Performance art Books

Book SynopsisWhat does it mean to fail in performance? How might staging failure reveal theatreâs potential to expand our understanding of social, political and everyday reality? What can we learn from performances that expose and then celebrate their ability to fail? In Performance Theatre and the Poetics of Failure, Sara Jane Bailes begins with Samuel Beckett and considers failure in performance as a hopeful strategy. She examines the work of internationally acclaimed UK and US experimental theatre companies Forced Entertainment, Goat Island and Elevator Repair Service, addressing accepted narratives about artistic and cultural value in contemporary theatre-making. Her discussion draws on examples where misfire, the accidental and the intentionally amateur challenge our perception of skill and virtuosity in such diverse modes of performance as slapstick and punk.Detailed rehearsal and performance analysis are used to engage theory and contextualise practice, extending the dialogue between theatre arts, live art and postmodern dance. The result is a critical account of performance theatre that offers essential reading for practitioners, scholars and students of Performance, Theatre and Dance Studies.Trade Review'Performance Theatre and the Poetics of Failure illuminates a vital arena of contemporary art practice with a rare combination of rigor, respect, and insight.' - Una Chaudhuri, New York University'A crucial intervention into the politics of contemporary performance. It combines theoretical sophistication with a richly detailed engagmement with the experience of performance.' - Nicholas Ridout, Queen Mary, University of London‘Performance Theatre and the Poetics of Failure represents a compelling and stimulating addition to current debates surrounding the turn against virtuosity and the appropriation of signs of amateurism in contemporary western experimental theatre and Live Art. This is the first monograph dedicated to the subject of failure in contemporary experimental performance, and its investigation is detailed and nuanced. This book will provide an invaluable resource for theatre-makers, scholars, and critics as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students studying experimental performance and Live Art.’ – Sarah Gorman, Contemporary Theatre ReviewTable of Contents1. Introduction: Failure and Representation 2. World(s) after a Different Image: Marxism, Slapstick, Punk 3. Profane Illumination: Theatre and Forced Entertainment 4. News from Nowhere: Goat Island Performance Group 5. Dislocations of Practice: Elevator Repair Service 6. Afterword

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Book SynopsisâDr. RadosavljeviÄ has an excellent and extensive grasp of her subject, and deep understanding of not only the history of these groups, but how they function, and how each contributes to the field of ensemble theatre.â â David Crespy, University of Missouri, USAQuestions of ensemble â what it is, how it works â are both inherent to a variety of Western theatre traditions, and re-emerging and evolving in striking new ways in the twenty-first century. The Contemporary Ensemble draws together an unprecedented range of original interviews with world-renowned theatre-makers in order to directly address both the former and latter concerns. Reflecting on âthe ensemble way of workingâ within this major new resource are figures including: Michael Boyd, Hermann WÃndrich, Yuri Butusov, Max Stafford-Clark, Elizabeth LeCompte, Lyn Gardner, Adriano Shaplin, Phelim McDermott; and Emma Rice;representing companies including:The RSC; The Berliner Ensemble; The Satirikon Theatre; Out of Joint; The Wooster Group; Kneehigh Theatre; Song of the Goat; The Riot Group; The Neo-Futurists; Shadow Casters; and Ontroerend Goed.All 22 interviews were conducted especially for the collection, and draw upon the authorâs rich background working as scholar, educator and dramaturg with a variety of ensembles. The resulting compendium radically re-situates the ensemble in the context of globalisation, higher education and simplistic understandings of âtext-basedâ and âdevisedâ theatre practice, and traces a compelling new line through the contemporary theatre landscape.Table of ContentsPART I: Redefinitions of Ensemble1.1. MICHAEL BOYD (Royal Shakespeare Company): A ‘Contingent Community’ in a Free Market Economy 1.2. GABOR TOMPA (Hungarian Theatre of Cluj): Between the East and the West Today1.3. HERMANN WÜNDRICH (The Berliner Ensemble): How the Berliner Ensemble Changes With Time1.4. YURI BUTUSOV (guest director Satirikon Theatre): Directing as an Art of Composition1.5. MAX STAFFORD-CLARK (Out of Joint): A Tried and Tested Ensemble Methodology 1.6. ELIZABETH LECOMPTE (The Wooster Group): ‘A Group of People Around a Place’1.7. LYN GARDNER (The Guardian Newspaper): On Regional Theatre-Making PART 2: Working Processes2.1. ANTON ADASSINSKY and ELENA YAROVAYA (Derevo): Beyond Words2.2. EMMA RICE (Kneehigh Theatre): From a Community to the West End2.3. JOANNA HOLDEN (freelance actor, Northern Stage, Kneehigh, Cirque du Soleil): On Being an Ensemble Actor in the UK2.4. IAN MORGAN (Song of the Goat): An Actor’s Journey Between Wales and Wroclaw2.5. DAN ROTHENBERG (Pig Iron): ‘Comic Figures Repurposed’2.6. ADRIANO SHAPLIN (The Riot Group): Ensemble as a Musical ‘Intersubjective Unit’2.7. HANNA SLÄTTNE (Tinderbox Theatre): Working together in Northern Ireland2.8. ALEXANDER KELLY (Third Angel) and CHRIS THORPE (Unlimited Theatre): On Writing and Performance in an EnsemblePART III: Ensemble and the Audience3.1. MIKE ALFREDS (ex-Shared Experience, Method and Madness): Sharing the Experience of Imagination 3.2. GREG ALLEN (The Neo-Futurists): An Interactive Ensemble3.3. PHELIM MCDERMOTT (Improbable): ‘Safe Emergencies’3.4. PETER ECKERSALL (Not Yet It’s Difficult): The Dramaturgy of Long-Term Cross-Cultural Collaboration3.5. KATARINA PEJOVIĆ and BORIS BAKAL (Shadow Casters): Ensemble as a Tool of Civic Engagement3.6. DAVID BAUWENS, ALEXANDER DEVRIENDT, JOERI SMET (Ontroerend Goed): On Courting the Audience 3.7. RICHARD JORDAN (Richard Jordan Productions): Towards a Global Ensemble

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Book SynopsisThis updated edition of Bornstein's formative My Gender Workbook (1997) provides an invigorating introduction to contemporary theory around gender, sexuality, and power. The original is a classic of modern transgender theory and literature and, alongside Bornstein's other work, has influenced an entire generation of trans writers and artists. This revised and expanded edition extends that legacy, offering an accessible foundation for examining gender in the reader's life and in the broader culture while arguing for the dismantling of all forms of oppression. For fans of the original, Bornstein's new material merits a fresh read...--Publishers Weekly, starred review Cultural theorists have written loads of smart but difficult-to-fathom texts on gender theory, but most fail to provide a hands-on, accessible guide for those trying to sort out their own sexual identities. In My Gender Workbook, transgender activist Kate Bornstein brings theory down to ETrade Review"This updated edition of Bornstein's formative My Gender Workbook (1997) provides an invigorating introduction to contemporary theory around gender, sexuality, and power. The original is a classic of modern transgender theory and literature and, alongside Bornstein's other work, has influenced an entire generation of trans writers and artists. This revised and expanded edition extends that legacy, offering an accessible foundation for examining gender in the reader's life and in the broader culture while arguing for the dismantling of all forms of oppression. For fans of the original, Bornstein's new material merits a fresh read..."--Publishers Weekly, starred review Table of Contents1. Welcome to Your New Gender Workbook 2. Finding Gender. Arrrr, There Be Pirates! 3. Let X=X 4. Let Why Equal Why 5. There's Only One Gender: Yours 6. SEX! SEX! SEX! SEX! SEX! SEX! SEX! 7. Get Ready to Do Your Gender 8. Do Your Gender Mindfully 9. The Missing Piece Is Nothing, and We're Going to Find It Nowhere 10. OK, Now What?

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Book SynopsisFirst, pick up a copy of Rachel Rosenthal's inspiring The DbD Experience; Part manual, part manifesto, part memoir, then head for Los AngelesFRIDAY - OriginsArrive at the Doing by Doing workshop to be greeted by Rosenthal, pioneering theatre explorer and your host for the weekend ahead. Explore non-human ways of living and moving. Begin to develop a shared vocabulary with your fellow students through exercises. SATURDAY - ConnectionsContinue to connect with the group on an energetic level. Make the journey from Kansas to OZ. Collaborate and create as a group, moving and vocalising without language. Improvise boldly at every step. Treat music, voice, lighting, costume, sets, props and fellow performers as equals.SUNDAY - PowerLearn to arrive in the moment when you are needed. Engage with transformative processes and take part in the Star Meditation. Understand your own individual power, joining your physical and emotTable of Contents1. Foreword by Katie Noonan 2. Introduction 3. Preface 4. What is Doing by Doing? 5. Addendum

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Book SynopsisArchaeologies of Presence is a brilliant exploration of how the performance of presence can be understood through the relationships between performance theory and archaeological thinking. Drawing together carefully commissioned contributions by leading international scholars and artists, this radical new work poses a number of essential questions: What are the principle signifiers of theatrical presence? How is presence achieved through theatrical performance? What makes a memory come alive and live again? How is presence connected with identity? Is presence synonymous with ''being in the moment''? What is the nature of the co-presence' of audience and performer? Where does performance practice end and its documentation begin? Co-edited by performance specialists Gabriella Giannachi and Nick Kaye, and archaeologist Michael ShTrade Review‘Comprised of contributions from theorists and practitioners, external case-study analyses and internal reflections, and utilizing theoretical and performative modes of writing, alongside interviews, Archaeologies of Presence is a stimulating, enjoyable, varied and accessible publication… it is a delightfully produced publication to be found on the bookshelves of students, researchers, practitioners, theorists and enthusiasts alike.’– Studies in Theatre and Performance, Hannah CummingsTable of Contents1 Gabriella Giannachi, Nick Kaye and Michael Shanks Introduction: Archaeologies of Presence Being Here: place and time 2 Josette Féral, How to Define Presence Effects: the Work of Janet Cardiff 3 Gabriella Giannachi Environmental Presence 4 Rebecca Schneider Performance Remains Again 5 Jon Erickson Tension/Release and the Production of Time in Performance Being Before: stage and gaze 6 Erika Fischer-Lichte Appearing As Embodied Mind – Defining a weak, a strong and a radical concept of presence 7 Phillip Zarrilli ‘…presence…’ as a question and emergent possibility: a case study from the performer’s perspective 8 Simon Jones Out-Standing Standing-Within: being alone together in the work of Bodies in Flight 9 Nicholas Ridout Mis-spectatorship, or, ‘redistributing the sensible’ 10 Tim Etchells, Gabriella Giannachi and Nick Kaye Looking Back: a conversation about presence, 2006 Traces: after presence 11 Amelia Jones Temporal Anxiety/’Presence’ in absentia: experiencing performance as documentation 12 Lynn Hershman Leeson and Michael Shanks Here and Now 13 Nick Kaye Photographic presence: time and the image 14 Mike Pearson Neither Here nor There….

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Book SynopsisORLAN: A Hybrid Body of Artworks is an in-depth academic account of ORLAN''s pioneering art in its entirety. The book covers her career in performance and a range of other art forms. This single accessible overview of ORLAN''s practices describes and analyses her various innovative uses of the body as artistic material. Edited by Simon Donger with Simon Shepherd and ORLAN herself, the collection highlights her artistic impact from the perspectives of both performance and visual cultures. The book features: vintage texts by ORLAN and on ORLAN''s work, including manifestos, key writings and critical studies ten new contributions, responses and interviews by leading international specialists on performance and visual arts over fifty images demonstrating ORLAN''s art, with thirty full colour pictures a new essay by ORLAN, written specially for this volume Trade Review ‘Rather than a single, overarching account of ORLAN’s oeuvre, what this book valuably provides is a range of texts exploring overlapping ideas, myriad mouthpieces returning to and unpacking certain qualities of ORLAN’s practice in distinctly different ways, suturing and dissecting these into fascinatingly autonomous analyses. For me, quite purposefully, the undisciplined collection of texts in this rigorous and exciting volume morphs in a multitude of ways, much like the artist’s own marvellously monstrous practice.’ – Rachel Zerihan, Contemporary Theatre Review Table of ContentsPreface 1: Restless Corporealities - Simon Donger Preface 2: The Matter of ORLAN - Simon Shepherd The Triumph of the Folds - Christine Buci-Glucksmann 1 SEMINAL ARCHIVES 2 OPEN BODIES 3 HYBRID BODIES 4 CURRENT DIALOGUES

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Book SynopsisCreating Solo Performance is an innovative toolbox of exercises and challenges focused on providing you the performer with engaging and inspiring ways to explore and develop your idea both on the page and in the performance space. The creation of a solo show may be the most rewarding, liberating and stressful challenge you will take on in your career. This book acts as your silent collaborator as you develop your performance, by helpfully arranging exercises under the following headings: Beginnings Creating character Generating material Using your performance space Technology Endings Collaboration Exercises can be explored in sequence, at random or according to your specific needs and interests as a performer. By enabling you to create a bespoke formula that best applies to your specific subjecTrade Review"A welcome addition to an actor's bookshelves." - Susan Elkin, The StageTable of ContentsChapter 1 Introduction to contemporary solo performance; Chapter 2 Beginnings; Chapter 3 Character/persona: Performer as vehicle; Chapter 4 Generating material; Chapter 5 Creating, mapping and using your performance space; Chapter 6 Approaching technology; Chapter 7 Structures and endings; Chapter 8 Collaboration;

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Book SynopsisStepping Stones is the book of a practitioner. It documents the work of a laboratory-based practice that investigated the principles of collective improvisation as a performance practice. Though the dynamics and mechanisms of collective work and improvisation have been amply researched in training and composition contexts, not so can be said in the context of performance. Ingemar Lindh's research, which announces a resistance to choreography, fixed scores, and directorial montage, has significant implications for the practice and theory of performance in a post-dramatic age. Stepping Stones is, to quote Lindh himself, a book not written but spoken' in the sense that it is a collection of transcripts and writings by and about Lindh. The first two chapters are based on a transcript of a workshop held in Porsgrunn (Norway) in 1981. In these chapters Lindh's unique work on performer process (including the adaptation of isometric training for actors) is expounded in theTable of ContentsPreface to the Italian edition - Acknowledgements - Introduction to the English edition by Frank Camilleri - 1. In Search of Research - Introduction: A Hypothesis - The Actor: Poetry and Technique - 2. Catching the Moment of Eternity - Training - Frescoes - Immobility - The Actor - Incarnation - Alternation - Collective Improvisation - Stepping Stones - 3. 'Dear Friend...' - First Letter to Bengt Häger - Second Letter to Bengt Häger - 4. The Transparent Man - An Interview with Ingemar Lindh by Paolo Martini - 5. Institut för Scenkonst - AChronology by Magdalena Pietruska - 1971-1996: Twenty-Five Years of Research, Pedagogy, Performances - Post Scriptum - Munkängen 1998-2001 - Index of Performances - Index of Photographs - Glossary of Terms by Frank Camilleri - Index

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Book SynopsisThe Method Acting Exercises Handbook is a concise and practical guide to the acting exercises originally devised by Lee Strasberg, one of the Method''s foremost practitioners. The Method trains the imagination, concentration, senses and emotions to re-create' not imitate' logical, believable and truthful behavior on stage and in film.Building on nearly 30 years of teaching internationally and at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in New York and Los Angeles, Lola Cohen details a series of specific exercises in order to provide clear instruction and guidance to this preeminent form of actor training. By integrating Strasberg''s voice with her own tried and tested style of teaching, Cohen demonstrates what can be gained from the exercises, how they can inform and inspire your learning, and how they might be applied to your acting and directing practice. As a companion to The Lee Strasberg Notes (RoutleTable of ContentsABOUT THE HANDBOOK (INTRODUCTION)PART ONE – THE EXERCISES• About the Exercises• Exercise Descriptions and Guides□□ Painting and Sculpture Exercise□□ Private Moment for the Character□□ Animal Exercise□□ Need Exercise□□ Music Exercise□□ Emotional Memory ExercisePART TWO – BUILDING THE CHARACTERPART THREE - ACTING AND DIRECTING CHOICES• Use the imagination to stimulate the creative process• Break down the text to discover fully developed believable characters• Use subtext to find logical emotional and physical behavior andtransitions• Find inspiration from the other art forms• Work alone and with scene partners to fulfill the given circumstances ofthe play. (Understanding the characters psychology of behavior andtheir very nature.• Making production choices for set, lighting, music, costumes,transitions, etc.PART FOUR APPLYING THE WORK• Rehearsal Procedures• Monologues• Auditions• Performance• Scene ExamplesPART FIVE DIRECTING AND THE METHOD ACTING EXERCISES• Origins of Method Acting Use in Directing• Creating the Director’s Vision• Production and Technical Choices• Director’s Work with Cast and Crew• Selected Great DirectorsPHOTOGRAPHS

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Table of ContentsPervasive Animation. An Introduction Suzanne Buchan SECTION 1: Preludes and Innovations 1. Expanded Animation: A Small Genealogy of the Idea and Praxis that Breathe a Soul into Dead Things Siegfried Zielinski 2. The Transforming Image: The Roots of Animation in Metamorphosis and Motion Tom Gunning SECTION 2: Material Culture 3. Animation’s Petrified Unrest Esther Leslie 4. Ecocritique and the Materialities of Animation Sean Cubitt SECTION 3: Life and Non-Life 5. Coming to Life: Cartoon Animals and Natural Philosophy Thomas Lamarre 6. A Cinema of Apprehension: A Third Entelechy of the Vitalist Machine Suzanne Buchan 7. The East Asian Post-human Prometheus: Animated Mechanical 'Others' Joon Yang Kim SECTION 4: History, Documentary and Truth 8. Socialimagestics and Cinemasymbiosis: The Materiality of A-Realism Mark Bartlett 9. ReAnimator: Embodied History, and the Post-Cinema Trace in Ken Jacobs' 'Temporal Composites' Jeffrey Skoller 10. Animated Documentaries: Aesthetics, Politics and Viewer Engagement Nea Ehrlich SECTION 5: Display, Process and Practice 11. Take the B Train: Reconstructing the Proto-cinematic Apparatus George Griffin 12. Spaces of Wonder: Animation and Museology Edwin Carels 13. Animation Studies as an Interdisciplinary Teaching Field Paul Ward

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Book SynopsisThe Actor Training Reader is an invaluable resource for students and teachers of acting, offering access to a wide range of key texts that identify, explore, illuminate and interrogate the challenges, practices and processes involved in training the modern actor. A companion volume to the highly-acclaimed Actor Training (Hodge 2010), this book collects key writings by influential actor training practitioners of the twentieth century, introduced with essays from leading academics in the field of actor training. Key practitioners included are: Eugenio Barba;Anne Bogart;Bertolt Brecht;Peter Brook;Michael Chekhov; andKonstantin Stanislavsky. The book sets established, widely used texts alongside less well-known ones in order to trace the development of actor training from the pioneering advances of Eastern Europe to the acting games of Augusto Boal. The texts are grouped into thematic sections rather tTrade Review'There’s plenty here for any serious student needing to get to grips with the theory and would make an excellent accessible starting point for anyone hungry for information but as yet not quite ready for any single practitioner’s complete oeuvre.' - Susan Elkin, The StageTable of ContentsIntroduction Mark Evans, Coventry University, UK.PrologueJacques Copeau: Rudlin, J. & Paul, N. (eds.) (1990) Copeau: Texts on TheatreKonstantin Stanislavsky: Stanislavski, C. (1980) My Life in ArtPurposeThe Purpose of Actor TrainingIan Watson, Rutgers University, USA.Extracts:Mike Alfreds: Alfreds, M. (2007) Different Every Night: Freeing the ActorEugenio Barba: Barba, E. (1979) The Floating IslandsAugusto Boal: Boal, A. (1995) The Rainbow of Desire: The Boal method of theatre and therapyMichael Chekhov: Chekhov, M. (1985) Lessons for the Professional ActorEdward Gordon Craig: Craig, E. G. (1983) Craig On TheatreJerzy Grotowski: Grotowski, J. (1997) 'Performer', in Schechner, R. & Wolford, L. (eds.) (1997) The Grotowski Sourcebook,Jacques Lecoq: Lecoq, J. (2000) The Moving Body: Teaching creative theatreYoshi Oida: Oida, Y. & Marshall, L. (1997) The Invisible ActorKonstantin Stanislavsky: Stanislavski, K. (2008) An Actor’s Work TechniqueTraining the Actor’s Voice and BodyJonathan Pitches, University of Leeds, UK.Extracts:Antonin Artaud: Artaud, A. (1970) The Theatre and its DoubleEugenio Barba: Barba, B. (1986) Beyond the Floating IslandsAugusto Boal: Boal, A. (2002) Games for Actors and Non-ActorsMoshe Feldenkrais: Feldenkrais, M. & Schechner, R. (1966) ‘Image, Movement, and Actor: Restoration of Potentiality - A discussion of the Feldenkrais Method and Acting, Self-Expression and the Theater’Dario Fo and Franca Rame: Fo, D. & Rame, F. (1983) Theatre Workshops at the Riverside StudiosJerzy Grotowski: Grotowski, J. (1969) Towards a Poor TheatreRudolf Laban: McCaw, D. (ed.) The Laban SourcebookJacques Lecoq: Lecoq, J. (2006) Theatre of movement and gestureKristin Linklater: Linklater, K. (1976) Freeing the Natural VoiceVsevolod Meyerhold: Bruan, E. (1969) Meyerhold on TheatreMichel Saint-Denis: Saint-Denis, M. (1982) Training for the TheatreTadashi Suzuki: Suzuki, T. (1986) The Way of Acting: The theatre writings of Tadashi SuzukiYevgeny Vakhtangov: Malaev-Babel, A. (ed.) (2011) The Vakhtangov SourcebookPhillip Zarrilli: Zarrilli, P. (2009) Psychophysical Acting: An Intercultural approach after StanislavskiCharacter and CompositionThe Self and the Fictive Other in Creation, Rehearsal and PerformanceBella Merlin, University of California, Riverside, USA.Extracts:Stella Adler: Adler, S. The Art of Acting (2000) Eugenio Barba: Barba, E. (2010) On Directing and Dramaturgy: Burning the HouseAnne Bogart and Tina Landau: Bogart, A. & Landau, T. (2005) The Viewpoints BookBertolt Brecht: Willett, J. (ed.) (1978) Brecht on Theatre: The Development of an AestheticMichael Chekhov: Chekhov, M. (2002) To The ActorDario Fo: Fo, D. (1991) The Tricks of the TradeJacques Lecoq: Lecoq, J. (2000) The Moving BodySanford Meisner: Meisner, S. & Longwell, D. (1987) Sanford Meisner on ActingOdin: Christoffersen, E. E. (1993) The Actor’s Way,Open Theatre: Pasolli, R. (1972) A book on the Open TheatreKonstantion Stanislavsky: Stanislavski, K. (2008) An Actor’s WorkPresencePresence, Physicality, Play and CommunionDick McCaw, Royal Holloway University, UK.Extracts:Peter Brook: Brook, P. (1993) There Are No Secrets: Thoughts on Acting and TheatreJoseph Chaikin: Chaikin, J. (1991) The Presence of the ActorJacques Copeau: Rudlin, J. & Paul, N. (eds.) (1990) Copeau: Texts on TheatrePhilippe Gaulier: Gaulier, P. (2006) The Tormentor: le jeu, light, theatreKeith Johnstone: Johnstone, K. (1981) Impro: Improvisation and the TheatreJacques Lecoq: Lecoq, J. (2006) Theatre of Movement and GestureJoan Littlewood: 'Working with Joan: Theatre Workshop actors talking to Tom Milne and Clive Goodwin' Ariane Mnouchkine: extracts from: Féral, J., Mnouchkine, A. & Husemoller, A. (1989) ‘Building up the Muscle: An Interview with Ariane Mnouchkine’Wlodzimierz Staniewski: Staniewski, W. with Hodge, A. (2004) Hidden Territories: the theatre of gardzieniceRuth Zaporah: Zaporah, R. (1995) Action Theater: The improvisation of presenceEpilogueYoshi Oida: Oida, Y. & Marshall, L. (1997) The Invisible ActorAfterword Mark Evans, Coventry University, UK

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Book SynopsisMae West, wise-cracking vaudeville performer, was one of the most controversial figures of her era. Rarely, however, do people think of Mae West as a writer. In Three Plays By Mae West, Lillian Schlissel brings this underexplored part of West''s career to the fore by offering for the first time in book form, three of the plays West wrote in the 1920s--Sex (1926), The Drag (1927) and Pleasure Man (1928). With an insightful introduction by Schlissel, this book offers a unique look into to the life and early career of this legendary stage and screen actress.Trade Review"...in a useful introduction, Schissel does a fine, readable history of both West and the theater of her day. ...these plays...are fascinating windows into another time." -- Windy City Times"This volume gives a glimpse of the real Mae West by publishing her three radical, melodramatic, but quite hilarious plays for the first time." -- Booklist"No mere strutting sexpot, West's capacity for scathing satire comes into full view in Three Plays by Mae West, edited by Lillian Schlissel...Filled with the saucy argot of the New York streets, the plays still crackle and cook." -- Publisher's Weekly"These plays are important, original and fun. Anyone interested in theatre and gender is going to have a new and bold face to deal with." -- Michael Cadden, Director of the Program in Theatre and Dance, Princeton University Mae West was many things-sexual outlaw, wildcat feminist, actress, icon. The publication of these plays proves that she was more complex than her movies suggest. The only thing she did straightforwardly was to insist that her convictions were worth fighting for...She was as close as any woman has ever come to being one of the great American queens."...we can look back at Mae West with new eyes, and admire the fun she had with sex and the control she exercised on her image and her career." -- The Boston Book Review"I would recommend this book to anyone interested either in the history of gay theatre in America or in how gays were perceived in the early decades of the twentieth century." -- Marsh Cassady, Lambda Book ReportTable of ContentsIntroduction by Lillian Schlissel, Sex: A Comedy Drama 1926, The Drag: A Homosexual Comedy in Three Acts 1927, The Pleasure Man: A Comedy Drama 1928, The Case Against Mae West

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Book SynopsisWe experience and understand the world, including music, through body movementâwhen we hear something, we are able to make sense of it by relating it to our body movements, or form an image in our minds of body movements. Musical Gestures is a collection of essays that explore the relationship between sound and movement. It takes an interdisciplinary approach to the fundamental issues of this subject, drawing on ideas, theories and methods from disciplines such as musicology, music perception, human movement science, cognitive psychology, and computer science. Trade Review "The book proposal is quite well prepared, reflecting the experience of the editors both in terms of publishing themselves and in attracting high-quality submissions from other authors for edited volumes and peer-reviewed journals. They have a good grasp of the evolution and importance of the field of sound and music computing, and put forward here a volume that can have a significant impact on that growth.... I would use this book as supplemental material in my course on the psychology of music—I would recommend offering a contract for this book." "The three strongest aspects of the book would be its beginning at the beginning; the breadth of material covered; and the clarity of the writing style (in Godøy’s article in particular). These three strengths lead me to believe that the book would be ideal for a graduate course in music and gesture…. I would recommend offering a contract for the book. It provides an accessible summary of a variety of approaches to music and gesture, which is a rapidly emerging and expanding field." "The proposed book Music and Gesture Foundations tackles a relatively new topic that is quickly becoming fundamental to multiple fields. Since the topic is so interdisciplinary, a book establishing methodological, terminological, and conceptual foundations is particularly crucial. Such a book has the potential to advance collaboration and understanding across fields, and to accelerate research in the area. The proposed book’s core strength is its stated aim to provide a systematic development of the concept of gesture in music.... The thoroughness and intellectual rigor of the manuscript is excellent. Subtle points are systematically addressed, and there is a nice balance between reviewing existing findings and developing frameworks for future inquiry. As it stands, however, the manuscript suffers from one serious problem: the quality of the English. I recommend that someone be added to the editorial team who can rework the entire manuscript, modifying sentence structure, grammar, and vocabulary so that it reads well in English..... In sum, I believe this to be a high quality manuscript targeting an important topic that people from many different fields will find interesting. I recommend publication. The book fills a niche not currently occupied, and presents an admirably thorough overview of current research in this area. " "In summary, then, I think that the novelty and strength of the book’s topic, its appeal to interdisciplinary issues, and its insights into the works of different scholars are its main strengths. Its main weaknesses lie in its rather uncertain role as an "introductory" text, its unidiomatic English, and its somewhat untraditional perspective from an American musicological perspective (though this is, also, a strength!). Based on the appeal of the project as a volume of scholarship that breaks new ground, I would recommend offering a contract for this book. This recommendation is unreserved: I believe the volume has considerable academic importance as it stands. " Table of ContentsForeword Preface 1. Why study musical gestures? 2. Musical gestures: concepts and methods in research 3. Gesture in performance 4: Music and Gestures: a historical introduction and survey of earlier research 5. Gestural Affordances of Musical Sound 6. Music, gesture, and the formation of embodied meaning 7. The Functional Role and Bio-Kinetics of Basic and Expressive gestures in Activation and Sonification 8. Gesture and Timbre 9. Sensorimotor control of sound-producing gestures} 10. Visual Gesture Recognition: from motion tracking to expressive gesture 11. Conductors' Gestures and Their Mapping to Sound Synthesis

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Book SynopsisLinks avant-garde performance practices with religious histories in the United States, setting contemporary performances of endurance art within a broader context of prophetic religious discourse in the United States. Its focus is on the work of Ron Athey, Linda Montano, and John Duncan, US-based artists whose performances involve extended periods of suffering.Trade Review“The author’s engagement with the actual performances through anintense immersion in archival material, primary sources, interviews withthe artists, and a broad and sustained engagement with the contextand historical circumstances of this work make this book particularlycompelling, and her attempt to counter the academic mistrust offundamentalism and embrace of secularism is laudable. Equallysignificant is her engagement with the relationship between ecstaticreligions, ethical actions, moral imperatives, and the history of religiousrevivalism and reform in the U.S.” - Jennie Klein, Ohio University

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Book SynopsisLinks avant-garde performance practices with religious histories in the United States, setting contemporary performances of endurance art within a broader context of prophetic religious discourse in the United States. Its focus is on the work of Ron Athey, Linda Montano, and John Duncan, US-based artists whose performances involve extended periods of suffering.Trade Review“The author’s engagement with the actual performances through anintense immersion in archival material, primary sources, interviews withthe artists, and a broad and sustained engagement with the contextand historical circumstances of this work make this book particularlycompelling, and her attempt to counter the academic mistrust offundamentalism and embrace of secularism is laudable. Equallysignificant is her engagement with the relationship between ecstaticreligions, ethical actions, moral imperatives, and the history of religiousrevivalism and reform in the U.S.” - Jennie Klein, Ohio University

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Book SynopsisPerformance Now charts the development of performance by visual artists across six continents since the turn of the 21st century. It reveals how live art, so integral to the history of art in the 20th century, has become an increasingly essential vehicle for communicating ideas across the globe in the new millennium. Renowned authority RoseLee Goldberg discusses the key themes in performance art practice, from beauty, global citizenship and political activism to performance's intersection with film and technology, dance, theatre and architecture. Each chapter is followed by illustrated profiles of the world's best-known performance artists, accompanied by extended captions that assess the importance of specific works to the practice of international performance art. The book concludes with an extensive reference section. Providing a visually exciting and stimulating overview of this most varied art form, Performance Now is the go-to reference for artists, art students and historians asTrade Review'RoseLee Goldberg’s writings on Performance as an art and activity have been THE necessary texts that inform our discovery and understanding of this complexly critical yet seductively available cultural practice. Performance Now continues to follow this dynamic live art into the 21st century with an expansiveness and rigor that has made Goldberg’s writings an indispensable chronicling of both art and its time' - Barbara Kruger'An extensive survey of the most ground-breaking performance artists living and working today' - Dazed & Confused'Goldberg’s specificity of language means that transitions between crisp descriptions and concise analyses of contexts are consistently thought-provoking' - frieze'This book shows how Performance Art has infected Visual Art, World Citizenship, Politics, Choreography, Theatre and Architecture. Performance Art is a virus that doesn’t destroy, but gives oxygen and life … RoseLee Goldberg, you gave and give us an insight into what Performance Art has been, how it has developed and where it is at this moment. Thanks for this precious gift to all of us' - Ivo van Hove, Theatre DirectorTable of ContentsIntroduction • 1. Performance as Visual Art • 2. World Citizenship: Performance as a Global Language • 3. Radical Action: On Performance and Politics • 4. Dance After Choreography • 5. Off stage: New Theatre • 6. Performing Architecture

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Book SynopsisRoseLee Goldberg is an art historian, author, critic and curator specializing in modern and contemporary performance art. Goldberg has curated the work of many prominent artists from Philip Glass to Cindy Sherman, and in 2004 founded Performa, a multidisciplinary arts organization dedicated to the research, development, and presentation of twenty-first-century visual art performance.

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Book SynopsisRoseLee Goldberg is Director of Performa, a multi-disciplinary arts organization for the research, development and presentation of 21st-century visual art performance. Among her other books are Performance: Live Art Since the 60s and Laurie Anderson, both published by Thames & Hudson.

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Book SynopsisFeatures more than 100 performance artists' interviews that highlight complex issues in performance art, including the role of identity in performer-audience relationships and art as an exploration of everyday conventions rather than a demonstration of virtuosity.Table of ContentsPreface by Linda M. Montano Introduction: Shall We Talk? Linda M. Montano Performs Autobiographical Voices, by Angelika Festa PART ONE sex Introduction by Christine Tamblyn Vito Acconci Philip Corner Paul Cotton Karen Finley Vanalyne Green Lynn Hershman Dick Higgins Laurel Klick Steven Kolpan Jill Kroesen Robert Kushner Minnette Lehmann Lydia Lunch Paul McCarthy Tim Miller Frank Moore and Linda Mac Vernita Nemec Pat Oleszko Carolee Schneemann Barbara Smith Annie Sprinkle and Veronica Vera Hannah Wilke PART TWO food Introduction by Moira Roth Jerri Allyn Nancy Barber John Cage Angelika Festa Howard Fried Joan Jonas Alison Knowles Leslie Labowitz Suzanne Lacy Les Levine Antoni Miralda Susan Mogul Faith Ringgold Rachel Rosenthal Martha Rosler Richard Schechner Bonnie Sherk Stuart Sherman Anne Tardos and Jackson Mac Low PART THREE money/fame Introduction by Laura Cottingham Eleanor Antin Robert Ashley Bob and Bob Eric Bogosian Nancy Buchanan Linda Frye Burnham Papo Colo Lowell Darling Steven Durland Simone Forti Mel Henderson Julia Heyward Mikhail Horowitz Allan Kaprow Tom Marioni Meredith Monk Jim Pomeroy Willoughby Sharp Michael Smith Martin Von Haselberg Martha Wilson PART FOUR ritual/death Introduction by Lucy R. Lippard Marina Abramovicˇ and Ulay Helene Aylon Chris Burden John Cage Ping Chong George Coates Betsy Damon Terry Fox Cheri Gaulke Alex Grey Deborah Hay Geoffrey Hendricks Donna Henes Kim Jones Alistair MacLennan Ann Magnuson Ruth Maleczech Paul McMahon Ana Mendieta Hermann Nitsch Lorraine O’Grady Morgan O’Hara Pauline Oliveros Adrian Piper Jerome Rothenberg Brian Routh Robert Schuler Theodora Skipitares Stelarc Elaine Summers Fiona Templeton Mierle Laderman Ukeles William Wegman Paul Zaloom Ellen Zweig Afterword: Quicksilver and Revelations: Performance Art at the End of the Twentieth Century, by Kristine Stiles Biographies Index

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Book SynopsisIn the 1960s, the fascination with erotic art generated a wave of exhibitions and critical discussion on sexual freedom, visual pleasure, and the nude in contemporary art. Radical Eroticism examines the importance of women's contributions in fundamentally reconfiguring representations of sexuality across several areas of advanced art-performance, pop, postminimalism, and beyond. This study shows that erotic art made by women was integral to the profound changes that took place in American art during the sixties, from the crumbling of modernist aesthetics and the expanding field of art practice to the emergence of the feminist art movement. The works of Carolee Schneemann, Martha Edelheit, Marjorie Strider, Hannah Wilke, and Anita Steckel exemplify the innovative approaches to the erotic that explored female sexual subjectivities and destabilized assumptions about gender. Rachel Middleman reveals these artists' radical interventions in both aesthetic conventions and social norms.Trade Review"Rather than calling for a new aesthetic category of “the erotic,” Middleman’s study identifies the use of diverse erotic aesthetics in art produced by women as a means of political action. In so doing, Radical Eroticism amounts to a political act in its own right." * ASAP/J *“…Middleman provides an insightful examination of the exhibition and critical reception of erotic art, laying the groundwork for understanding the social context and political stakes of the approaches of women artists to eroticism in a decade of expanding forms of artistic practice, the demise of modernist aesthetics, and the rise of the feminist art movement.” * Panorama: Journal of the Association of Historians of American Art *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction 1. Performing Eros: Carolee Schneemann 2. Figures of Fantasy: Martha Edelheit 3. Pop Perversions: Marjorie Strider 4. Abstract Eroticism: Hannah Wilke 5. Gender Play: Anita Steckel Conclusion Notes Bibliography List of Illustrations Index

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Book SynopsisThe first comprehensive publication to capture Hayes's unique blend of performance and social engagement which has been at the forefront of questions of feminist history, queer time, and protest culture for over a decade

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Book SynopsisGlorious catastrophe presents the first detailed critical analysis of the visual art, film, performance and writing of Jack Smith, an icon of the New York avant-garde, from the early 1960s until his AIDS-related death in 1989. It uses his personal papers, and unpublished interviews with friends and collaborators.Trade Review‘In Glorious Catastrophe, Johnson celebrates the fabulous, freakish spectacle of Jack Smith and his work to its fullest extent in a manner that reflects his subject’s contempt for assimilation. In this, he seems inspired by Kathy Acker’s injunction to writers ‘to scream, to forget, to do anything except reduce radical difference, through representation, to identities, singularity, calculable and controllable’ in the rethinking of art’s histories.’Fiona Anderson, Contemporary Theatre Review 24:1 -- .Table of ContentsIntroduction: Jack Smith’s glorious catastrophes1. ‘Little triumphs of disaster’: failure, boredom and excess2. ‘Beyond self-disappearance’: Jack Smith and art’s histories3. Flaming Creatures and the burden of disgust4. Innocent monsters and Normal Love5. The deaths of Maria Montez6. ‘Glamorize your messes’: scenes of writing7. Rehearsals for the destruction of AtlantisBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisArgues the conceptual significance of performance, and of a performative model of art, to the revival of the monument in the wake of the Second World War, the Holocaust and the fall of the Eastern bloc. -- .Trade Review'Mechtild Widrich’s astonishing and original book connects performance histories, feminist theory and speech act theory to elucidate the “event character” of public art by contemporary artists. Widrich advances a powerful argument about the stakes of spectatorship, temporality and collective memory.'Julia Bryan-Wilson, Associate Professor of Contemporary Art, University of California, Berkeley'Rigorously researched and argued, this important book will become required reading not only on the history and theory of performance art but also on the history of the "performative" itself as it has transformed public art and commemoration.'Kirk Savage, Professor, History of Art & Architecture, University of Pittsburgh -- .Table of ContentsIntroduction: what is a performative monument?1. Documents 2. Audiences 3. Sites 4. Monuments Conclusion: relations Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisStep down a little closer; you don''t want to miss a thing. Join fifty-year sideshow veteran, Rick West, on a strange and wonderful trip through behind-the-scenes tales of his life as a showman. The strange, the bizarre, the unusual comprise this engaging memoir bursting at the seams with rare images of two-headed cows, Bigfoot creatures, pickled punks, showgirls, humongous hogs, 3,500-pound steers, and much, much more. From attending the Ozark Empire Fair at age five to revealing the true story behind Frank Hansen''s infamous Minnesota Iceman, the author takes the reader into the world of America''s sideshows and midway grind shows. It''s all here; it''s all on the inside. See it now or miss it forever. It''s showtime!

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Book SynopsisExploring the making and experience of a lesbian feminist haunted house, this book reframes and reclaims queer feminist histories with humour, provocation, and theoretical sophistication.Table of ContentsLesbian Rule: Welcome to the Hell House / Cait McKinney and Allyson MitchellRISING FROM THE DEAD: INCEPTION1 Scaling Up and Sharing Out Dyke Culture: Killjoy’s Kastle’s Haunted Block Party / Heather LoveLesbianizing the Institution: The Haunting Effects of Killjoy Hospitality at the Art Gallery of York University / Emelie Chhangur 2 Feminist Killjoys (and Other Wilful Subjects) / Sara AhmedKilljoy in the ONE Archives: Activating Los Angeles’s Queer Art and Activist Histories / David Evans Frantz THE KASTLE: EXECUTION3 Inside Job: Learning, Collaboration, and Queer-Feminist Contagion in Killjoy’s Kastle / Helena Reckitt Valerie Solanas as the Goddamned Welcoming Committee / Felice Shays Valerie Solanas Script 4 Playing Demented Women’s Studies Professor Tour Guide, or Performing Monstrosity in Killjoy’s Kastle / Moynan King Demented Women’s Studies Professor Tour Guide Script The Sound of White Girls Crying / Nazmia Jamal Paranormal Killjoys / Ginger Brooks Takahashi Menstruating Trans Man / Chase Joynt A Ring around Your Finger Is a Cord around Your Genitals! / Chelsey Lichtman Once upon a Time I Was a Riot Ghoul / Kalale Dalton-Lutale Riot Ghoul / Andie Shabbar Inconvenienced / Madelyne Beckles On the Cusp of the Kastle / Karen Tongson 5 Processing Killjoy’s Kastle: A Deep Lez Performance / Ann CvetkovichTHE CRYPT: ARCHIVING AND REFLECTIONFacebook Statements: “We Learn More Every Time We Do This”6 Reflections of a Real-Life Feminist Killjoy: Ball-Busters and the Recurring Trauma of Intergenerational Queer-Feminist Life / Kyla Wazana TompkinsR.I.P. Little Frida’s / Chris E. Vargas 7 Home Sick: Horror, Gothic Storytelling, and the Queers Who Haunt Houses / S. Trimble8 The Graveyards of Community Gathering: Archiving Lesbian and Feminist Life in London / Catherine GrantLeave Britney Alone! and Other Ghostly Feelings / Tobias B.D. Wiggins Index

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Book SynopsisCurrent philosophies of art remain sadly dominated by visions of its end and lamentations of decline. Defining the very notions of art and the aesthetic as special products of Western modernity, they suggest that postmodern challenges to traditional...Trade ReviewThe essays are lively and engaging in many ways. Not only is Shusterman informative about topics relating to mass-media arts and self-fashioning, his reflections consistently raise important philosophical issues concerning our postmodernist condition and the cultural and sociological factors fostering it. Furthermore, Shusterman's arguments are fecund and provocative, his style vigorous, and his critique of current analytical and continental philosophical approaches adroit.... We cannot but admire the skill and verve of Shusterman's attempts to bring philosophy back to its original goals of teaching us how to live more fully and wisely. -- Trevor Whittock * British Journal of Aesthetics *Shusterman's new book is a collection of mutually complementary essays which encompass a decade of writing. It represents his pragmatist aesthetics critically applied to a range of issues, theories, and methods foregrounded by recent work in both analytic and continental philosophy. Interestingly, the contemporary vitality of some of these issues is in part due to the influence of Shusterman's previous writings.... Shusterman's text is enormously sophisticated not only in the range of philosophical and cultural sources which he is able to draw upon, but also in the probing and succinct way in which these are applied. * Mind *

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Book SynopsisIn this new book about Ernest Haycox's literary career, Richard Etulain tells the engrossing story of his rise through the ranks of popular magazine and serial fiction to become one of the Western's most successful creators.Trade ReviewThe distinguished western-U.S. historian Richard W. Etulain resurrects the neglected Western writer Ernest Haycox from undeserved obscurity. Etulain traces the development of Haycox's career from its origins in the 'pulps' and the 'slicks' in the 1920s and '30s to such illustrious historical novels as The Wild Bunch and Bugles in the Afternoon in the 1940s. Professor Etulain's critical study is definitive."" - Gary Scharnhorst, author of Owen Wister and the West

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Book SynopsisA twelve-member cast enacts Scheherazade's tales of love, lust, comedy, and dreams. This adaptation offers a wonderful blend of the lesser-known tales from Arabian Nights with the recurring theme of how the magic of storytelling holds the power to change people.

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Book SynopsisA survey of community-based performance in the US from its roots, to its flourishing during the 1960s, to present-day popular culture. It provides descriptions of performances and processes, first-person stories, and analysis and shows how ritualism reinforces community identification while aestheticism enables locals to transgress cultural norms.Trade ReviewCohen-Cruz's book is a highly effective local (and global) act in itself; paralleling the culturally democratic acts it is inspired by, Local Acts will in turn inspire others. -- Lucy R. Lippard * author of The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a Multicentered Society *Cohen-Cruz's book is a highly effective local (and global) act in itself; paralleling the culturally democratic acts it is inspired by, Local Acts will in turn inspire others. -- Lucy R. Lippard * author of The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a Multicentered Society *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction Part I. Legacies 1. Early Antecedents 2. Motion of the Ocean 3. Establishing the Field Part II. Principles 4. Between Ritual and Art 5. Criticism Part III. Methodologies 6. Storytelling 7. Performance Structures Closing: Boundary Jumping Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"This book is a tour de force, a grand jeté, a series of sustained arabesques introducing a new and exciting way of thinking through the relation between aesthetic and political forms in twentieth-century American culture." -- Virginia Jackson * University of California-Irvine *"Don’t Act, Just Dance is an exceptional study of cold war culture. Americanists will find indispensable Kodat's brilliant meta-political analyses of works by George Balanchine, Merce Cunningham, Stanley Kubrick, and Marianne Moore. I cannot recommend this book too highly." -- Harilaos Stecopoulos * author of Reconstructing the World: Southern Fictions and U.S. Imperialisms, 1898-1976 *"An important manifesto for dance as a subject of serious scholarly attention in academic disciplines beyond dance history and dance studies … the book's final case studies are brilliant comparative meditations on the complex, multilayered relationship between Cold War art and politics." * Dance Chronicle *Table of ContentsPrefacePart I Rethinking Cold War Culture1 Combat Cultural2 History: From the WPA to the NEA (through the CIA)3 Theory: Adorno and Rancière (Abstraction, Modernism, Gender, Sexuality)4 Dancing: “Don’t Act, Just Dance”Part II Rereading Cold War Culture5 Figures in the Carpet: Balanchine, Cunningham, “Persia”6 Spartacus7 From Art as Diplomacy to Diplomacy as Art: The Red Detachment of Nixon in ChinaNotesBibliographyIndex

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