods, fires, and a century's worth of history, the theater proudly remains and operates on Washington Street. Dozens of events are put on there each year. Orchestras, Vaudeville, various musical groups, and comedians are just a few of the thousands of acts that have been housed within its walls. The building inside has been remodeled various times over the last few decades, and each time parts of the past have been found. Though there's a haunting presence, the six hundred seat house is still full for most events. The theater may not be run by the same employees, and the jobs have changed, but the theater is still as loved by many as it was when it was first opened. The State Theatre of Bay City has one thrilling past from its century of being alive!
In this essay I will address racial issues in Musical theatre, specifically the black and white divide. I have chosen this subject because I find it interesting how racism used to be so accepted in society, and although it’s decreasing presence it is still an issue today. I will be looking at two similar yet contrasting musicals written at different times. Both these musicals have racial issues through their storyline. I will look at the similarities and differences between these two musicals and how racial issues are expressed. Additionally I will consider when the shows were written; what impact these musicals had on society and vice versa.
In this essay I will be exploring the nature of the challenges Site-Specific theatre presents. It is ever growing as a genre with practitioners such as Punchdrunk and Station House Opera leading the way in the UK, as performances not set in conventional theatre buildings are becoming increasingly popular. Conventional theatres provide a comfortable performance arena with unspoken rules an audience adheres to, as explored by Nicolas Bourriaud in Relational Aesthetics suggesting that ‘forms, patterns and functions’ of artistic activity ‘develop and evolve according to periods and social contexts’ (Bourriaud, 1998, p1 ). If an audience sit in a Victorian theatre, they will act as if Victorian manners still apply. Site Specific and Immersive performance have no such boundaries and I will be arguing that this genre of theatre produces its own specific challenges and to what extent must we as an audience adapt to these. I will also be analysing the works of established practitioners in this field and similarly my own practice.
In a recent performance of the two-man murder mystery at the Geffen playhouse entitled, Murder For Two, the show actively breaks the illusion of the fourth wall by addressing the audience throughout the performance. For example, one of the two actors, who plays multiple characters, breaks character and the fourth wall in order to address the audience when sound effects for a ringing phone are played. In the plays world, its simply the phone of the second actor’s character who is trying to receive a phone call to advance the plot, but in the audience’s world for a split second it seems like the noise is embarrassingly coming from a member of the house. This created some of the funniest moments of the show because of how separate the moment was from the play’s reality. It had such an effective response from the audience simply put, because it was more poignant about the world’s infatuation with cell phone usage than the content of the play, which was purposefully implausible and unbelievable. A choice like this could not be made without directly addressing the audience’s world politically; otherwise it simply would not get a laugh. Whether or not the audience continues to use their phone in public places, the audience, in that moment, took a critical look at their societal state and laughed at it. True Brechtian Theater encapsulates all genres and emotions with the political and
"I would have been more successful if I'd left movies immediately, stayed in the theater, gone into politics, written, anything”(Cramer). This quote from Orson Welles during an interview in 1982 produces questions about the career of one of the most celebrated filmmakers of the twentieth century. How could the director of Citizen Kane, the movie cherished as the best movie of last century, wished for his life to be void of the cinema? How could he wish to have continued in theater when most of the critical acclaim he experienced in that medium has been long forgotten? Most people do not even realize that Welles was an acclaimed director of theatre before Citizen Kane because Citizen Kane overshadows all of the rest of this genius’ work. Yet, Orson Welles’ theatre is just as important as his filmmaking because in all that he did, Welles exhibited the same artistic tendencies. His theatre was a unique experience and a creative achievement, but it also inspired his later work in films. The theatre of Orson Welles provides significant insight for an understanding of his films and what went wrong with his career in Hollywood.
Anger can be partly physiological, cognitive, and psychological, and it is also pointedly ideological. Factors such as race, class, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, nation, and religion arouse anger (Kim1). Goldhor-lerner stated that:
... a way for audiences and performers to connect on a closer level. They are both experiencing the surreal, disassociating themselves from the performance taking place. They both become more introspective. The performance becomes a vehicle for self-understanding, metacognition.
For my concert performance review, I chose to see Yvonne Kushe perform at the Calabash Bistro on December 8th. It is worth noting that although the Calabash Bistro is a Caribbean restaurant – and as such, employs performances that are reflective of Caribbean music, -- it has amazingly reflective attributes of African culture. Chiefly, this is a fundamental realization of the African Diaspora, and cultural reaches in Western society. As we learned in class, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade displaced an incredible amount of Africans to Central America and the West Indies, spawning a new identity of African culture beyond the physical scope of Africa the continent. Thus, although the Caribbean is not a direct reflection of African culture, I see
Theatre as we know it now was born more than two thousand years ago and has gone through many streams until it reached the current modernity. Among these streams is the avant-garde theatre. This theatre achieved a break in the traditional theatre and became the forefront of a new experimental theatre. Therefore it is necessary to ask how this theatre started, what impact it had on society and if this type of theatre is still common in our modern era.
and came about as a result of the Second World War. It was also a