Practical Dramaturgy

Practical Dramaturgy
Maska, vol. XVI, no. 131-132

The issue of Maska entitled Practical Dramaturgy was co-edited by Bojana Kunst and Jasmina Založnik. The issue is dedicated to the reflection on dramaturgy and the dramaturgical in dance.
Although dramaturgy has been present in dance for at least a decade, which Maska pointed out already in 2001 in the Dramaturgy of Dance issue (no. 1-2 (66-67)), the questions in this issue are different, or rather have a different political orientation, not only due to the temporal distance, but also due to the different approach used in 2001. If, in the past, the relation between dramaturgy and dance was considered in view of the changes in the dramaturge’s role and on the basis of a critique of the “objective” role of the dramaturge as “the one who knows” and suggested more embodied, closer models of cooperation, today the role of the dramaturge as an organic part of the process is taken for granted.
Upon reading the texts published in this issue, it becomes evident that the reflection on the dramaturgical goes beyond the reflection on the changed role of the dramaturge and focuses on the specificity of work and collaboration processes in art, the visibility and openness of these processes and the changes in the relations between the process and the product (dance performance). In the articles, dramaturgy is considered as a characteristic of a performance, independent of the dramaturgical function itself and of the ‘dramaturgical person’. This ‘depersonalisation’ can be related to many other concepts that today accompany contemporary dance production: education, research, cooperation, theory, open work, etc. This change implies that the appearance of dramaturgy is closely connected also to the new forms of dance production and knowledge that arose in the last decade and to the visibility of choreographic and dance work/process coming to the fore in contemporary dance performances.

The topical part of the issue was inspired by a series of lectures entitled Reflective Dramaturgy, which we extended, complemented and followed up by the texts published in the journal. The topical section includes articles by Jeroen Peeters, Una Bauer, Bojana Cvejić, Janez Janša and Peter Stamer, to which we added an interview with choreographer and dancer Mette Ingvartsen by Andreja Kopač and the reviews of The End and My Heart Beats for Her written by Pia Brezavšček and Katja Čičigoj.