Order form

EDITORIAL

The study examines art phenomena in contemporary theatre and performance art. It is conceived in an expressly interdisciplinary way: its terminology as well as the key theoretical starting points draw on some of the fundamental humanities fields, above all anthropology, linguistics and philosophy. The book is composed of three parts, which have several chapters.

In the first part, the author focuses on three important theoretical paradigms that had an essential influence on the development of theatre and related performing practices in the second part of the 20th century: the anthropological, performative and gestic theatre. The author confronts anthropological theatre, especially the one practised and theoretically defined by E. Barba, with certain classic anthropological concepts (e.g., M. Mauss’s “body techniques”, V. Turner’s “social drama”, the theoretical approaches of Cl. Lévi-Strauss, etc.). In this context, he also develops a critical reading of the ritual theories of theatre, from the so-called “ritual hypothesis” of the Cambridge group (Harrison, Murray, Farnell, Graves) to R. Schechner’s “ritual theatre performance”. This is followed by Milohniæ’s original theory of performative theatre based on J. L. Austin’s speech act theory. The author’s third point of consideration follows from his in-depth study of Brecht’s theory of acting, especially his analysis of the concept of gestus.

In the second part of the book, the author raises the question of the (a)political in theatre. First, he discusses Brecht’s epic theatre and concepts such as “alienation effect”, “historicization”, etc., whereas, in the second part of the chapter, he analyses selected examples (Horvat, Janša, Berger) of contemporary post-Brechtian performances in Slovenia. In the following chapter, he discusses the political nature of (the supposedly apolitical) theatre of the younger generation of Slovenian directors at the turn of the 1980s. In the closing chapter of the second part of the book, we follow an analysis of the achievements of a more recent – and, as it seems, increasingly more influential – concept of “postdramatic theatre” as developed by H.-T. Lehmann in his study under the same title.

In the third part, Milohniæ analyses select examples of activist and artistic practices described by the neologism “artivism”. In the following chapter, he extends this topic, which is expressly political, to an analysis of a specific relationship between art and the legal field. The last chapter is devoted to the conceptual project of three artists changing their name to Janez Janša and its effects. The author analyses this project in the light of those art practices that come into conflict with certain legal provisions and thus explore the limits of the “grey area” of the so-called freedom of artistic expression in societies based on the rule of law and the human rights doctrine.

Maska, Institute for Publishing, Production and Education
Metelkova 6
SI-1000 Ljubljana
Slovenia
Europe

Tel.: + 386 1 431 31 22
        + 386 1 431 53 48
Fax.: + 386 1 431 31 22
info@maska.si