IASIL 2005 Charles University, Prague
Ireland – A Global Village?
25-28 July 2005

Border zones: aspects and issues of performance in contemporary Irish theatrical art

‘Theatre exists not as an entity but as a continuum blending into other arts. Each name and term refers only to a significant point on this continuum’ (Kirby, 1995).

Focussing on the diverse forms of theatre-making and performance strategies that are responsive to the heterogeneity and hybridisations of practices and identities forming contemporary Irish culture and society, this panel seeks to investigate interfaces of theatrical manifestations which can challenge hegemonic boundaries of representation, soften traditional sense of disciplines boundaries, eschew outmoded categorizations and are most often at the edges of critical attention and educational establishment. Therefore, the panel proposes papers which address, through a variety of approaches, aspects and issues of performance in Irish contemporary theatre such as: performativity and reception, elements of theatrical productions (performers’ appearance and presence, space, light, sound), multimedia performance, devised physical theatre, site-specific theatre, new performance processes.

The panel, drawing critical attention to the multifarious styles and voices of the Irish theatrical scenario, tries to undermine the received and saturated myth of Irish theatre as exclusively text-based, and relying for its strength on words and narrative. This alternative ‘way of seeing’ requires an interrogation of the relation of Irish theatrical art to structures of power.

The revised and complex status of Irish theatre, as it emerges from the multiplicity of performance strategies and modes of analysis, can refocus our thinking about traditional forms of theatrical expression, and explore the relation of Irish theatrical art to the international contemporary theatre scene.

The panel will consist of three speakers, with papers of 20 minutes in duration.
Panellists’ presentations will be aided by audio-visual materials.

Chair: Enrica Cerquoni (UCD)

Panellists:
Lisa Fitzpatrick (Institute of Technology, Waterford)
Stage Irishry: Performing Irishness on the Contemporary Canadian Stage

Carmen Szábo (University College Dublin)
Artscapes of Meaning: Performance and Multimedia Installation in Northern Irish Art