In my presentation, I will examine how performances can be used to create rooms for critical discussions that are aiming at exposing the embodied knowledge that is inherent in certain actions or situations. I will also argue that the experience from the artistic research presented can be documented through artefacts produced within the rehearsing process and how this can contribute to a further understanding of the performance.
In my ongoing artistic research project, I am developing the Brechtian concept of the learning play. In the performance Violence & Learning, I used die Maßnahme (Bertolt Brecht) and Mauser (Heiner Müller) as reference points and toolboxes. Violence & Learning was performed primarily in social centres and occupied buildings in Sweden and Germany. During 2019, I am developing and directing Corpus & Punishment, in which the methods developed in Violence & Learning will be used in a reconstruction of a dystopia, set out in a possible future in a European country with a nationalist government.
The possibility to move from the role of a bystander to the role of a participator, and vice versa, facilitates the possibility to scrutinize a political action itself. By inviting the audience to participate alongside actors in fictional scenarios, it is possible to examine the ethos of a social movement; a reasoning in line with Brecht’s learning plays. In both performances, the audience physically takes part in ways that are inspired by police and military training, and how social activists set up and play out violent scenarios to educate themselves. The tools used in the creation of the performances include the sociological terms repertoires of contention (Charles Tilly) and public order management (Donatella Della Porta).
In order to contribute to an ongoing discussion about how to document artistic research and public performances, my presentation involves physical participation, in the re enactment of some parts from the performances.
John Hanse is a director and an artistic Ph.D. student at Malmö Theatre Academy, Sweden. The focus of his research is to investigate how a combination of theatre practice and different level of physical engagement of the participants can be used to perform, examine, and discuss collective action. Directing and writing Violence & Learning and Corpus & Punishment is a part of John Hanse’s Ph.D., and the performances are developed and performed by a team of scholars and artists. Violence & Learning was awarded for “originality in creating rooms for reflection” by the Swedish Performance Festival (Scenkonstgalan) 2016 and was chosen to perform at the International Brecht Society Symposium in Oxford 2016 and at the 3rd biennial Performance Philosophy conference in Prague 2017.
Go to the websites violenceandlearning.com (English and Swedish) and kroppochstraff.se (only in Swedish) for scripts and additional information about the performances Violence & Learning and Corpus & Punishment.
Other references:
Brecht, Bertolt. Die Massnahme. Kritische Ausgabe. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1972.
Brecht, Bertolt; Willet, John (ed.). Collected plays. 3. London: Methuen Drama, 1997.
Müller, Heiner. Texte. 6, Mauser. Berlin: Rotbuch Vlg, 1988.
Tilly, Charles. “Contentious Repertoires in Great Britain. 1758–1834”. In Taurgott, Mark (ed.). Repertoire and Cycles of Collective Action. North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1995.
Dearden, Lizzie. Spit hoods to be carried by all London police officers, Scotland Yard announces in major U-turn. Independent UK, London, Independent UK, 2019. Available on: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/spit-hoods-police-met-london-scotland-yard-suspects-cressida-dick-crime-a8767826.html. Accessed on 16. 7. 2021.
Utvisningshotad tvingas ha huva. Svt nyheter, Svt.se, 2009. Available on: https://www.svt.se/nyheter/inrikes/utvisningshotad-tvingas-ha-huva. Accessed on 16. 7. 2021.