Devoted and Disgruntled

I would just like to draw attention to the report of ‘Devoted and Disgruntled’ that has been put on the improbable website (www.improbable.co.uk). The event took place earlier this month at the BAC (SAVE BAC!) where Theatre makers, critics, and funding bodies from all disciplines came together to discuss the current state of British Theatre, the positives, the negatives, and what can be done to improve it. The Guardian Online has also covered the event. The report is long and a little obvious in places (in respect to it areas covered) but I think it is worth wading through and carefully considering. It may also be worth considering how VLP can add a voice to the debate.

TOWARDS A THEATRE OF OBJECTS: Updated Proposal

The Violence of Transformation: A praxis based investigation into the use of the object in performance.

Theatre is transformation. It is a vision created by an artist transforming… himself or a puppet or even an object into an imagined character.

Henryk Jurkowski 1988:37

The essential thing about theatre is transformation. Dying. And the fear of this last transformation is general, one can rely on it, one can depend on it.

Heiner Muller cited in Postdramatic Theatre by Hans-Thies Lehmann. 2006:47

To argue towards a theatre of objects is to argue towards a theatre of objectification, a theatre without subjects. A theatre without subjects is totalised, it’s participants (both performer and spectator) and the objects (costumes, props, puppets etc.) are all collectively acting as one in the event. This notion of theatre is typified in Ritual performance. The Italian Fascist spectacle of 18BL (1933) a “theatre of the masses for the masses” (Schnapp, Book Title, 1996) is a terrifying example of how such a theatre of objects can be realised with an audience of over 20,000 sharing in the event. Robin Hardy’s film The Wicker Man (1973) can be seen as another example of how ritualism can collectivise its participants that can drive them to barbaric action. At the heart of both these Ritual performances is an object, a unifying centrepiece, a focus. In 18BL it is a fiat truck of the same name, a symbol of fascist military power (which takes on a personality in the performance) and the giant figure of the wicker man who is ceremonially burnt. From an ethnographical standpoint, it is not surprising that puppetry, like all theatrical forms have roots in human ritual. It is not my intention to dissect theses examples but use them to begin too establish what is meant by a ‘theatre of objects’ (beyond a theatre that just contains objects) and to establish a context from which to develop the argument that currently concerns me: the moment of transformation from inanimate to animated.

To turn a dead object/puppet into something that has an illusion of life requires a process of transformation. This process of transformation relies on the investment of both the performer and the spectator in the believed life of the object. I purpose that this process of transformation is inherently violent, that through interaction with objects we are allowed to play out desires or project erotic, sadomasochistic, or brutal actions. There are of course varying levels to this violence and complex variations, not every encounter will appear ‘violent’. It is the goal of my research to extract evidence in support of these convictions. There are clear parallels that can be drawn in the transformations that occur in totalised Ritual performance that also suggests a collective violent undercurrent.

My research will be predominantly practice lead but I wish to establish a dialogue between what is produced in the studio and the development of my theoretical arguments. I will begin my exploration with two contextualising chapters that will locate my work within the traditions of critical debate surrounding the use of the object in performance. Firstly the discourses of modernism, where arguments of replacing the actor with an object first emerged and followed by a more in-depth study of the theatre of Tadeusz Kantor, who’s use of animated objects sidestep modernist notions and present a more integrated “dialogue between people and objects” (Lehmann 2006:73). I will briefly introduce the ideas of this contextualising.

CHAPTER 1
The Modernist Junction Box: In Search of the Ideal Actor.

…The absence of the human seems to me essential. When a human appears in a poem, the great poem of his presence dims everything around him. A man can only speak in his own name; he has no right to speak in the name of the dead.

Maurice Maeterlinck Cited in Jurkowski 1998:20

Puppet and object have long provided a radical appeal to the avant-garde, the experiments of modernist theatre embraced the plastic aesthetic of the puppet as an opposition to naturalist theatre. It is due to the initiatives of modernism embracing the potential that has provided the foundation for contemporary uses of puppetry. Along with the work of Maeterlinck I will consider the pioneering theories of Edward Gordon Craig and the Uber Marionette who demanded the immediate removal of the actor from the stage and replace it with another presence.

CHAPTER 2
Tadeusz Kantor: Ceremony and The Theatre of Death.

The mannequin as EMPTY object. The DUMMY. A message of DEATH. A model for the actor.

Kantor in ‘The Theatre Of Death: A Manifesto’ in The Twentieth-Century Performance Reader Ed. Huxley and Witts, 2003:253

Kantor’s theatre is a significant departure from the theories of the Uber Marionette as he does not discriminate against the actor but unties object and living presence in the “realm of death” (Lehmann 2006:74). His theatre environments are meticulously filled with all manner of surreal apparatus, machines and mannequins that integrate with the performers so that as in The Dead Class (1977) it is difficult to distinguish, which is which.

CHAPTER 3
The Violence of Transformation: Practical Explorations.

This chapter will provide the main body of my research. It is the most underdeveloped at this stage as I intend my practice to inform theory and vice versa. I will locate my own practice within the contexts I have discussed building upon the themes and ideas extracted and ultimately construct an argument towards a theatre of objects making claims for how processes of (violent) transformation can provoke fear and pathos in an audience (either enjoyably through narratives of horror or disturbingly through uncanny recognition) The chapter will be presented as a documentation of my findings.

I will pursue the following research as a point of departure to inform or support exploration workshops and/or performance work:

• A response to Kantor’s Theatre of Death: Doppelganger happening
• An examination of anti-humanist discourse: connections with ritualism and the idea of a theatre of objects.
• A study of traditions of violence in puppet theatre.
• An examination of Artaud’s Theatre of Cruelty and an attempt at staging part of his unrealised (and unfinished) total theatre work, There is No More Firmament.

I am aware that all these elements need to be focused but feel that the work needs to remain expansive at this stage as my arguments continue to formulate.

The State I'm In

Back home, distanced and refreshed I have been able to reflect on the past three months. I feel that my work has undergone a drastic mobilisation; from the frustrations of a year spent dipping into ideas, the last three months have not only provided a much needed focus to them but more importantly have challenged and tempted them from the safety net I had surrounded them with. I have long felt the need to break away from the Schumann/dada inspired black and white cardboard aesthetic and with the completion of the group project eleven: fifty-seven I feel that this is on the turn.

Eleven: Fifty-Seven

In retrospect there is much to be pleased with. Reading Ming’s blog, I agree with his concerns with the quality of certain aspects and understand the need to be critical at this stage but would warn against too much self-flagellation. The demands of what we aimed to produce were ambitious considering the number of creative voices and accommodating the range of disciplines. The vast array of media did not conflict and was used evenly, appropriately, and despite the varity of stylistic inputs it had a strong aesthetic coherency. I felt we succeeded in creating an expansive and tangible world in which the characters existed and in which the audience could be immersed, a world in which (according to feedback) they were more than happy to inhabit. It was one of Ming’s criticism that the audience did not behave as we had intended and I myself was shocked when the puppet figures encountered them face too face on the boulevard. Yet the audiences reaction was one of the most interesting out-comes. We had created this rich environment but had made little provision to contain the audience, instead preferring to guide and focus the action by using the various elements of media and performer. I feel that when we are able to view the recording of the performance we can get a greater sense of how these dynamics worked. I will post reflections of how my own contributions to the work developed on a future blog and much more will be commented upon in the coming weeks when the group put up an exhibition of the process in the foyer gallery space at Wimbledon.

A Critical Shift

My own research project has shifted in its approach and focus. The over-riding feedback from my Cross Course Crit was that my work, practically had moved beyond my theoretical interests. This was confirmed after a tutorial with Amanda. We spoke of how the ‘Uncanny’ was a valid but less engaging thread to my thinking, and that there was something much more dynamic at the heart of my questioning which corresponds with my over-arching argument Towards a Theatre of Objects. The Uncanny and the mythologies surrounding the doppelganger contain this questioning but it is (particularly from a fine art perspective) a bit of a cliché and a much less pertinent area of investigation to drive my work forward. I therefore have taken a different tact, which is a development of my research into the Uncanny (I will still be using the idea of the doppelganger but using it as material to inform performance rather than the focus of research). My new direction will consider what am I arguing when I talk of ‘a theatre of objects’, and what ideas are at play.

It seems that I am arguing towards a theatre of objectification. From an ethnographical standpoint, a theatre that objectifies (through the objects used) is one in which the participants (performers and audience) become ‘objects’ themselves, as in ritual performance. These ideas cross humanist and anti-humanist dialogues, asking fundamental questions of what it is to be human, (which has allowed me to grapple with some of the more challenging philosophical texts). Furthermore, as a focus, I will explore the action at the centre of this theatre: the act of transformation. I will go further to suggest that this act is inherently violent, an exchange that is much more dynamic than it may first appear. This may seem slightly cryptic at this stage, I myself am trying to unravel the ideas and I feel uncomfortable leaving behind the relative safety of pursuing the uncanny…but I guess this is what research is all about.