engleski

Theatre Of/On Terror – spectator between oppression and expression

The paper starts from the assumption that some of the questions of the conference can be approached and discussed by means of comparative analysis of particular, local, multimedia theatrical performances, namely the Chinese Roulette by D. B. Indoš, Fifth Gospel by Branko Brezovec and Deleted Messages by BADco. The analysis is carried through two interwoven flows of performance, which might be termed textual or discursive, and performative flow. The first task is to present, contextualize, comment and of course compare the (dramatic) discourses of the three performances, their narratives, motives, subjects and different ways in which they are executed. In their own fashion, the recent works of Indoš, Brezovec and BADco. are dealing with the pressing issues such as cultural imperialism, social and political surveillance and repression, biopolitical power, security regimes, terrorism, war crimes, human rights, civil liberties, resistance, individual freedom. However, the main challenge of the presentation is to investigate in what way are these issues reflected in the performative flows of the three performances. Relying on the, arguably, still vital concept of theatre as a metaphor of the life/world, I try to identify some processes, matrices, constelations and struggles characteristic of our present-day (glocal) society in the mechanisms and effects of functioning of the representational situation which theatrical performance establishes through the complex frameworks of the relations between the performer/actor and the spectators/observer. The focus of the analysis is precisely the spectator-actor relationship and the strategies of performative/representational inversion which are implemented by the three performances. All of them (in their own way) are placing the spectator in the position of the one who is not only captured by the gaze from the stage and monitored by the actors/performers, or literally manipulated and intimidated by their physical acts, or videotaped and transformed/frozen into another (visual) media, or imprisoned into a scenery which represents a concentration camp barrack, or exposed to the aggression of extreme sounds and images, but is also (at some point) brought face to face with the freedom of expression, verbal and physical communication, i.e. with the call for actual participation in the performance, with the challenge to perform in the relatively secure environment (aesthetical frame) of the theatre, or else – agree to repression.

theatre; terror; spectator

Cjelovit rad bit će objavljen 2007. u zborniku radova znanstvenog skup.