Performing touch and smell : the liminality of the senses

Toporišič, Tomaž (author)

The paper discusses the liminal nature of the sensorial languages in contemporary performing arts. Its starting point will be the following chain of thoughts: during artistic events, a performative action reshaping the performers and the audience takes place, along with the interchange of the roles between the “stage” and “auditorium”, either in the sense of Augusto Boal’s spect-actor or the destruction of the fourth wall and the specific “autopoietic feedback loop” (Erika Fischer-Lichte) between both parties involved. We aim to rethink and re-examine the role of the sensorial language as one of the rarely used yet highly efficient tools of the performative revolutions of the 20$^{th}$ and 21$^{st}$ centuries. These revolutions started with the Futurists, continued with the tactile and sensorial performances and politics of Marina Abramović and Yoko Ono, and culminated with Enrique Vargas and his sensorial theatre in different stages from New York’s La Mama radical 1960s productions to his 1990s new sensorial theatre language of his Teatro de los Sentidos. We will try to answer the following questions: How can and how do we touch and smell … in performative actions? Which kind of liminalities does the act of sensorial produce in a contemporary performance?

• Language: English
• Keywords: sensorial theatre, liminality, immersive theatre, Enrique Vargas, performance art
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: AGRFT - Academy of Theatre, Radio, Film and Television
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2021
• Number of pages: Str. 36-52
• Numbering: Letn. 9, št. 2
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-154882
• UDC: 792.02:159.93
• ISSN on article: 1855-4539
• DOI: 10.51937/Amfiteater-2021-2/36-52
• COBISS.SI-ID: 92709379

Copyright

Podatek o licenci CC BY 4.0 je naveden na pristajalni strani članka oz. številke revije (glej izvorni URL zgoraj). (Datum opombe: 7. 3. 2024)

• Publication date in RUL: 07.03.2024

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Amfiteater : revija za teorijo scenskih umetnosti = journal of performing arts theory
• Publisher: Slovenski gledališki inštitut, Univerza v Ljubljani, Akademija za gledališče, radio, film in televizijo
• ISSN: 1855-4539
• COBISS.SI-ID: 239685632

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Title: Uprizarjanje dotika in vonja : liminalnost čutov

Abstract

Članek obravnava liminalno naravo uporabe različnih čutov v sodobnih uprizoritvenih umetnostih. Njegovo izhodišče so naslednje misli: med umetniškimi dogodki poteka performativno dejanje, ki preoblikuje izvajalce in občinstvo, ter izmenjava vlog med »odrom« in »dvorano«, bodisi v smislu spektakla Augusta Boala bodisi uničenja četrte stene in posebne »avtopoetične povratne zanke« (Erika Fischer-Lichte). Naš cilj je ponovno premisliti in preučiti vlogo čutnega jezika kot enega od redko uporabljenih, a zelo učinkovitih orodij performativnih revolucij 20. in 21. stoletja. Te revolucije so se začele s futuristi, nadaljevale s taktilnimi in čutnimi performansi ter pristopi Marine Abramović in Yoko Ono ter dosegle vrhunec z Enriquejem Vargasom in njegovim senzorialnim gledališčem v različnih fazah. Poskušali bomo odgovoriti na naslednji vprašanji: Kako se lahko dotikamo in vonjamo ... v performativnih dejanjih? Kakšne vrste liminalitet proizvaja senzorično dejanje v sodobni uprizoritvi?

• Keywords: senzorično gledališče, liminalnost, potopitveno gledališče, Enrique Vargas, performans

Projects

• Funder: ARRS - Slovenian Research Agency
• Project number: P6-0376
• Name: Gledališke in medumetnostne raziskave