Challenging Hierarchies?

Challenging Hierarchies? RADKA KUNDEROVÁ It has become quite usual that performance analysis interprets a production/performance within its social context. One of the recent attempts at grasping theatre in these wider circumstances is represented by a concept of stratification highlighted by the latest FIRT-IFTR World Congress “Theatre and Stratification“. In my paper, I will sketchily explore this concept´s potential for performance analysis, stratification being understood as a social phenomenon that refers to “the ordering of individuals, groups and institutions within socio-political hierarchies and global economies” and operates with historically constructed categories like nationality, citizenship, education or language which regulate authority and power.1 As a case study, I am going to use a joint theatre project called Together,2 produced by two Eastern and two Western companies as a manifestation of humanity and solidarity across the Iron Curtain in 1983. Even though this unique international collaboration had quite a significant status in the Western European discourse at that time, and it was extensively covered by the European media, it has not been studied yet. My paper is part of an ongoing research project at the Theatre Faculty in Brno, which reconstructs and documents also this international project, by exploring archives and interviewing artists of all involved companies.3 The Together project was initiated by Divadlo na provázku (Theatre on the String) from Czechoslovakia and its allied Polish group Teatr 77; both companies had already had experiences with participating in international projects in the West. Their activity was motivated by the desire for artistic freedom and for contact with current Theatre and Stratification [theme description of the FIRT-IFTR World Congress “Theatre and Stratification“, 28. 7. – 1. 8. 2014, University of Warwick, England]. [online], [accessed 10. 11. 2014]. <http://iftr2014warwick.org/theme/>. 2 Teatr 77 – Divadlo na provázku – Teaterværkstedet Den Blå Hest – Cardiff Laboratory Theatre. Together. Produced by the Copenhagen International Theatre Festival, Copenhagen, Denmark, 6.–17. 7. 1983. 3 The research on the Together project, which will result in a monograph, has been done by the author and professor Petr Oslzlý, one of the project´s initiators and key performers. 1 75 trends in Western arts. The Polish director Zdzisław Hejduk persuaded the artistic director of the Copenhagen International Theater Festival Fools 4, Trevor Davies,4 to organize the project.5 The preparation process took three years. Meanwhile, the Eastern groups were joined by Teaterværkstedet Den Blå Hest (Blue Horse Theatre) from Denmark, a theatre which they had already got to know through previous collaboration, and finally by the Cardiff Laboratory Theatre from Wales.6 Trevor Davies made the project a main event at the international festival in Copenhagen and it was financially supported by the Danish ministry of culture and the City and County of Copenhagen as well as from Scandinavian Theatre Committee. The unifying gesture of the project was also appreciated by UNESCO, which gave the project its patronage and also contributed financially.7 The joint site-specific production with elements of action and environmental theatre took place at the ruins of a deserted factory Valseværk, and it was visited by about seven thousand spectators in July 1983.8 As Davies put it in the programme, the initiators considered the event “an important paedagogical and theatrical project which could serve as a model for future international co-operation” and it was “based on the belief that international collaboration between artists from divergent cultural, political, and national backgrounds has a vital role in securing a deeper international cultural awareness and positive communication, based on mutual understanding and respect.”9 The main political and artistic goal, therefore, was clearly to overcome the existing political stratification. However, despite this unifying ethos, the phenomenon of stratification was present at multiple and sometimes contradictory levels within the project. So, when analysing the nature of stratification within this multinational Davies has been a director of the Danish non-profit cultural organization the Copenhagen International Theatre which organized the annual Copenhagen International Theater Festival. 5 Petr Oslzlý´s interview with Zdzisław Hejduk in Poland, 8. 11. 2013. 6 See e.g. a detailed description of the project´s genesis and its preparatory process in the summarizing and documenting bulletin Project Together. Copenhagen: Copenhagen International Theater Festival, 1983, pp. 18–22; or by a participating Czechoslovak director, Peter Scherhaufer, in SCHERHAUFER, Peter. Inscenování v nepravidelném prostoru. S. l.: KKS Ostrava and OKS Karviná, 1989, pp. 17–28, pp. 33–40. 7 A correspondence between the festival organisers (mostly Trevor Davies) and supporting institutions including UNESCO, as well as detailed accounts of the project´s budget, have been preserved at the archive of the Copenhagen International Theatre, Copenhagen, Denmark. 8 The organisers states 18 performances visited by the audience of 350–400 persons. In Project Together, p. 22. 9 DAVIES, Trevor. Introduction. In Together [bulletin for participating companies]. Copenhagen: Copenhagen International Theatre Festival, 1983 [without page numbers]. 4 76 collaboration across political borders, we find the connective tendency complemented by the disruptive one. I am going to characterize these tendencies at several levels of the production as an institutional as well as cultural practice. (Challenging) Hierarchies within the Organization of the Project During the project´s final preparation phase, which took place in Copenhagen starting two weeks before the first performance, the Danish organisers put a significant emphasis on an equal, even egalitarian relationship among the participating groups. Eighty artists lived directly at the site of the factory in caravans. The organisers addressed the participants with these instructions: “The conditions ARE PRIMITIVE, but we decided that it was more important for everyone to live together ON SITE than live separated in relative luxury, far away from the project site.”10 It was also the artists who physically – with the help of the Danish technical crew – adapted the factory´s ruins for the performance, so the hierarchy between artists and technical staff as well as between directors and actors was to some extent abolished. So basically, the artists spent all their time together as they took care of the common facilities or they cooked together. Nowadays, the artists remember long white nights full of singing at the fire, exchanging national songs, drinking or even smoking cannabis. A composer from the Cardiff Laboratory Theatre, John Hardy, characterizes the atmosphere of the meeting: “It seemed a very international gathering, and there was a sense of acceptance, optimism, idealism and hope for a peaceful future.“11 In this respect, the egalitarian social setting lead to an authentic cultural exchange, fulfilling the unifying goal of the project. The connective tendency of the project reached its climax in the form of an unexpected wedding between members of participating groups from “opposite” parts of Europe. The Czech actress and singer Ida Kelarová and the Welsh technician Tony Welsch fell in love with each other while rehearsing in Copenhagen, and celebrated their wedding at the site together with all the participants. This act symbolically erased the political, social, economic or cultural dimensions of stratification. 10 11 Keeping Yourselves, Your Clothes, and Everything Else Clean. In Together. John Hardy in email to the author, 8. 10. 2013. 77 However, at the same time, various hierarchies and differences among the groups appeared. The newly emerged social situation was quite complicated, since along with the four participating nationalities, at least four different discourses met and the project was positioned within four kinds of hierarchies of political, social, cultural and economic power. 12 The geopolitical tension was present even during the project´s final preparation. One of the key events, as the Western participants still vividly remember, was the Polish group arriving in Copenhagen in tears because three of them were not allowed to leave Poland to join the “suspicious capitalist” project – at that time, repression in Poland was being intensified by the martial law declared by general Jaruzelski. The crying Polish artists refused to tell their colleagues why they were upset until they were out of earshot of their bus driver because he was a spy.13 The Czech company also had two supervisors, in this case officially declared14 – the first one was their official artistic director and the second one an administrative officer for culture, working for the regional authorities.15 The Western theatre makers felt solidarity with their Eastern colleagues who – however – sometimes found their attitude patronising and too protective, as Zdzisław Hejduk puts it today.16 Trevor Davies told the Danish daily Politiken that “People from the East claim that we do not take things seriously enough, and we do not say them directly enough. On the other hand, they expect people from the West to be able to agree on something after hours of discussions and to come with a simple elucidating sentence.” 17 At the same time, the Western artists often admired the courage of their Eastern counterparts to face the authoritative regime. The Welsh director Joan Mills, Due to the limited extent of the paper, the situation´s characterization is simplified to the main features, in reality, there were many more of discourses and hierarchies involved, e. g. each of the national discourses involved a number of “sub-discourses” with specific internal hierarchies and mutual relationships. 13 The author´s interviews with members of the Cardiff Laboratory Theatre, the director Joan Mills and the actress Jill Greenhalgh in Aberystwyth, Wales, 1. 10. 2013. 14 Even the project´s organisers mentioned them when referring to the supportive reactions from “the observers sent by the Polish and Czechoslovakian goverments,“ which indicates that the Polish state organs also sent officially declared supervisors. In Project Together, p. 37. 15 The author´s interview with Petr Oslzlý in Brno, Czech Republic, 22. 7. 2014. 16 Petr Oslzlý´s interview with Zdzisław Hejduk in Poland, 8. 11. 2013. 17 LYSTER, Helle. Jo mere vi er sammen jo mindre slås vi. [The More We Are Together, the Less We Fight]. Politiken, 3. 7. 1983 [Czech translation Daniela Mrázová, English translation the author]. 12 78 also interviewed by the Danish press, spoke about the “moral superiority” of the Eastern colleagues because “their life is harder”.18 Besides the initial geopolitical stratification and its consequences, a new social hierarchy between the companies arose during the preparation. The strongest position was held by the authors of the initial idea, the Czechs and the Polish. It was also the Czechs who suggested and pushed for a textual basis for the production, the baroque philosophical allegory Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Heart by Czech philosopher and educator Comenius (1592–1670). The social hierarchy of the companies was also influenced by the languages used. The close relationship between the Polish people and Czechs was also determined by closeness of the Czech and Polish languages. In addition, the close relationship between the Eastern groups and the Danish one was significantly influenced by the fluent Czech and Polish spoken by the Danish director Alexander Jochved, who had studied in Prague and was of the Polish origin. As he had thoroughly experienced both the Eastern and the Western discourses, he represented a certain kind of interpreter between them. During the process of preparation, the stratification appeared even on an economic level. While discussing financial matters, the Welsh company insisted on a certain amount for royalties and the Eastern artists interpreted their behaviour as a lack of commitment to the project.19 Negotiations between two different discourses followed which revealed the different economic statuses of theatre within each of the geopolitical blocs. The Czechs, especially, did not understand the Welsh approach, since theatres in Czechoslovakia were subordinated to the state, which also financed them, albeit poorly. That is why financial matters were not of much importance within the Czech discourse where the state declared itself as an egalitarian communist regime and to put it simply, all people had the same lack of money. On the other hand, the existence of an experimental theatre company in Wales depended on their resource management and capability to earn wages as the Western discourse positioned theatre in an economically liberal environment. The companies´ negotiations, however, were Ibid. The conflict´s reflection can be found e.g. in Alexander Jochved´s apologizing letter to the Cardiff Laboratory Theatre, referring also to the financial matters, from 8. 4. 1983, 3 pages of handwriting. Deposited at the archive of the Centre for Performance Research, Aberystwyth, Wales. Different perspectives of the participating groups have been also described in quoted interviews with Joan Mills and Petr Oslzlý. 18 19 79 successful, the Czechs finally understanding the necessity of the Welsh request, and the preparation of the project could continue. (Challenging) Hierarchies within the Production The existing political hierarchy was also manifested – not surprisingly – within the production.20 Its narrative was based on the allegorical journey of a Pilgrim (Petr Oslzlý) around the world searching for a paradise which he finally finds in his own heart. Each theatre company was responsible for one or several sequences representing parts of the Pilgrim´s journey. They rehearsed them in their home countries and put them together on site where they modified them according to the spatial parameters of the factory ruins. The geopolitical stratification appeared in the production in various ways. Is some cases, it was done quite literally – for instance, it was embodied in a violent passport check which divided the audience into halves, each half watching either the Danish or the Polish part simultaneously. The directors meant to ridicule this humiliating custom of the communist countries´ repressive apparatus, but the scene provoked a number of upset reactions of couples or families being separated, acting as if they were not aware of constructed nature of the situation. The stratification was also literally evoked within the project by a barbed wire fence guarded by a man – with dog – resembling a border guard. While the Czech and the Welsh companies rather followed the symbolic nature of the baroque allegory, the Polish and the Danish groups decided to confront the ideological structures of the East and the West explicitly. The Polish company performed the Polish national historical trauma – the Yalta conference in February 1945 concerning Europe´s post-war reorganisation,21 which lead to what the Polish people called the fourth partition of Poland. Within the project, they dared to stage this national taboo they were not allowed to speak about in their country. During the Polish sequence, Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt unexpectedly joined a Christmas dinner and brought Besides written documents, the project´s reconstruction is based on two video recordings, the twenty minutes long essay-like dokumentary by the Czechoslovak Television Bratislava Labyrint světa, screenplay and direction Ján Fajnor, director of photography Richard Krivda, 1984; and a technical video record of one of the project´s performances shot by Richard Krivda. Both videos are deposited at the archive of the Centre for Experimental Theatre in Brno. 21 Quoted interview with Z. Hejduk. 20 80 a neon model of the new social order as a present. Consequently, symbolic and historical figures of the Polish present and past, such as the poet Witold Gombrowicz, a priest, a Jew and others, were forced to put the model into practice.22 The Polish patriotic narrative was contrasted with the self-critical Danish approach to the Western capitalist society as a mass of isolated individuals absorbed by the pleasures of consumerism.23 Various stylised figures were placed into cages where they performed stereotypical acts in cycles. The project´s unifying ethos culminated with the end of the performance, where the Pilgrim finds relative peace of mind in his love for his lover and belief in humanity, and all the actors and spectators sang together a polyphonic song including the line “but my heart is still with me.” While leaving the factory building through a large door, they suddenly saw a rainbow created by the combination of artificial rain and sunshine. Response to the project was – again – stratified according to the national discourses of the participants. The reaction of the Danish press was immense. Many reviews with different opinions were published, though the majority of them welcomed the social and artistic aim of the project.24 The Welsh or English media did not pay much attention to the project, as the position of this experimental company was not very strong within the mainstream cultural discourse, their poetics being closer to continental theatre. The reactions of the national press within the Eastern bloc was different in each country. In Poland, the artists had to face punishment for performing criticism of the political regime on stage: the Polish embassy in Denmark sent a note to the Polish Ministry of Culture about a “political scandal” Teatr 77 caused. Therefore, the project had zero publicity in Poland. After coming back, a passport of the director Hejduk was confiscated and the theatre was not allowed to take part in next international collaborative projects for some years.25 Back in Czechoslovakia, the dramaturge´s passport was also confiscated and the company´s international Petr Oslzlý´s interview with the Teatr 77 actor Tomasz Bieszczad in Lodz, Poland, 7. 11. 2013. Interpretations of this kind were both presented by the project´s organisers – “Den Blå Hest present a tragi-comic performance based on the futility of the modern western civilization.“ In Together Project, p. 28 – and spotted by some of the reviewers: e.g. “Blå Hest created a picture of the West“ (NORÉN, Kjerstin. Derfor adlød de ikke verdens ordre. Information, 7. 7. 1983, quoted from the review´s English translation in Together Project, p. 52.) or “human isolation under the capitalism in the west“ (FALCK, Jørgen. Chokerende og dramatisk. Politiken, 7. 7. 1983, quoted from the review´s English translation in Together Project, p. 65. ). 24 The Danish reviews (some of them translated into English) are included in the bulletin Project Together. 25 Quoted interview with Z. Hejduk. 22 23 81 engagement was reduced;26 compared to Poland, publicity surrounding the project was quite large.27 To conclude, it seems that the stratification represents a suitable concept for abstracting varied, both magnetic and repulsive powers in preparation, realization and response of a production – in particular, if the production is produced by subjects of different political, social or economic statuses. However, the Together project shows that the endeavour to overcome existing hierarchies does not lead to the desired result in a linear way – on the contrary, such endeavour reveals unexpected repulsive powers which oppose the original idea; the attempt to overcome differences first leads to uncovering them and experiencing them immediately and intensively in a potentially explosive process. Příspěvek byl realizován za finanční podpory ze státních prostředků prostřednictvím projektu Grantové agentury České republiky č. GA13-21421S – Brněnská studiová divadla II: dokumentace – rekonstrukce – analýza. Quoted interview with P. Oslzlý. The leading official cultural magazine Tvorba published a responsive article on the festival and the project in particular (HUBIČKA, Jiří. Kodaňský divadelní festival 83. Tvorba, 21. 9. 1983), the progressive theatre magazine Scéna provided the project a whole newspaper-size-page, where it published Peter Scherhaufer´s reflection on the project (SCHERHAUFER, Peter. Společně: Labyrint světa a ráj srdce. Scéna 9, 1984, č. 3, s. 8.) Also interviews with P. Scherhaufer and P. Oslzlý were published by the national and local press (GEROVÁ, Irena. Soubor v pohybu [interview with P. Oslzlý]. Svobodné slovo, 24. 3. 1984; KRAVKA, Jaroslav. Labyrint v Dánsku [interview with P. Scherhaufer], Brněnský večerník, 2. 8. 1983; (jvk) [KRAVKA, Jaroslav]. Jak jsem přislíbil... [an article quoting Peter Scherhaufer´s impressions of the Together project]. Brněnský večerník, 2. 8. 1983. 26 27 82 Mgr. et Mgr. Radka Kunderová, Ph.D., je vědecká pracovnice, pedagožka, kritička a editorka. Vystudovala divadelní vědu, mediální studia a žurnalistiku na Karlově univerzitě v Praze, studovala také v Anglii a Řecku. Na Katedře divadelních studií Masarykovy univerzity v Brně získala doktorát s disertací Eroze autoritativního diskursu v české divadelní kritice v období tzv. přestavby (1985–1989). Vyučuje zejména na DIFA JAMU, kde od roku 2010 pracuje na plný úvazek jako vědecká pracovnice a editorka. Mezi její odborné zájmy patří vztahy mezi politikou, jazykem a ideologií v divadelním diskursu, nová média v současném divadle nebo dokumentární divadlo. Účastnila se řady českých i zahraničních konferencí a výzkumných projektů, např. Contemporary Central European Theatre: Document/ary versus Postmemory pořádaného International Alternative Culture Center v Budapešti. Jako kritička publikuje především v časopise Svět a divadlo, jehož je externí redaktorkou. E-mail: [email protected] Hierarchiím navzdory? Na počátku osmdesátých let se čtyři evropská divadla ze Západu a Východu rozhodla čelit globální geopolitické stratifikaci vytvořením společného projektu Together. Byl uveden v rámci mezinárodního divadelního festivalu Copenhagen International Theater Festival Fools 4 v dánské Kodani. Západní perspektivu v něm ztělesňovala velšská skupina Cardiff Laboratory Theatre a Den Blå Hest z Dánska, východní Teatr 77 z Polska a české Divadlo na provázku. Osmdesát umělců žijících v Kodani v rovnostářské komuně upravilo tamní zchátralou továrnu a vytvořilo pod patronací UNESCO site-specific inscenaci, kterou v létě 1983 navštívilo kolem sedmi tisíc diváků. Přestože měl projekt v tehdejší západní Evropě poměrně významný status, dosud se mu nedostalo historické reflexe. Příspěvek analyzuje na základě archivního výzkumu a výpovědí pamětníků ze všech zúčastněných souborů rozmanité a leckdy protichůdné působení stratifikace a existujících hierarchií v rámci projektu. 83