Performance in The Public Sphere PDF

Performance
in
the
Public Sphere
COPYRIGHT TITLE
© 2018 Centro de Estudos de Teatro / Performance in the Public Sphere
FLUL and Performativa
© Ana Pais, authors and artists AUTHORS AND ARTISTS
Rebecca Schneider, Idalina Conde,
1 ST EDITION Carla Cruz, Sandra Guerreiro Dias,
David Helbich, Isabel Nogueira,
Eleonora Fabião, Sevi Bayraktar,
This ebook is a digital version
Jen Harvie, Christof Migone,
of the printed book
Rui Mourão, Liliana Coutinho,
Performance na Esfera Pública,
Catherine Wood, Peggy Phelan,
originally published by
Ana Bigotte Vieira, Ana Borralho
Orfeu Negro (Lisbon, 2017). & João Galante, Sílvia Pinto Coelho,
João Macdonald, Christine Greiner,
ISBN: 978-989-99838-1-6 Andrea Maciel, Paulo Raposo.
SPONSORS INTRODUCTION AND EDITION

This research is funded by Ana Pais
FCT Fundação para a Ciência
e a Tecnologia, I.P., in the realm SELECTION OF TEXTS AND WORKS
of the project «UID/EAT/0279/2016» Ana Pais
DGartes/Governo de Portugal Levina Valentim
Câmara Municipal de Lisboa Pedro Rocha
Apoio à Internacionalização:
Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian TRANSL ATION
Rui Parada Cascais
REVISION
David Hardisty
DESIGN AND WEBSITE

MALALAMA
Marta Anjos
Luís Alexandre
INTRODUCTION
FEELING, THINKING, CONTENTS
TAKING ACTION
Ana Pais
10—29
ARTICLE ARTIST PAGE ARTICLE

APPEARING TO OTHERS ALL MY INDEPENDENT PERFORMANCE AS ART
AS OTHERS APPEAR: WO/MEN AND CELEBRATION:
THOUGHTS ON Carla Cruz DEMOCRATIZATION,
PERFORMANCE, THE POLIS, 84—91
COLLECTIVE EVENTS
AND PUBLIC SPACE ARTICLE
AND PUBLIC SPACE
Rebecca Schneider SACRIFICING THE BODY TO Isabel Nogueira
32—59 130—153
THE MANIFESTO: LANGUAGE,
PAPER FUTURISM AND PERFORMANCE ARTIST PAGE
1917-2017, Sandra Guerreiro Dias TO TRADE
ALMADA NEGREIROS 92—113
EVERYTHING
AND EUROPE ARTIST PAGE
Eleonora Fabião
154—169
Idalina Conde SCORES FOR THE BODY,
60—83
BUILDING & SOUL FOR THE SÃO
LUIZ TEATRO MUNICIPAL, LISBON
David Helbich
114—129
CONTENTS
ARTICLE ARTIST PAGE ARTICLE

CHOREOGRAPHING HIT, HIT MAKER, WHEN PERFORMANCE
RESISTANCE IN TURKEY’S HIT PARADE MEETS THE MUSEUM:
GEZI PARK MOVEMENT, Christof Migone A DIALOGUE WITH
2013 240—253
CATHERINE WOOD
Sevi Bayraktar ARTIST PAGE
Liliana Coutinho
172—201 268—285
THE PERFORMANCE
PAPER IS THE MESSAGE ARTICLE
THE HOUSING CRISIS, Rui Mourão APPEARING IN PUBLIC
ART, AND PERFORMANCE 254—267
AS PUBLIC
Jen Harvie Peggy Phelan
202—239 286—313
CONTENTS AUTHORS
BIOGRAPHIES
440—449
AUTOR
AUTOR
ARTIST PAGE ARTICLE ARTIST PAGE
LOVE IS IN THE AIR THE AVANT-GARDE FRONT TO THE GROUND OF THE
8 Ana Borralho & João Galante BACK: PORTUGUESE MUSICAL CITIES – A PERFOMANCE 9
316—321
RETRO-PERFORMANCE CATALYSIS
AND COMMUNICATION Andrea Maciel
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
ARTICLE
EXILE – FROM THE 1980s TO THE 410—417
DETERRITORIALIZATION 1910s–1920s ARTICLE

IN CONTEMPORARY João Macdonald PERFORMANCE, ACTIVISM
354—377
DANCE/PERFORMANCE: AND PUBLIC SPHERE:
TWO RECENT ARTICLE ARCHIVE, REPERTOIRE
EPISODES FROM THE THE POLITICAL AND REPERFORMANCE
PORTUGUESE CONTEXT REENACTMENT OF IN THE NEW NEW SOCIAL
Sílvia Pinto Coelho PERFORMANCE AND MOVEMENTS
322—353
ITS MICRO-ACTIVISM Paulo Raposo
OF AFFECTIONS 418—439
Christine Greiner
378—409
FEELING,
THINKING,
TAKING
ACTION
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AUTOR
10 “After Trump, we must begin”, said Alain Badiou speaking 11

to an audience of students and teachers at the University of
California in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s election to the
CAPÍTULO
INTRODUCTION
presidency of the United States of America. Sharing his sur-
prise at the result, and diagnosing its causes, the philosopher
maintains that the 2016 American elections lacked an alter-
native strategic vision of the current times, which was in itself
a reflection of a similar lack at a global scale. Characterizing
this context as a “global crisis”, the era of neoliberal capital-
ism, which subverted the separation between the public and
private spheres and accentuated the rift between material and
immaterial work, Badiou pointed out the resulting “monstrous
social inequalities” that the new political protest movements
seek to voice. More than an economic crisis, this is a “crisis of
Ana Pais subjectivity” insofar as the “destiny of human beings is more

and more unclear for themselves”. Badiou claims that in the
last two centuries there was always an alternative, a “strategic Their presuppositions condemn us to a life under the “law of
choice” of that destiny, a choice that has been vanishing since affect”, like slaves of a principle that controls human behav-
the 1980s. As he highlights, the lack is not only at the political iour, but which we do not know; good or bad, the implication
level, but, crucially, at the symbolic level as well. It is necessary is that they cloud vision and clear thinking; that “affect” must
to create other policies for communal living through thought, be ignored, controlled, hidden or silenced so that we are able
action and political determination. After Trump, we must think to “think beyond” them. However, if we continue ignoring the
and take action. We must not yield to the “law of affect”: causes that generate affect – fear, depression, anger, panic –,
or underestimating the importance of knowing individual and
You know, for me, but I think for many people, it has collective processes for the transmission, circulation and acti-
been, in some sense, a sort of surprise. And we are vation of affect that shape and mediate our contact with the
often, in that sort of surprise, under the law of af- world, thinking and acting will become much harder. If there
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fects: fear, depression, anger, panic, and so on. But is one imperative in the current moment it would be to “start”
we know that philosophically, all these affects are listening to the other and to allow ourselves to recognize and
not really a good reaction, because in some sense, name what we feel at the various moments and junctures of in-
12 it’s too much affect in front of the enemy. And so, dividual and social life. Old constellations often repeat them- 13
I think it’s a necessity to think beyond the affect, selves under a new guise. After Trump, we must feel, think,
beyond fear, depression, and so on. To think the take action.
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
situation of today... what we must do, which is not
precisely to be under the law of affect, of negative
affect, but at the level of thinking, action, political
determination, and so on. AGONIC SPACES
(Badiou 2016)
While carrying out a critique of rationalism, in her work On the
Perhaps this is precisely where the problem lies. Alain Badiou Political (2005), Chantal Mouffe claims that we should not ig-
proposes a continuation within the elitist bubble that gener- nore the affective dimension of politics mobilized via collective
ated surprise because we remained deaf to the outcry of the processes of identification and projection in which passions
world and insisted on downplaying the power of affections – play a crucial role in the construction of desires and fantasies.
seen as negative – on thought and action. Despite the heat- Passions or emotions are acting forces in the political field as
ed speech on the day following the elections, Badiou’s state- they feed and determine the conflict of opinions required by a
ments expose the dichotomies between thinking/taking action. healthy democratic practice. Mouffe’s agonistic model (2013)
has influenced the rethinking of the notion of the current pub- Although Badiou and Mouffe use the terms “affect” and “pas-
lic sphere as a discursive space within which ideological, ethi- sions” as synonyms of “emotions”, I resort to a broader notion
cal and affective forces are at play. Taking into account desires that includes the felt quality of experience which often cannot
and affect when debating ideas, this notion sets itself apart be named – in other words, I understand affect as ways of af-
from that of Habermas, author of the reference work that es- fecting and being affected within a constellation of political,
tablished the concept of the public sphere (1991). By identify- economic, cultural and affective forces.
ing the emergence of the public sphere in the context of the
eighteenth century rise of the bourgeoisie in the West, Haber- In the essay “Agonistic Politics and Artistic Practices”, in
mas affirmed the centrality of the argumentative power of rea- the volume Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically, Chantal
son as a tool for consensus building between people that share Mouffe develops her reflection on the political force of affect
a certain set of values and consider themselves equal. But if we on the arts, maintaining that these play a relevant role in the
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consider the mobilizing power of affect in the debate of ideas counter-hegemonic struggle insofar as they act politically in
within the public sphere, as highlighted by Mouffe, rational ar- the construction of other perceptions of the world in the af-
gumentation is not enough to understand its dynamics and the fective experience (2013, 96–97). Participative projects, which
14 collective processes that arise from and, consequently, affect it. invite spectators to an empowering experience (as they actively 15
participate in the making of the work), have in this regard been
The public sphere also has a historical location. Currently, it as emblematic as they are problematic. The active spectator
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
tends to be seen as a globalized space in which a plurality of idealized by futurism emerged as a participant in the 1960s-
public spheres corresponding to specialized interest groups, 70s, namely in performance art, an aspect which is crucial in
whose opinions circulate in the media and in social networks, the work of Alan Kaprow, for instance. Here, performance art
co-inhabit and are debated. Public interest is decided by the is understood as the artistic genre that emerged in the early
neoliberal market. Those who are allowed to speak are opinion twentieth century with Italian futurism, as RoseLee Goldberg
makers, alongside emerging collective protest movements and argues in The Art of Performance (1979), and which was in-
civil society across social networks. However, unlike the public tensified and which affirmed itself in the 1960s-70s. Charac-
sphere in the eighteenth century, the best argument does not terized by a series of predominantly self-reflexive aesthetical
necessarily lead to the appropriate political decision, i.e., civil strategies, performance art challenges the relationship with the
society has limited leverage to pressure and influence delibera- spectator, the boundaries of the artistic object and the very
tive power. However, is anyone ever really heard? Are you real- notion of artist, radicalizing the modernist premise of the art-
ly in a position of equality within that (those) public sphere(s)? life fusion. While theatre was for centuries the place for social
Which affect circulates, and which can be heard and/or felt? encounters for a public sphere precisely in which affect play
a clear role in the exercise of citizenship1, performance art op- lows us to weigh the mobilizing power of performance at the
poses the paradigm of representation to create forms of being various moments of its emergence, and, on the other hand,
with the spectator that are convivial and reflexive, in the reality to think about the way in which each artistic field activates
of the here and now. This is one of the pillars of the political a specific participation in the public sphere via performance.
potential of 1960s-70s’ performance art, inherited by different
contemporary performing practices. Can performance art today assemble, recreate and participate
in the public space? How can the worlds created by perfor-
Where is Portuguese performance art located in this frame- mance reconfigure the political, ethical and aesthetical pos-
work? Symptomatically, performance irrupted in Portugal in sibilities of an encounter with the other, of acting upon the
configurations of change (the establishing of the Republic in world and upon the relationship between the private and the
1910, the Carnation Revolution in 1974, and the accession to public spheres? To answer these questions it is necessary to
the eec in 1986), creating a time and space to breathe within
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examine the politics of affect on which every work is found-
those contexts. Its history is made up of fleeting episodes in the ed, creating the ethical, political and aesthetical conditions of
different arts (poetry, music, visual arts, performative arts). the encounter that it promotes. As Lauren Berlant reminds
16 After Almada Negreiros and Santa Rita Pintor’s futurist con- us in Cruel Optimism (2011), public spheres are worlds of af- 17
ference of 1917 at the Teatro República (currently São Luiz fect. They are saturated with norms and ideologies that shape
Teatro Municipal) which can be considered as the inaugural desires and ways of living through social practices (at work, in
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
milestone of a possible history of Portuguese performance, it the family, within institutions). Performance art operates upon
was only in the wake of experimental poetry and music prac- the constitution of affective attachments conditioned by those
tices undertaken in the 1960s-70s that the visual arts were implicit norms and narratives, which nurture desires that are
able to participate in the 25 April revolutionary process with publicly negotiated and shared by criticizing, subverting or im-
actions and happenings. After Portugal’s accession to the eec, ploding them. Acknowledging that to “start” it is necessary to
performance began manifesting itself in theatre and dance, feel, to take action and to think, performance art can thus have
a period of vitality that waned with the first internal reflections a meaningful place in a process of collective listening to public
of the global financial crisis of 2007-2008. Since it systemati- feelings and, perhaps, in an affective mobilization of thought
cally occurs at moments of political change, it is possible to and action.
detect a lineage in the modes of participation of performance
art in the public sphere. On the one hand, this approach al-
1
On this subject see Wiles (2011) and Balme (2014).
FUTURIST ANNIVERSARIES This ebook appears in the context of Projecto P!, a curatorial
and critical programme (April 10-14, a one week event held
This ebook is intended as a contribution towards thinking how in several venues in Lisbon), the pretext for which being the
performance art acts upon the public sphere: how it sheds light commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of Almada
on ethical, social and political issues with very limited public Negreiros and Santa Rita Pintor’s futurist conference.This mo-
expression; how it creates spaces for the circulation of ideas tivated a retrospective overview of the history of Portuguese per-
and opinions; how it generates affect worlds that demonstrate formance art.The other two areas of the programme involved an
the extent to which the conditions for affective experience de- international conference (at the Calouste Gulbenkian Founda-
termine our thinking and acting; how, sometimes, it shows that tion) and a selection of performances presented at the São Luiz
we take decisions that impact our lives and the lives of those Teatro Municipal, Maria Matos Teatro Municipal and mnac
around us every day. Here we outline the framework of this – Chiado National Museum of Contemporary Art. Particular-
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volume, reflecting on what the arts, particularly performance ly relevant was the reinvention of the futurist conference with
art, can enable us to feel in order to take action and think. fourteen performances by artists from different generations
and different artistic fields, which occupied the place where it
18 Considering the cultural and socioeconomic context diag- was originally held – São Luiz Teatro Municipal. In the website 19
nosed by Badiou in the aforementioned lecture, it is impor- performativa.pt you can find the video and audio recordings
tant to understand how performance art makes politics via of all the events of Projecto P!
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
the provocative, disturbing, excessive and controversial expe-
riences that it generates, opening up the space for other pos- Inspired by the one hundredth anniversary of Marinetti’s
sibilities of thinking and feeling. If it is capable of all this (pro- “Futurist Manifesto” (2009), a series of peripheral histories
voking, disturbing, being excessive, creating controversy), it is of performance art proliferated, seeking alternative narratives
because of its aesthetical and ethical commitment to change. to the prevalent Anglo-Saxon discourse, especially RoseLee
In this sense, it is crucial to weigh its potential for action in Goldberg’s thesis (1979), alongside the process of the institu-
the public sphere, the place for debate, influence and mobili- tionalization of performance art – by the museum, the market
zation. Sharing these concerns, several academic works in the and the programmatic tendency for reenactment. Expanding
field of Performance Studies have made significant contribu- the perspectives on the futurist movement and, consequently,
tions to account for the role of performance art in public life the genealogy of performance art, several authors dedicated
and public art as performance; the recent study Tactical Per- themselves to reviewing the history of the avant-gardes, such
formance: the Theory and Practice of Serious Play by L.M. Bogad as Mirella Bentivoglio and Franca Zoccoli, who published a
(2016) is one example. study on Italian futurist women in the visual arts (2008), or
Chistine Poggi, who, in Inventing Futurism:The Art and Politics of Performance in the Public Sphere is organized into three inter-
Artificial Optimism (2009), identifies a subterranean ambiguity connected sections (i.e., the articles may show traces of sec-
in the futurists’ fascination with war or speed resulting from the tions other than theirs) the aim of which is to highlight the
impact of the industrial revolution. From geographies that are overlapping topics in each set of texts. The essays in part one,
peripheral relative to the American epicentre of performance VECTORS OF INFLUENCE, provide contextual information on
in the 1960s-70s, such as the Slavic countries or Ireland, origi- the concepts of public sphere and performance, as well as on
nate publications that seek to write or rewrite the history of lo- crucial moments in Portuguese performance art: the futurist
cal performance art taking in consideration the specificities of movement and 1960s-70s experimentalism. Here, the differ-
their contexts (Phillips 2015; Bryzgel 2013). Projecto P! falls ent vectors of influence between the national and internation-
within this retrospective movement. al, political and historical, ethical and aesthetical planes that
conditioned emerging phenomena in the public sphere and
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This ebook is a version of the printed paperback Performance
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performance art are considered.
na Esfera Pública [Performance in the Public Sphere], originally
published by Orfeu Negro in 2017. All original texts have been In this section, the first essays offer insights into the historical
20 translated into English. The articles and artist pages previously understanding of the public sphere through different configu- 21
published in English were excluded from this edition2 and new rations of change, of the Portuguese futurist movement and
texts were added, which are flagged in grey. At the Projecto P!’s the values promoted by the 25 April from the point of view
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
conference (10 April 2017, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian), of performance art. The opening text, Appearing to Others as
Rebecca Schneider, Jen Harvie and Idalina Conde3 presented Others Appear: Thoughts on Performance, the Polis, and Pub-
timely contributions to the topic. Their papers were included not lic Space, is the paper presented by Rebecca Schneider at the
only to keep the orality of speech reverberating the different tem- launching of the Portuguese printed book Performance na Esfera
poralities of reflection and critical thinking of Projecto P!’s event Pública (Performance in the Public Sphere). Hence, you will
but also to preserve the memory of those intensely lived moments. find a generous number of references to it. The essay opens a
2
dialogue with different articles and artist pages from the book
Bojana Cvejić and Ana Vujanović, “Public Sphere by Performance” (excerpts of Public
Sphere by Performance, 2012); Claire Bishop, “The Social Turn: collaboration and its dis- to discuss how acts of appearance (Arendt) are performative
contempts” (adaptation of the first chapter of Artificial Hells: Participatory Art and the
(Butler) in relation to the making of public space/sphere and to
Politics of Spectatorship, 2012); Maria Andueza Olmedo, “Lectura, apropiación, protesta
y conversación. Expresiones sonoras en el espacio público” (Aural 2, 2005); Leif Elggren performance scores. Discussing both authors, Schneider pro-
/ KREV, “Kingdom” (excerpt of Genealogy, 2005); “Practical Jobs for Utopian Artists
(From the ‘Imaginary Activism’ series)” by Guillermo Gómez Peña (TDR, 60(4), 2016).
poses that appearing in public space (and in public spheres) is
3
Brazilian theoretician Christine Greiner was also a guest speaker, but her article was
both theatrical and political, architectural and choreographic,
already published in the Portuguese version of the book. mobile and corporeal; in one word, “interstitial”. She further
suggests that performance art, in particular, scores as a po- tween national and international futurism in a genealogy hark-
tentiality of call/response gestures that cross time and space, ing back to the Orpheu generation with a particular focus on
which can also be considered as interstitial for they can per- Almada Negreiros’ oeuvre. Considering that the performative
form actions both “as is” and “as if” (“again” and “not yet”), activation of auditory, visual and semantic materiality via the
disclosing alternative pasts and potentially different futures. aesthetical and political saying/making is central to futurism,
the author calls for a revision of this movement through the
The specificity of Portuguese futurism is key to understanding concept of performance.
››› DAVID HELBICH
its connections to performance art in Portugal. On the one hand,
cultural sociologist Idalina Conde approaches Portuguese fu- Such influence of the international plane on the national plane
turism through assessing the aesthetic and political position of is also identified by Isabel Nogueira in an essay on experimen-
Almada Negreiros concerning Europe in the “Ultimatum Fu- talism in the visual arts in the 1970s and its links to poetry
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turista às Gerações Portuguesas do Século xx” [Futurist Ulti- and music. In Performance as Art and Celebration: Democra-
matum to the Portuguese Generations of the Twentieth Cen- tization, Collective Events and Public Space, the author looks
tury], one of the manifestoes he delivered at the conferência into the collective actions, exhibitions and new protagonists
22 futurista, in 1917. Keeping in mind the relevance of war for that emerged after the 25 April 1974 Revolution, mobilized 23
futurism inscribed in the manifesto, Conde presents a detailed by affects of hope, joy and enthusiasm. Particularly relevant
overview of historical conceptions of Europe in the 20th century. to the aesthetical ideal of celebration [festa] argued for by Er-
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
In particular, she looks at how war and its devastation prompt- nesto de Sousa, the artists who called themselves “aesthetical
ed the emergence of institutional narratives about Europe and operators” built a public sphere at the service of a democratic
its identity. This is a delicate issue that regularly resurfaces in ideology of art according to which the invitation extended to
the public sphere, both in political and in artistic discourses. the public to participate in artworks offering a direct and non-
elitist experience of art is crucial.
››› CARL A CRUZ ››› ELEONORA FABIÃO
On the other hand, the retrospective exercise of questioning In part two, POINTS OF FRICTION, the essays expose the
Almada Negreiros’ futurist conference as the foundational wearing that may arise in aesthetical and political encoun-
milestone of Portuguese performance art calls for a question- ters (and confrontations) occurring both at the level of the
ing of the alignment, or lack thereof, of Portuguese futurism action of performance art in the public sphere, such as re-
vis-à-vis the international modernist avant-gardes. In the essay sistance, protest and intervention within and without insti-
Sacrificing the Body to the Manifesto: Language, Futurism and tutions, and at the level of political protest actions as per-
Performance, Sandra Guerreiro Dias identifies a dialogue be- formance, which often resort to the aesthetical strategies of
performance art. In her article Choreographing Resistance discovered performance art, and the experiences it offers, as a
in Turkey’s Gezi Park Movement, 2013, Sevi Bayraktar dem- means to captivate audiences, on the other hand, the ephem-
onstrates how dance and performance became protester eral nature of performance – its protocols, practices, and work
mobilization tools crucial to their interaction and collabora- and presentation conditions – poses problems to institutions
tion. The author analyses two types of movements: to stand the primary mission of which is to collect and conserve4.
still and to dance in circles, arguing that collective learning In Liliana Coutinho’s interview, When Performance Meets the
during protests is central to understand mobilizing power, Museum, it is possible to read the position of Catherine Wood,
the resistance of choreography and the performative poten- coordinator of the Performance department at Tate Modern,
tial of repetition in the acquisition of a corporeal lexicon. on the relationship between performance art and the muse-
In the same way that dance and performance generate pro- um. At the end of this section, Appearing in Public as Public,
ductive frictions, there are performances that address press- a conversation between Peggy Phelan, Ana Bigotte Vieira and
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ing issues in the public sphere to render frictions visible. myself, reflects on several subjects germane to the debate on
That is the case with the projects discussed by Jen Har- the current public sphere, the role of performance art and pro-
vie in the paper Housing Crisis, Art, and Performance. Tak- test as performance: the refugee crisis in Europe (forced to re-
24 ing the critical situation of housing in times of accelerated evaluate its hospitality policies); the Occupy movement in the 25
gentrification and escalating real estate prices in big cit- United States and its inspiring contaminating force; the sinis-
ies, Harvie provides an overview of performances in the uk ter side (in terms of democratic freedom) of former Brazilian
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
from the 1990s onwards which tackle these problems and president Dilma Roussef’s impeachment; and the theatrical
present diverse solutions. Looking closely into two feminist rhetoric that generates fictions perceived as reality in the us
performances (getinthebackofthevan’s Number 1, The presidential campaign, in a dialogue with Badiou’s diagnosis
Plaza and Sh!t Theatre’s Letters to Windsor House), Harvie mentioned earlier.
suggests that by showing the social and emotional distress
of the precarity of housing (lived privately, thus, in invisibil- In the last section, LINES OF TENSION, the essays review con-
ity), those performances contribute to raising awareness of cepts in the light of artistic practices that resort to the strate-
painful realities that need to “be shown as collective” and to gies of performance art. In doing so, they effect a tensioning
“be made public”. and toning of both the concepts and the works or contexts
under analysis, contributing to the reflection on the modes of
››› CHRISTOF MIGONE ››› RUI MOURÃO
participation of performance art in the public sphere. A press-
The frictions between performance art and the museum are
even more pronounced. While, on the one hand, the museum 4
For an in-depth analysis of these subjects, cf. Jackson (2014)
ing question is to know what the outlines and specificities of Between the Decades of 1980 and 1910-1920, João Macdonald
contemporary Portuguese performance art are. It is urgent to examines this gesture in the international context of the his-
listen to the echoes of the dissemination of its strategies across tory of rock, establishing bridges between Manuel João Vieira’s
other artistic genres, which eventually update and redefine it. (Ena Pá 2000), Rui Reininho’s (gnr) and Heróis do Mar’s
Those strategies, particularly from the 1990s onwards, mani- provocation and the irreverence of Santa Rita Pintor, Almada
fested in dance and theatre already filtered by postdramatic Negreiros and Raúl Leal. The appropriation of strategies from
practices, were brought in by creators that began enjoying a de the past is related to the modern format of reenactment – the
facto participation in European networks and in international re-making, reactivating, recreating of an action – insofar as it
art discourse. seeks to activate the latent aspects of a performative gesture in
the present moment of making. This topic is examined in the
››› ANA BORRALHO & JOÃO GAL ANTE
two essays that close this volume.
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Sílvia Pinto Coelho’s text, Exile – Deterritorializations in Con-
temporary Dance/Performance: Two Recent Episodes from Reenactment offers the possibility of understanding the politi-
the Portuguese Context, provides a brief contextualization of cal character that is constitutive of performance art. For Chris-
26 these processes in New Portuguese Dance and invites us to tine Greiner, the destabilizing power of performance art lies 27
think of performance art as “deterritorialization potential”, i.e., precisely in its ability to create spaces for openness and shar-
as a destabilizing force. The author creates a dialogue between ing with the other through a “microactivism of affects”, as the
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
Félix Guattari’s concepts of deterritorialization and reterrito- author suggests in The Political Reenactment of Performance
rialization and notions of artistic field, exile and gentrification, and its Microactivism of Affects. Resorting to examples from
by looking at two cases: Muito atento a tudo o que se está a pas- Brazilian creators (Marcelo Evelin, Núcleo Marcos Moraes
sar [Very attentive to all that is going on] by Pizamiglio/Fur- and Oriana Duarte), Greiner shows how those microactivisms
tado, and Art Piss, on Money and Politics by Ana Borralho and may erupt in Teresina homes, at the table of a “performatic
João Galante. While this essay identifies the lines of tension kitchen” and in the body of a performer.
››› ANDREA MACIEL
between place, population, performance and reception, João
Macdonald’s text reflects on the tensions between provocation, According to Paulo Raposo, reenactment (or re-performance)
the audience and the Portuguese pop-rock bands of the 1980s. is a useful political category to consider the various forms of
In search for an inspiring reference, some of the decade’s most protest and even the logics of the hashtag as the re-appropria-
emblematic bands explored, more or less explicitly, modernist tion of a full public life. In Performance, Activism and Public
aesthetical strategies. In the text The Avant-garde Front to Back: Sphere: Archive, Repertoire and Re-performance in the New
Portuguese Musical Retroperformance and Communication New Social Movements, Raposo reflects on the forms of digital
sociability as political action. Aside from constituting fast me- REFERENCES
dia for the circulation of information and opinions, crucial in BADIOU, Alain. 2016. «Alain Badiou: Reflections on the Recent Election».
mobilizing public protests, social networks are also tools for po- versobooks.com/blogs/2940-alain-badiou-reflections-on-the-recent-election
litical activism that resort to different forms of performativity. BALME, Christopher. 2014. The Theatrical Public Sphere. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
BENTIVOGLIO, Mirella, and Franca Zoccoli. 2008. Futuriste Italiane Nelle Arte Visive.
Throughout the book, the reader will find artist pages (inter- Rome: De Luca Editori d’Arte.
ventions and texts), which more or less explicitly reflect on BERLANT, Lauren. 2011. Cruel Optimism. Durham: Duke University Press.
BOGAD, L. M. 2016. Tactical Performance: The Theory and Practice of Serious Play.
their artistic practices in the current debate about the public
London: Routledge.
sphere. They do not require the type of introduction that essays BRYZGEL, Amy. 2013. Performing the East: Performance Art in Russia, Latvia and Poland
demand, but are organized according to a careful dramaturgy since 1980. New York: Tauris.
that seeks to highlight the resonance between the pages and GOLDBERG, RoseLee. 1979. Performance Art, Live Art from 1909 to the Present.
New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc Publishers.
ANA PAIS
ANA PAIS
the articles, along with the themes they deal with. Moreover, HABERMAS, Jürgen. 1991. The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere:
these contributions offer an invaluable dimension of sensitivi- An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
ty, bring in elements of humour and offer profound reflections JACKSON, Shannon. 2011. Social Works: Performing Arts, Supporting Publics.
London: Routledge.
28 under the guise of next to nothingness, generating a dynamic 29
—. 2014. «Performativity and Its Addressee». In On Performativity, edited by Elizabeth
that can positively contaminate the reading. This series of es- Carpenter. Vol. 1 of Living Collections Catalogue. Mineapolis: Walker Art Center.
walkerart.org/collections/publications/performativity/performativity-and-its-
says and artist pages draws vectors, points and lines that elu-
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
addressee/
cidate influences, frictions and tensions in the complex geo- MOUFFE, Chantal. 2005. On the Political. London: Routledge.
political constellation of the current moment in the globalized —. 2013. Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically. New York: Verso.
world, in which the role of performance art in feeling, thinking PHILLIPS, Áine. 2015. Performance Art in Ireland: A History. Chicago: The University
of Chicago Press.
and acting in the public sphere is as urgent as it is contingent.
POGGI, Christine. 2009. Inventing Futurism: The Art and Politics of Artificial Optimism.
Princeton: Princeton University Press.
WILES, David. 2011. Theatre and Citizenship: The History of a Practice. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
INFLUENCE
APPEARING TO OTHERS
AS OTHERS APPEAR:
THOUGHTS ON
PERFORMANCE,
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32
THE POLIS, 33
AND PUBLIC SPACE

CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
[The polis] is the space of appearance in the widest sense of the word,
namely, the space where I appear to others as others appear to me…
Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition
Rebecca Schneider
of “appearance.” Thus I will be focusing less on (19th cen-
tury) modern capitalism’s circulating print cultures and more
on the circulation of bodies/images that move, speak, talk, act
››› Coutinho p.270
in and among architectures that script comportment, relation,

››› Raposo p.421
››› Phelan p.290
enactment (whether ancient or as contemporary as a traffic

median). Public space helps me think, here, about something
as seemingly simple as bodies walking and talking, moving and
breathing in the (publi)city. That is, I am interested to think
››› Bayraktar p.180
about a public(ity) potentially less bounded by sovereign na-

››› Nogueira p.145
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
››› Harvie p.211
tional borders or logics of capital that flow across those bor-

ders, but given to both question and critique, deploy and resist
of the norms of appearance that make a space “public.”
I’d like to start my talk by lifting out a score of one of David

34 In this talk, I will discuss performance-based art and archi- Helbich’s “Scores for the Body, Building, and Soul for the São 35
tecture in relationship to political theory about public space Luiz Teatro Municipal, Lisbon,” published in the book we are
as coextensive with acts of appearance. Throughout, my com- gathered at this conference to celebrate, Performance na Esfera
VECTORS OF INFLUENCE
ments should run parallel to those working on extensions of Pública [Performance in the Public Sphere].1
public sphere theory – that resolutely modern idea, associated
with Jurgen Habermas, in which print provides a (discursive) From among Helbich’s scores based on prior work by oth-
space for the generation, negotiation, and evolution of (bour- er artists, I chose a work that gestures to Valie Export. Here,
geois) public opinion in a (bounded) democracy. Habermas’s Brussels-based conceptual artist Helbich gestures simultane-
Öffentlichkeit (publicity, or, public sphere) is grounded in ide- ously to past work by Valie Export and future work by possi-
as “coextensive with a bounded political community and a ble participants. ››› That is, his score instructs participants in
sovereign territorial state, often a nation-state” (Fraser 2007, future actions based on prior actions – or, said another way,
n.p.). Here I follow Seyla Benhabib (1998) and choose to use prior actions reset in possible futures.
the phrase public space, rather than sphere, and, in doing so,
include a discussion of Hannah Arendt as well as the haunt-
ing reiterativity of Western pre-modern form. I also chose the 1
These scores were performed on April 11th thru 13th 2017, in the realm of Projecto P!
phrase in order to emphasize the spatial and embodied aspects and the video recording is available online at performativa.pt
AUTOR
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36 37
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Körperkonfigurationen, Valie Export, 1972-76 / Photograph: courtesy Atelier VALIE EXPORT
Austrian performance artist Valie Export made significant work São Luiz Teatro Muicipal, Lisbon, but in doing so reabsorb
composed of her body in the late 1960s and 1970s, often in pro- Valie Export. And, of course, in a citational chain of invitation-
nounced opposition to the violence and misogyny of theViennese al gesture – Helbich himself. It is partly the aspect of “score”
Actionists. She is best known for tapp und tastkino [touch that does the cross-temporal work here. A score passes a work
and tap Cinema] from 1968, in which she invited random along, hand to hand, existing between iterations – much as a
passersby in public space to touch her naked breasts through walkway might exist, scripting access between or across ac-
a cardboard mock television box she wore on her chest, and tions. A sidewalk, after all, is a kind of instruction: walk this
Aktionhose: Genitalpanik [Action Pants: Genital Panic], 1969, in way. And, as Export’s Body Configuration series suggests, a built
which she wore pants with the crotch cut out and walked up and environment is a kind of instruction as well, as if to say, “Put
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
down the aisle of a porn movie theatre. But in pieces such as your body in relation to stone in this way.” Of course, Export
Körperkonfiguration [Body Configuration] from the mid-1970s, draws attention to the score that is architecture, or the score
Export pressed her body to a different kind of service. The Body that is a traffic median, by playing the score against the grain
Configuration photographic series documents actions Export of habitus. She publically presses her body into architectural
made in public space in which she used her body as something spaces in ways contrary to the norm, illustrating, in that way,
38 of an architecture among architectures, or even (in keeping with the norm that otherwise goes unremarked. 39
the more sexually explicit work) a public space in public space.
In this way, her body questioned not only quotidian relations Though Helbich wrote this score for a specific municipal build-
between stone and flesh, but the ways our spaces script us and ing, that building is a theatre, and arguably recognizable as any
become us as mutual constructions – we are the buildings we theatre according to certain architectural conventions (in the
build; we are the sidewalks we walk; and they are us. There is way one might recognize a sidewalk as a “way to walk” across
an intimacy in these works with buildings not unrelated to her distinct cities, or compose an aria for a specific soprano that
more famous genital panic art, and there in an “intra-inanima- can be sung by any number of sopranos thereafter). Helbich
cy” as well, by which the animate and the inanimate blur their offers these scores in the style of other artists, writing that they
otherwise presumptive distinctions (Schneider 2017). are “instructions and scored concepts to be self-performed in
and around architectural landmarks,” similarly indicating the
Taking up Export’s work, along with the work of other art- elasticity of the specific theatre in a blend of possible theatres
››› Greiner p.381
ists, as if those works were invitations to reenactment, Helbich of architecture. The word landmark suggests public space, but
turns the works into explicit instructions. “Cheers Valie Ex- whether public or private, the insertion of the body into the
port” invites readers to realize the script he sets forth, asking space suggests the making of public space, and possibly the
participants not only to “absorb” the physical building of the theatrical making of public space, by virtue of performance.
Let’s think a little bit more about scoring. A “score” pronounc- Appearance, in performance-based art, is often a strange amal-
es a possibility for a performance yet to come. It is a blueprint gam of reappearance, or overt citationality, and a call to dif-
for an action deferred into a future when it might appear, being ference. Like call and response, scores for performance work
realized in a space become public by virtue of the appearance of punctuate the time of appearance with multiple other times,
the action. A score contains a “not yet” aspect in that a score is much as chants in street protests often recall prior protest ac-
a set of instructions for actions. The score itself is not entirely, tions while calling forward, simultaneously, to as yet unreal-
or at least finally, the artwork it gestures toward. As any score ized futures (Schneider and Ruprecht 2017). As such, call and
pronounces both a “not yet” and a “might be,” any action that response can expand the idea of public space into potentiali-
takes place via a score is, much like a script or a blueprint, ties for different futures (born of different pasts). So, too, a
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REBECCA SCHNEIDER
necessarily cross-temporal in that it realizes a score that comes reenactment of a protest is both a protest in the present, and a
to the moment from another time. A score is something of an dragging of a past event into a temporally porous set of times
invitation to action. It is a gesture – a call to make a response. where forgotten pasts might re-irrupt, such that, as Jack Hal-
An action made into a score is a combination of the score’s call berstam has written, so-called failed revolutionary actions may
and the action as response, and as such, as already suggested, not in fact be wholly disappeared (or failed) but lie in wait for
40 it weaves its work in multiple times. A score – perhaps like the future re-ignition or “animation” (2011, see also Foster 2003). 41
architecture of a public square or a simple sidewalk – is a po- Let us think now together, in a next section to this talk, about
tentiality. An action that realizes a score takes place in double, “appearance” in relationship to performance in public space.
triple, or multiple times, just as a public square or a sidewalk To do this, we will make a bit of a detour to ancient Greece,
is laid down for access again and again. In addition, the time but we will encounter walkways there as well, and so, perhaps,
of the score is syncopated with the times of the actions. Many a certain kind of instruction art.
actions that realize a score, themselves become calls – calls to
future actions that might appear again, as others potentially re-
alize the score as well. Given that Helbich is composing a score
in the style of another artist, his score (which is a call) is also a WALKING TO THE THEATRE AND BACK
response (in this case to Export) and as such, by virtue of re-
sponse, it renders Export’s prior work a kind of call – which is In Public Sphere by Performance, Bojana Cvejić and Ana Vuja-
to say, Helbich’s call/response gestures in multiple directions: nović ask:
to Export’s actions, his own call, and to futured “Cheers Ex-
port” actions. Is the Public Sphere the domain of performance? Or, can
it only be performed? Why, and in what sense “perfor-
mance”, and why “only”: is performance too little, or just One assumes, by means of habit, that when one buys a ticket
enough? (2015, 27). and enters a standard Western theatre, “theatricality” will take
place. And though the architecture shares some basic aspects
Remembering that the Greek word for actor is hypokrites and with assembly halls, arenas, and political forums, the assump-
gesturing toward the long tradition of anti-theatricality in the tion is that a standard audience would be able to read a distinc-
West, we might add to their question: is performance “too tion between the “real” of political deliberation and the “just
much”? Perhaps, and paradoxically, performance is all of these pretend” or, in J.L. Austin’s words “infelicity,” of theatricality.
simultaneously. Too little, just enough, too much. Realilty television may have changed all that, but the verdict
is, as yet, still out. The mimicry between courtrooms, assembly
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REBECCA SCHNEIDER
Cvejić and Vujanović wind their questions along the well-worn halls, senate floors, and theatres with bicameral divides clearly
path that follows Hannah Arendt, to remind us of the central- marking stage, or dais, from house (and note that this bicam-
ity of theatre in Athenian democracy where the space to ap- eral division is not a “given” in all global performance tradi-
pear in the Ekklesia on the Pnyx (the political assembly, the tions), asks us to consider the theatre/politics connection as
“citizen’s assembly”) mirrored/mimicked the architecture of one not only of performance, but of habits of embodiment that
42 the theatre of Dionysus on the southern slopes of the neigh- divide viewer from viewed, speaker from auditor. Returning 43
boring Akropolis. They claim, as have others, that “theater to ancient Greece we note the fact that the two distinct sites
and politics belong to the same order of activities” (2015, 28). at the Pnyx and the Acropolis mirror each other, but to what
We are certainly well aware of the fact that theatre and poli- degree do the politicized citizen and the theatrical actor also
tics are entangled. To this day, whether with or against Arendt, mirror each other? Is there a (dis)connection between public
critical and political theorists still turn to ancient Greece to appearance as a citizen, and public appearance as an actor –
negotiate the theatricality of state, kinship, moral duty, civic a hypocrite, histrione, hysteric? After all, both the assembly and
law (Ranciere 2011, Honig 2013, Butler 2015, 85). Fully dis- the theatre are spaces for appearance – if one for the excesses
entangling theatricality and politics is, in some ways, a fool’s of the fake, and the other for the adjudication of the real.
errand given the degree to which each seeming binary pole re-
lies mimetically upon the other. Nevertheless, across Western “Appearance” is a big word in Arendt, though contrary to what
history we arguably have relied on architectures and conven- I have been saying it is not necessarily the stuff of architecture.
tions of standard usage of said architectures to claim for one The polis “appears” wherever people appear, she argues. Arendt
(theatre) or the other (politics). A (theatrical) actor on a stage writes: “The polis, properly speaking, is not the city-state in its
and a (political) actor in the assembly are in part distinguished physical location; it is the organization of the people as it arises
by the venue that conditions and even scores their appearance. out of acting and speaking together, and its true space lies be-
tween people living together for this purpose, no matter where pearing, but appearing only “as if.” What happens in theatre is
they happen to be” (1958, 198). For Arendt, the polis is a mobile presumptively fakery – or mere performance – appearing, but
space of appearance, a space “where I appear to others as oth- appearing only “as if.” Theatre is recognizable as theatre when
ers appear to me, where men exist not merely like other living it complies with accepted habits of architecture and comport-
or inanimate things, but to make their appearance explicitly” ment that delimit “pretend” from “real.” At other times what
(idem, 198-99). Such public appearance – made “explicitly” – happens in similar spaces for public assembly is considered
nevertheless bears a habit or gesture or posture perhaps deter- real. The same space might make possible the appearance of
mined by architecture, as if bodies cite the civic architectures citizen subjects considered performative rather than theatrical.
that contain them. This is to say that the means by which one What is key here is that both theatricality and citizen subject-
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REBECCA SCHNEIDER
stands out, or make one’s appearance “explicit,” to use Arendt’s hood occur by means of appearance. Clearly, legislating the
word, may be a (learned) posture of display proper to the twin real from the fake, the political from the theatrical is hounded
houses of performance. Recognizing the “man who makes his by the leaky borders of any frame that might contain the efforts
appearance explicit” to paraphrase Arendt, may be a recogni- of both hypocrites and citizens to claim voice – fake or real.
tion trained in the twin arenas as well. Though it is not clear in Donald Trump’s “alternative facts” are only the latest example
44 Arendt precisely how this performance of explicit appearance of a fundamental porosity in which “theatocracy” (to quote 45
takes place, it seems as though theatricality may be implicitly Plato) can at any point show its face to be the Janus face of
involved – for how is one to “appear to others as others appear so-called democracy (which is why Plato was not a fan of de-
to me” except by conventions of (overt or covert) mimetic dis- mocracy). If political acts are supposedly “real” and theatrical
play? The theatre/politics tangle is already impossibly manifest acts supposedly fictional, the very real stakes in the theatrics of
even at the site of citizen appearance, for while Arendt assumes politicality, and the politics of theatricality is today, as across
that men are appearing as themselves, even more complicatedly the history of the West, still of paramount importance.
these self-appearances appear as others appear.
What can it do to remember the street that runs between the
Despite the fact that the Ekklesia on the Pnyx mirrored the the- fake and the real?
atre of Dionysus on the Acropolis, just as today architectures
of assembly and jurisprudence continue to share what could In Athens, the street between Political Assembly and Theatre
be called spaces for theatrical scenes of “appearance,” we rely of Dionysus runs in a snaking line between the hills. Of course,
on the social sanctioning of proper usage to determine “thea- this is not any surprise at all. Sidewalks run between state
tre” from “politics.” That which happens in the theatre proper houses and theatres in most cities. But we rarely take count of
is presumptively theatrical fakery – or mere performance – ap- them as anything other than intervals between actions, much
as scores or scripts exist between instances of enactment.
But, what happens when we walk this way, from the theatre
to the state house? Or back? What changes along the road –
on the street and at the level of feet – to make us comfortable
(or uncomfortable as the case may be) with the interstices, the
passageways, the intervals between or among so-called theatre
and so-called politics? Is it on the street, in these corridors be-
tween institutions, that Arendt’s mobile space of appearance
manifests? And if so, is it somehow useful to think of that ap-
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
pearance as interstitial, “between” these houses, as well as what
Arendt declares as “between people” (1958, 198)?. Of course
this might be called, with Michel de Certeau, basic “Walking
AUTOR
in the City” (1984). But for now, let’s stay with the theatre/as-
sembly problematic. For I think it is possible to argue that this
46 theatre-[interstice]-assembly paradox continues to inform, or 47
choreograph, our engagements with ideas of the public. Judith
Butler’s Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly (2015)
CAPÍTULO
as well as Cvejić and Vujanović’s Public Sphere by Performance
(2015) certainly indicate that the question of performance is
still ripe – too little, just right, too much.
Let’s walk together for a moment again, back again to the Ek-
klesia on the Pnyx. At the Athenian political assembly, the dem-
os are given to appear. Members of the citizen public could
appear, to speak as citizens in public. We have been asking:
to what degree did the Ekklesia depend upon its twin, the thea-
tre? Walking back to the theatre, we recall that those who appear
in the theatre are actors who are acting as others.They appear as
Walking the ancient road between the Acropolis and the Pnyx. May 2013 others appear, and are not what they appear to be. Between the
Photograph: Rebecca Schneider
Assembly and the Theatre we walk and talk and wonder: does
the rift between appearance as is, and appearance as merely ap-
pearing to be, create a generative paradox for political action?
To what degree is the appearance of a member of the public
(and, for Arendt, one is only a member of a public if one has
access to the space of appearance) always already dependent
upon the twin theatricality, or what Butler calls the “theatri-
cal self-constitution,” that grounds its formulation (2015, 85)?
To appear is itself a performance-based (and potentially the-
atrical) operation. To appear to appear as one – a subject – is
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
necessarily haunted by the fundamentally conjoined operation

of appearing both to and as an other. Or, as Butler has writ-
ten in another context, to appear “beside oneself” (2004, 20).
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The promise in the fact that appearing to act is also, simultane-
ously, only appearing to act may seem like a damnation of any
48 ultimate efficacity, but it is damnation only if we insist that only 49
“felicitous” performatives get things done. That is, only if one
sees “failed” performatives as… failures (see Halberstam 2011).
CAPÍTULO
On our walk back to the theatre, let’s tarry for yet another mo-
ment with Butler engaging Arendt. Like Arendt, Butler argues
that public space itself does not exist independently of pub-
lic action (which Arendt marks as appearance and Butler sees
as embodiment). As Moya Lloyd has written, for Butler like
Arendt, “public space as such does not exist”:
Instead, when the “new social movements” fighting against

precarity demonstrate on a square or rally in the street they
“reconfigure the materiality of public space” and by laying
claim to that space, they constitute it as public. (2015, 178) Walkway to the theatre (and elsewhere) as seen from the Pnyx
Photograph: Rebecca Schneider
This is to say that public space is constituted by/as perfor- tates politics. We might think of this space of appearance, para-
mance. But unlike Arendt, Butler makes clear the ingredient of doxically manifested through embodied action, as neither one
architecture in the mix when she suggests that it is impossible (the theatre) nor the other (the state/court house). We might
to think of the body that appears (in distinction to what she think of such space (space for potential appearance) as run-
calls the opaque “given” body) apart from the “architectural ning on the street between theatre and assembly, always on the
regulation” of that body. This is Butler from “Bodies in Alli- road or in the intervals between one and another. Such a no-
ance and the Politics of the Street”: tion of public space as intervallic, or interstitial, would remind
us that such space is always both theatrical and political – ar-
[The] act of public speaking […] depends upon a dimension chitectural, choreographic, mobile, and, for Butler, irreducibly
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REBECCA SCHNEIDER
of bodily life that is given, passive, opaque and so excluded corporeal (2011b). For Butler, a space becomes a public space
from the realm of the political. Hence, we can ask, what by virtue of the claim made where and when bodies appear to
regulation keeps the given body from spilling over into the other bodies as bodies like others – which is to say by conven-
active body? Are these two different bodies and what pol- tions of appearance based on the likeness of bodies. There may
itics is required to keep them apart? Are these two dif- be significant problems with the likeness based model of de-
50 ferent dimensions of the same body, or are these, in fact, terminant appearance, but for Butler, what appears as a body 51
the effect of a certain regulation of bodily appearance that (“to others as others appear to me”), appears in/as bodily vul-
is actively contested by new social movements, struggles nerability. That is, for Butler, the “likeness” between bodies is
against sexual violence, for reproductive freedom, against mutual vulnerability.
precarity, for the freedom of mobility? Here we can see
that a certain topographical or even architectural regula- We have reached the theatre. For it is at the threshold of the
tion of the body happens at the level of theory. Significant- theatre that I wonder whether Butler’s formulation is limiting.
ly, it is precisely this operation of power – foreclosure and One problem with Butler’s formulation is that despite its reli-
differential allocation of whether and how the body may ance on appearance, and acknowledgement of a double body
appear – which is excluded from Arendt’s explicit account (the given body and the body that appears), her theory reval-
››› Guerreiro Dias p.104

of the political. Indeed, her explicit account of the political orizes “the body” as somehow both self-identical and blind to
depends upon that very operation of power that it fails to itself, even as it is essentially “beside” one own self and others.

consider as part of politics itself (2011, n.p.). This move strangely forgets the very theatricality that it simul-
taneously relies upon. In some ways it forgets performance in its
Politics necessitates the space of explicit appearance, and that effort to rush to performativity.
space of explicit appearance, by means of performance, facili-
Let me try and explain. Butler writes: “[W]hat we are seeing ance forgets the shared interstice, the interval of theatre, that
when bodies assemble on the street, in the square, or in other constitutes the public in the interstices of spaces of appearance.
public venues is the exercise – one might call it performative –
of the right to appear, a bodily demand for a more livable set of At the theatre of Dionysus, unlike at the Pnyx, I might appear
lives” (2015, 25-26). Here we can see that the Arendtian space of to others as I am not, or where others appear to me as they are
appearance that is morphed to Butlerian bodily space is still, for not. Or not yet. The logic of perspectivism meets its vanishing
Butler, “the space where I appear to others as others appear to point at the theatre and the idea that the body is necessarily
me.” This is the making of public space by showing up as oneself blind to the way that it is seen is rendered bogus. The blinded
to a scene. Showing up as oneself means that one is vulnerable to body (a theatrical trope par excellence) reveals itself to be one
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
and with the others who also appear. Butler is invested in an idea more “architectural regulation,” scored perhaps most iconical-
of shared bodily vulnerability as a “sociality that exceeds us” and ly for Oedipus. But in the interstices of Oedipus’s acts, sighted
renders us interdependent and always more than one. This is a actors emerge again from behind the mask, knowing exactly
scene entirely proper to the assembly form of appearance, where, how they had appeared to others. You might rightly argue that
in Arendt’s words again, “men exist […] to make their appear- these be-masked actors bodies are not Butler’s vulnerable bod-
52 ance explicitly” (1958, 198-99). But oddly, these men who ap- ies. They are, you might argue, highly skilled bodies trained to 53
pear, appear as others appear, and yet, Butler writes, they cannot see manipulate appearances such that bodies appear as if they are
how they appear to others. This is a strange interdependency of the the others they appear to be. Actors, you might say, are affected
blind, based on a classical idea of perspective (inherited through – they are “as if” – they are manipulating affect, not effect-
Nietzsche and his frog). For Butler, that is, the body is limited ing the real. But isn’t the effective performative always engaged
to itself, and somehow blind – it cannot see itself as others see with infelicitous, affective performance in the twin, intervallic,
it. She writes: “The body is constituted through perspectives it and oscillating possibility that the way in which one appears is
cannot inhabit; someone else sees our face in a way that none of not or not only the appearance of what is but also of what was
us can” (2011, n.p.). Why is she so determined that this must be (not) and might yet (not) be?
the case? How is it that we cannot show each other to each other
as each other (one of the basic tenets of theatre)? Why is she so At base, for Butler “our thinking gets nowhere without the presup-
››› Pinto Coelho p.325

certain that we cannot appear as someone or some thing we are, position of […] corporeal interdependency and entwinement”

in fact, not (another tenet of theatre)? And is it really the case (2011, n.p.). The space of appearance of public space is, then,
that we can never know, or never orchestrate or choreograph, as Loyd would have Butler say: “irreducibly corporeal” (2017,
precisely how we are given to appear (yet another tenet of the 178). The issue we may have with this is not the presupposition
stage)? What I am arguing here is that this approach to appear- of corporeal interdependency, but of the idea that seems to fol-
low regarding irreducibility. There is, I would submit, nothing abilities of the body, but about appearing to others as others
irreducible about corporeality. Corporality is necessarily protean appear to me on the seeming traffic merideans of information
when it appears in and through performance. Corporeality or highways. When we think of digital “appearance,” public space
corporality that appears by means of performance, or performs is not delimited to what Critical Art Ensemble, back in 1996,
by means of appearance, is always in the throes of alteration, termed the bunker mentality of thinking of appearance as nec-
becoming the too little, or too much, at the interval of the just essarily either corporeal or immaterial, either present or absent.
right. Corporeality is not irreducible precisely because it is also At that time, in cae’s opinion, public space was nonexistent.
always inter-corporeal, and we would do well to register the spac- They wrote, “Legitimized autonomous zones where one can
es among our embodiments, or the spaces between appearances freely express oneself (politically or otherwise) are long gone,
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
at least much as we look directly at material “embodiment,” or, if such spaces ever existed at all” (1996, 40). If public space
what appears to appear. Again, Arendt’s phrase “where I appear is a matter, in any case, of showing up – mobile in the way
to others as others appear to me” implies a space across which we have explored – can showing up be manifested digitally,
appearance takes place as relation. If public space is “where at a distance, and still be counted as present? Can corporeal-
I appear to others as others appear to me,” then public space ized vulnerability appear without bodies? This may be another
54 is always inter-corporeal, even if the “others” that might also question of or for the theatre, or between the assembly and the 55
appear are, as in Valie Export’s performance with the traffic theatre, where bodies appear regularly that are not (yet) there.
median, not only human but nonhuman – inter(non)human.
All of this is to say that we would do well to recall that, with
Clearly, we can concede that the public sphere depends on pub- Arendt, political “scenes of appearance” (the appearance of those
lic space in which a subject can appear as one and, simultane- with or without the rights to appear) are also spaces for/as per-
ously, to others (therefore as others). And as we know from the formance. As Butler writes, “we might call them performative.”
volumes of work on the privatization of the public sphere under Insofar as appearance is vital to the idea of the public and, in-
neoliberalism, emplotted public space has been rendered vir- deed, the manifestation of a public, appearance occurs by means
tual – uploaded into cyberspace for instance. Writing in their of performance. But performance, to act and to do via performa-
prolog to Intermediality, Performance, and the Public Sphere, of tives, is always, simultaneously, to tap performance in its always
events leading to the Arab Spring, Khalid Amine and George potentially infelicitous aspect: to act as if. This is to say, the inex-
F. Roberson state the situation succinctly: “The lack of democ- tricable double, the twinned aspect of theatricality and politics,
racy on the ground led the youth to perform it online, spurring is the always double-edged aspect of performance. Performance
the people to mobilize in cyberspace” (2014, 12). This raises can manifest both as is, and as if, simultaneously. Both the reit-
new questions not only about intercorporeality and the vulner- erative or resurgent again, and, simultaneously, the not yet.
BY WAY OF CONCLUSION, BUT NOT YET they were appearing in/as public space, and not necessarily only
as/in the “recognized” space (time) of the colonizer. Important-
The logic of bringing forward (alternative) pasts in the form of ly, they were not representing themselves. This was not repre-
performative re-dos (as Helbich re-scores Export), is the idea sentation, but reiteration. Not image, but gesture. As Simpson
of making palpable the alternative futures that those alterna- writes, they were “celebrating” (idem, 11).
tive pasts might have realized, or might yet realize. Though the
following example may seem very far afield of Helbich redo- If performance-based actions may be off of the present, or not
ing Export, the idea that pasts may irrupt into presents avail- only present but composed in repetition, or resurgence, this
able for redo is at the basis of some work in decolonial theory. is related, I would argue, to the ways in which performance
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
Dene nation political theorist Glenn Coulthard has written rendered explicit as performance can effect what Ana Pais
movingly on this in Red Skins White Masks (itself a performa- has termed a “disturbance” to norms of convention. Pais asks
tive re-do of Franz Fanon’s Black Skins White Masks). In that whether the “function of performance art could be one of rear-
book, Coulthard calls for the “emergent theory and practice of ranging connections between existing materials, matters, ob-
Indigenous resurgence” (2014, 153). In making that call, he jects, people in the public sphere precisely because it infiltrates
56 is remaking a call put forward by Nishnaabeg scholar Leanne from the side of the site? Perhaps performance art activates the 57
Simpson in Dancing on Our Turtles Back (2011). For Simpson, public sphere through an injection of ‘side affects’ undermin-
resurgence can “reclaim the very best practices of our tradi- ing prevalent public feelings” – or conventional trajectories of
tional cultures, knowledge systems and lifeways in the dynam- those feelings. ››› Drawing on Ahmed, Pais asks: “By distur-
ic, fluid, compassionate, respectful context in which they were bing public feelings through sparkles of solidarity, empathy,
originally generated” (2011, 18). In fact, Simpson links the generosity and kindness, is performance art able to reshape,
practice of reclaiming to performance-based art (idem, 96). reconfigure, and change social spaces?” (ibidem). In this she is
Simpson’s book begins with performance-based actions on the playing, with Peggy Phelan, on a double meaning of parasite.
streets of Nogojiwanong, the Michi Saagiig name for Peterbor- Recall that “para” is a prefix appearing in loanwords from
ough, Ontario. The performative “resurgence” of indigenous Greek, most often attached to verbs and verbal derivatives, with
lifeways is not a failed past now submitted to represention, but the meanings “at or to one side of, beside, side by side” as well
an alternative future making ongoing claims in/as public space. as “beyond, past, by.” For me the “para” opens a passageway
As “Nishnaabeg dancers, artists, singers, drummers, commu- of besideness, something of a side walk, meridian, or interstice,
nity leaders, Elders, families and children walked down the that might move us out of the forever forward, habitual march
main street of Nogojiwanong,” Simpson writes, they were “not of the dialectic.
seeking recognition or asking for rights” (idem, 11). Rather,
Performance art actions that are both/and – both is and as if – REFERENCES
might be seen to be interstitial or intervallic. Or perhaps to the
AMINE, Khalild and George F. Roberson. 2014. Intermediality, Performance, and the
side, marginal. This to the side aspect (and again, if we think of Public Sphere. Denver: Collaborative Media International.
ourselves as beside ourselves in the strange logic of “I appear ARENDT, Hannah. 1958. The Human Condition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
to others as others appear to me” in Arendt’s phrase) opens BENABIB, Seyla. 1998. «Models of Public Space: Hannah Arendt, the Liberal Tradition,
and Jurgen Habermas». In Feminism: The Public and the Private, edited by Joan B.
whole worlds of alternatives to otherwise unidirectional or dia-
Landes. Cambridge: Oxford University Press.
lectical thought. The idea of to the side is implicit, for example, BUTLER, Judith. 2004. Undoing Gender. New York: Routledge.
in Carla Cruz’s discussion of All My Independent Wo/men in the — 2011. «Bodies in Alliance and the Politics of the Street». Transversal: EIPCP
book. ››› Cruz writes of artists who “see their work marginal- multilingual webjournal. October. eipcp.net/transversal/1011/butler/en
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
REBECCA SCHNEIDER
— 2015. Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly. Cambridge: Harvard
ized/or consciously marginalize their work because of the sub- University Press.
ject matter and methodology but mainly as a search or a dif- DE CERTEAU, Michel. 1984. The Practice of Everyday Life.
ferent way of doing and making in the art worlds.” For Carla Berkeley: University of California Press.
Cruz, to consciously marginalize, or to make marginalization COULTHARD, Glen Sean. 2014. Red Skins, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of
Recognition. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
explicit, is to institute a kind of sideness, or para – siticness. CRITICAL ART ENSEMBLE. 1996. Electronic Civil Disobedience. New York: Autonomedia.
58 As para-sites, sites that move to the side, performance acts to CVEJIĆ, Bojana and Ana Vujanović. 2015. Public Sphere by Performance. Berlin: b_books. 59
move the sidewalk itself, or move our relationships to the ar- FOSTER, Susan Leigh. 2003. «Choreographies of Protest». Theatre Journal 55: 395-412.
chitectures of comportment that define us. If we only keep the FRASER, Nancy. 2007. «Transnationalizing the Public Sphere: On the Legitimacy and
Efficacy of Public Opinion in a Post-Westphalian World». Transversal. March.
side walk running between the theatre as we already know it, European Institute for Progressive Cultural Policies.
and the state house as we already know it, we will never discover eipcp.net/transversal/0605/fraser/en
new intersections, old lifeways, or alternative ways of moving HALBERSTAM, Jack. 2011. The Queer Art of Failure. Durham: Duke University Press.
HONIG, Bonnie. 2013. Antigone Interrupted. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
to other heres and other theres. To step out of the presumptive
LOYD, Moya. 2017. Butler and Ethics. Edinburg: Edinburgh University Press.
habits of recognition, out of the mores and modes of habitual ap-
RANCIÈRE, Jacques. 2011. The Emancipated Spectator. New York: Verso.
pearance, is to also ask appearance to move aside – allowing us, SCHNEIDER, Rebecca. 2017. «Intra-inanimation». In Animism in Art and Performance,
perhaps, to imagine how we might find other intimacies at (or edited by Christopher Braddock, 153-175. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
with) our meridians, and appear beside ourselves in difference. SCHNEIDER, Rebecca, and Lucia Ruprecht. 2017. «In Our Hands: An Ethics of Gestural
Response-ability. Rebecca Schneider in Conversation with Lucia Ruprecht».
Journal of Performance Philosophy 3, no. 1.
performancephilosophy.org/journal/article/view/161
SIMPSON, Leanne. 2011. Dancing on Our Turtle’s Back: Stories of Nishnaabeg Re-Creation,
Resurgence, and a New Emergence. Winnipeg: Arbeiter Wing Publishing.
1917-2017,
ALMADA NEGREIROS
AND EUROPE
AUTOR
AUTOR
60 61
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Idalina Conde
AUTOR
AUTOR
62 63
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Reminiscência de Almada Negreiros [Reminiscence of Almada Negreiros], by Rita and Catarina Almada Negreiros, at Ribeira das Naus, Lisbon / Photograph: José Vicente
Exactly in the same year, 1917, in November, Álvaro de Cam-
pos, the sensationist heteronym of Fernando Pessoa (1888-
1935), began publishing his “Ultimatum” in the supplement to
the magazine Portugal Futurista, with an “Eviction notice to the
mandarins of Europe! Get out! Get out!”, that he repeated in
a tour of European references and geographies, while defend-
ing “another” way, which he announced for a near future. And
he ended: “I shout this out at the top of my lungs, on the Eu-
ropean coast where the Tagus meets the sea, with arms raised
high as I gaze upon the Atlantic, abstractly saluting Infinity!”
IDALINA CONDE
IDALINA CONDE
(Pessoa 2001).
Such is the contrast between expectant and problematic re-

lationships with Europe, which, seen from the land’s end of
64 WHAT PERSPECTIVE FOR TODAY? Portugal, they regarded as an other-space; and the national in- 65
telligentsia took on the representation of Portugal’s distance in
One hundred years ago, amidst the furore of World War I, and of the face, or in front of Europe over that of a country on com-
war as futurism’s “great experiment”, José de Almada Negreiros mon soil, Portugal in Europe. Given the vastness of the theme
(1893-1970) ended his “Ultimatum Futurista às Gerações Por- I shall move on to reflect following in the wake of Almada Ne-
tuguesas do Século xx” [Futurist Ultimatum to the Portuguese greiros’ challenge with regard to the trilogy Europe, war, and
Generations of the Twentieth Century] with an appeal to patri- civilization. Since it is an exhortatory patriotic “Ultimatum”,
otic heroism: “Above all, take advantage of this unique moment coupled with a futurist praise of war, this will be the theme for
in which the war in Europe invites you to enter Civilization. The a dialectic between the drive to war and the quest for peace.
complete people will be that who bring together all their quali- There have always been wars in Europe, to which is added the
ties and defaults to the maximum. Courage, oh Portuguese you latent and permanent paradigm of terrorism, but for this text
››› Macdonald p.370
only lack the qualities” (Almada Negreiros 1997, 650).1 a note on that dialectic in part of the last century is required.
Beyond the literal warmongering, the apology for war using

1
The transcription of the “Ultimatum” can be found online in a longer version of this text
with complete bibliography, at iscte-iul.academia.edu/idalinaconde/book-8a-europe-
futurism had more an artistic meaning. Aside from the na-
in-cultural-vision-(texts) tionalist references that characterize it, even in Almada Ne-
greiros’ “Ultimatum” war symbolized, above all, the combat the pathway of ideals. Broadly, the ethical dimension that en-
of the avant-garde in art, and in the name of art: a creative dures as the imperative for many forms of activism and artistic
destruction. In parallel, both modern and technological, and practices. Their claims and interventions in the public sphere
as one of the deadliest ever, the First World War opened up the are committed to a value-based ethical and axiological turn
twentieth century to wholesale destruction and paved the way manifesting in European contexts and beyond.2 Bringing this
for its own recreations of Europe. Boosted by ideals of peace, perspective after a journey back to the time of Almada Ne-
cohesion and prosperity, the “European project” that emerged greiros, futurism, and the experience of wars in Europe, is to
in the post-Second World War had prior roots, from the First provide a perspective for today.
(1914-18) to the Second (1939-45) World Wars. A project that
helped to forge institutional, economic and political re/con-
IDALINA CONDE
IDALINA CONDE
struction in the post-Second World War.
THE CONFERENCE AND THE “ULTIMATUM”
Besides the un – United Nations – created in 1945, in the
following years the major European institutions were set up, The theme of Europe continued in the writings and invectives
66 propelled by those ideals such as the former European Com- of Almada Negreiros. Eighteen years after the “Ultimatum”, in 67
munity, until the current European Union, and the Council of June 1935, the publication Sudoeste – Cadernos de Almada Ne-
Europe. Despite irregularities, failures or setbacks in this pro- greiros [Southwest – Notebooks of Almada Negreiros] appeared
cess, among its achievements are reference documents for the with the subtitle Portugal e a Europa [Portugal and Europe]. Its
safeguarding of human rights, values, democracy, citizenship, three issues, namely the third, included various collaborations,
and diversity in Europe. In brief, outcomes from the ideals of such as Fernando Pessoa’s, with the opening text “Nós os do
anti-war European modernity that obviously transcend Europe, Orpheu” [We of the Orpheu] and a poem.3 Almada explicit-
as a space seeing beyond its institutional pillars and perimeters. ly wrote about Europe in the first issue, in a text that begins
In our time Europe has been globalized by all kind of flows; a with the symbolic importance of maps to situate the Iberian,
vast, complex, metamorphic and multiform space in which the and insular, condition of Portugal. He repeats the anathemas
twists and turns of identity and culture often end up in the apo- and lamentations about the country, yet euphemized in the
ries of an “imagined community” (Anderson 2006).
2
See two reports from the last decade (Koivunen and Marsio 2007; Wiesand, Chainoglou
and Simon 2016).
Instead of those issues, my perspective in this text aims at the
3
Here represented by the heteronym Álvaro de Campos with the text “Nota ao acaso”
conjuncture of ideals, values and citizenship. Precisely because [A random note]. Cf. more references in the complete version of the text at iscte-iul.aca-
of contemporary turbulences and dystopias, it matters to recall demia.edu/idalinaconde/book-8a-europe-in-cultural-vision-(texts)
arguments of another, Almada. After returning from Madrid At the time, Almada Negreiros and Fernando Pessoa pro-
in 1932, (where he had been since 1927), he was even called duced their criticism, despite their own nationalistic and mes-
a “futurist in slippers”,4 but this Almada, judged by many as sianic values. In fact, they had belonged to the first “heroic”
defeated, would “arrive”, and for which his marriage to Sarah phase of the movement in Europe (1909-1920; from 1915 in
Affonso (1899-1983) in 1934 greatly helped (Conde 2015). Portugal, with a peak in 1917).6 Among us, futurism repre-
sented an avant-garde front rather than an adherence to the
Curiously but significantly, Almada did not meet Filippo Tom- orthodoxy of Marinetti’s principles. Santa-Rita Pintor (1889-
maso Marinetti (1876-1944), the historical founder of futur- 1918) declared himself a futurist immediately, but the maga-
ism, when he visited Lisbon on 23 November 1932. Ironical- zines Orpheu (1915) and Portugal Futurista (1917) displayed
ly, now at a distance of 23 years since his Futurist Manifesto an eclecticism in terms of their influences. Fernando Pessoa
IDALINA CONDE
IDALINA CONDE
(1909), Marinetti was received by the early “staunch enemies distinguished himself from futurism, which he recognized in
of futurism” in Portugal (Cabral 2014, 95-122).5 To wit: the Almada Negreiros, whose “Ultimatum Futurista” was above
still-journalist António Ferro (1895-1956), who would be- all a form of account-settling with Portugal.
come a key figure in the Estado Novo dictatorship’s “policy of
68 the spirit”; architect, professor and politician Adães Bermudes For Almada and his peers, a passage through futurism was one 69
(1864-1948); and Júlio Dantas (1876-1962), the butt of Al- more way of “being modern”,7 of which the “Ultimatum” with
mada Negreiros’ 1915 Manifesto Anti-Dantas. However, the the furore of his “twenty-two years brimming with health and
visit took place as the so-called “second futurism” was afoot intelligence” is an example, as he declared at the beginning of
(1921 to 1944), a phase in which the movement had turned the text (Almada Negreiros 1997, 649), not missing a note of
academic and was connected to Italian fascism. narcissism: “[I] demand a nation that recognizes me”. Besides,
in the poem A Cena do Ódio [The Scene of Hatred], written
4
According to the note by José-Augusto França on the “jocose and opportunistic accu-
in 1915 and dedicated to Álvaro de Campos, Almada already
sations” of “aging” that Almada was subject to: “[…] in 1936 O Sempre Fixe [a humoristic
weekly] published a fictitious and rather dry interview in which he was called ‘a futurist in claimed to be a “Sensationist Poet and Narcissus of Egypt”
slippers’” (França 1986, 321).
(Almada Negreiros 1997, 641).
5
Words of Almada Negreiros in “Um Ponto no i do Futurismo” [Clarifying Futurism], origi-
nally published in Diário de Lisboa on 25 November 1932: “The staunch enemies of futur-
ism in Portugal won their first victory the day before yesterday in the presence of the
leader of futurism, F. T. Marinetti […] The admirable creator of futurism has reached that 6
In 1916, Almada Negreiros and Santa Rita Pintor formed a Comité Futurista [Futurist
stage in academia and in life that lends itself beautifully to the scheming of shameless
Committee].
plotters […]. We, the Portuguese futurists, regret [Marinetti’s] amnesia regarding Portugal,
7
his loss of memory of the heroic names of futurism that fought a war without a truce [in Title of the exhibition José de Almada Negreiros: Uma Maneira de Ser Moderno, curated
Portugal] against the rotten and the antediluvian.” [TN- Portuguese version for this essay]. by Mariana Pinto dos Santos with Ana Vasconcelos, 3 February to 5 June 2017, Calouste
See also “The reception of futurism in Portugal” (Miraglia 2011). Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon (Pinto dos Santos 2017).
An identical furore inflamed Almada Negreiros’ futurist con- “Ultimatum” heard in April at the Teatro da República, with
ference at the Teatro República in Lisbon on 14 April 1917, for either perplexity or joy at the “madness”11 of the young, vision-
which he put on an aviator suit, like someone flying into the ary and rebellious futurist, could be heard, after November,
future, and manifestos were read.8 The conference was echoed with that ideological tone of patriotic exaltation denouncing
in the press and in the magazine Portugal Futurista. According the failure of the Republic and of the “democratic attempt”.12
to him9 (and the specialists), the “Ultimatum” was read at the
conference, although the text was only published in the maga- The magazine Portugal Futurista was seized by the police, but
zine seven months afterwards in November 1917, along with the question remains valid: was it an offensive against the mod-
the Almada-aviator photograph.10 During that interval much ernists by the democratic government still in power, or a mere
happened to justify certain nuances in interpretation, which application of state of war “preventive censorship” targeting
IDALINA CONDE
IDALINA CONDE
is why I dare to ask exactly which text did Almada read at the all publications capable of “enemy propaganda” or “aimed at
Conference: the full published text, or a previous version, pub- depressing the soul of the nation or the honour of its army”?13
lished later with changes or corrections? In this case, Almada’s “Ultimatum” really pointed out the
lack of soul in Portugal, parallel to the apology for war shared
70 The Portugal of 1917 was the immediate context for that text by futurists, which for him was a masculine, Darwinist, Pro- 71
and those seven months provided Almada with more informa- methean epiphany.
tion on the country, such as episodes on the negative impact of
the war, among other circumstances, which do not feature in
the manifesto. Moreover, by November, the tone of the “Ulti-
matum” was closer to the political about-face of Sidónio Pais’
11
“O Elogio da Loucura” [In Praise of Madness] was the title of an article about the futurist
coup (1872-1918), which overthrew the government of the
conference in A Capital, a newspaper to which Almada wrote: “thanking the ‘futurist ca-
democratic republican Afonso Costa (1871-1937). Thus, the maraderie’ of the press, and taking the opportunity to announce a new futurist spectacle
– which never took place”. Cf. entry “Conferência Futurista” (Arquivo Virtual da Geração
de Orfeu [n.d.]).
8
Tuons le Clair de Lune! (1909) and Le Music-Hall (1913) by Marinetti, as well as the muscu- 12
“We live in a country in which the democratic attempt is compromised every day. The
lar Manifeste Futuriste de la Luxure (1913) by Valentine de Saint-Point (1875-1953), the au-
mission of the Portuguese Republic had been completed since before 5 October [1910]:
thor of Manifeste de la Femme Futuriste (1912). Cf. entry “Conferência Futurista” (Arquivo
to display the decadence of the race. It was doubtlessly the Portuguese Republic which
Virtual da Geração de Orfeu [n.d.]).
consciously proved to every brain the ruin of our race, but the revolutionary duty of the
9
“Thus I began my ultimatum [sic] to twentieth century Portuguese youth, and the audi- Portuguese Republic reached its limit in the powerlessness to create” (Almada Negreiros
ence, used to exclusively literary and pedantic conferences, were visibly shocked by the 1997, 649-650). [TN– English version for this essay].
virility of my statements, bursting into premeditated and cowardly isolated reproaches, 13
With the by-laws of 10 and 13 November, and cinema censorship since September;
albeit without any substantial effect.” (Almada Negreiros 1997, 648-649).
cf. sources in the complete version of this text at iscte-iul.academia.edu/idalinaconde/
10
Cf. entry “Portugal Futurista” (Arquivo Virtual da Geração de Orfeu [n.d.]). book-8a-europe-in-cultural-vision-(texts)
THE YEAR 1917 IN PORTUGAL With turmoil and war, political life was less than quiet. Parties
organized themselves into congresses, two elections saw huge
What did Almada Negreiros know about war, he who did not abstention rates, the narrow victory of the Democratic Party
fight at the front, unlike many who, before the exhortation – in the last of these announced their parting with the early De-
“Go seek in the war in Europe all the strength of our new fa- cember coup. The Military Junta, headed by Sidónio Pais, ap-
therland” (Almada Negreiros 1997, 650) – had fought, suffered, proved the measures for the new regime, and the year ended
won and died since 30 January 1917, when the first brigade with Pais at the head of the Government and the Presidency.
of the Portuguese Expeditionary Corps (cep) left for France. He was a controversial First Republic politician, for his “Ger-
Almada knew of the war from a distance mediated by the press, manophile position”, which worried the Allies at war, even so
in which he could follow the intense diplomatic activity, such Fernando Pessoa praised him with the epithet “Presidente-
IDALINA CONDE
IDALINA CONDE
as official trips to France, England and Spain, among others. Rei” [President-King]. The title, however, did not apply for
long. Sidónio Pais was assassinated on 14 November 1918,
In daily life, Almada experienced14 the effects of war with the a year after the coup and three days after the Armistice of 11
food crisis, unless he was spared this in his bourgeois and ar- November 1918.
72 tistic circle. There were restrictions on the use of electricity 73
and gas, scarcity of food products, hoarding and price specu- The kaleidoscopic year of 1917 saw other contrasts as well.
lation – all of it with the potential for upheaval. In April, the It was the year of the alleged Fátima Apparitions (13 May at
month of the futurist conference, a “Soup Kitchen” opened Cova da Iria, and supposedly with repetitions lasting until Octo-
in Lisbon, soon followed by disturbances and fights with the ber) and also of the Ballets Russes in Lisbon.15 A sort of “mira-
police, to the point where the government declared a state of cle” of modernity and to such an extent that, with a few excep-
emergency on a few occasions. On May 19 and 20, in Lisbon tions, the reception was less than warm,16 albeit a high point,
and the suburbs, the “Potato Revolution” spread and violent which Almada Negreiros did not lose. Before the arrival of the
confrontations resulted in the deaths of a few officers, twen- company, scheduled for October [they arrived in December],
ty-two people and many wounded. The fight for bread led to he published the manifesto Os Bailados Russos em Lisboa [The
more strikes, more dead and a strong mobilization of the União
Operária Nacional (uon; National Workers’ Union). 15
A company created in 1909 and directed by Serge Diaghilev (1872-1929) until his death.
Their visit to Lisbon was due to the war; it was an alternative to the great stages, as they
14 looked for contracts not only in Portugal but in Spain as well.
A word dear to him in the “Ultimatum”, that of experience, in the narcissistic sense:
16
“I am the conscious outcome of my own experience […]. The experience of someone who With such exceptions as “Impressões dos Bailados Russos” [Impressions of the Ballet
has been living all the intensity of every instant of his own life” (Almada Negreiros 1997, Russes] by critic Manuel de Sousa Pinto, who wrote about the shows (eight) at Coliseu dos
649). [TN – English version for this essay]. Recreios (December 1917) and (two) at Teatro de S. Carlos (January 1918).
Russian Ballets in Lisbon] (Arquivo Virtual da Geração de Or- image points us to the word “for”, Portugal for Europe, at a dis-
feu [n.d.]),17 spent time with them during their stay and found tance or facing a Europe that national perception had reduced
inspiration for his dance activities. The figures of Arlequim and to the largest countries. In this way, Europe was represented
Columbina in Almada’s drawings were inspired by Carnival, as enlightened, advanced, majestic and central, whereas Portu-
one of the pieces brought by the Ballets Russes to Lisbon.18 gal only belonged due to geographical and historical reasons.
A small backwards country plagued by long lasting endemic
In 1917, Almada Negreiros also published K4 Quadrado Azul instability, though in fact similar cases existed in Europe in the
[K4 Blue Square] and A Engomadeira [The Ironer], pieces process of destruction and territorial re-arrangement. Even if
from a long prodigal life. Reminiscência de Almada Negreiros we had a “potato revolution” in the same year as the Russian
[Reminiscence of Almada Negreiros], since 2014 at Ribeira Revolution, it was nevertheless a European moment on our
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das Naus (Lisbon) is the last monument dedicated to him on scale, after all caused by the First War. A war that ploughed
the occasion of the 120th anniversary of his birth. This sculp- through contexts and countries, destroying some in its path.
ture by his granddaughters recovered a portrait of the artist
with the “giant eyes” and Almada seems to be gazing at the
74 Tagus, Europe and the world, at that place at once real and 75
mythical from whence departed the Portuguese ships on the WAR AND PEACE, IDEALS AND INSTITUTIONS
odyssey of the Discoveries.
From 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918, the First World War
The image has a double meaning here. On the one hand, a sou- spread from Europe to Africa, Asia, the Pacific and America,
venir of Almada the visionary of a new horizon; on the other, a as the United States and Canada joined the conflict and oth-
representation of Almada in his time, under the weight of my- er countries declared their alignment. When it was over, four
thologies and ideologies about Portugal. A “decadent” country empires (German, Russian, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman)
of “weak men”, as he wrote in “Ultimatum”; a country “asleep had vanished and the borders of several countries had been
since Camões” (Almada Negreiros 1997, 651 and 653). So, the redefined – some were born, others re-born. At the time, it was
an extraordinary war for Europe and the world with a huge
17
Manifesto published in Portugal Futurista, in October 1917, and distributed at the Coli-
seu; signed by Almada Negreiros, José Pacheco and Ruy Coelho, although in 1925 Almada
“machine” for mobilization and death. By land, sea and air
claimed he was the sole author. Cf. Castro (2012); Serra (2013). it involved 70 million military personnel, of which 60 million
18
Originally a 1910 creation with music by Robert Schumann, choreography by Michel were European.20 16 million lives were lost, including geno-
Fokine and costumes by Léon Bakst. In the wake of this involvement, Almada developed
and produced dance projects (he was at the head of a group in 1918) as script writer, cho-
cides, especially that of 1.5 million Armenians executed and
reographer, costume designer, set designer and, occasionally, as a dancer. deported in the final years of the Ottoman Empire.
Despite the magnitude, and the impact due to historical prox- nomic, social, scientific and artistic changes. But to establish
imity, we should widen the scope in Europe and its “theatre of a link between war and peace, we must return to the period
war”20 which is as old as its civilization. On the eve of the First between the First and Second World Wars, which saw funda-
World War there had been a total of over 500 conflicts, along mental changes in Europe. The First World War still endures
with the 1917 Russian Revolution and civil war (by 1921). De- in European remembrance as an epic war involving patriot-
spite all efforts, peace21 was temporary and literally relative be- ism, courage and veterans, and in the monuments to the “un-
cause in the two decades between the wars there were dozens known soldier” honouring some of the fallen millions. How-
of conflicts on European soil. During the Second World War ever, if futurists, including Almada Negreiros, had believed in
(1939-45) parallel conflicts took place and, from 1945 until that war as an “entry into civilization”, civilization was left be-
the early 1980s another twenty flared up. Afterwards, the Cold hind with the Second World War, a war of trauma, especially
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War maintained a semi-permanent conflict,22 and the spiral of the Holocaust, the darkest moment in the history of Europe
upheaval, wars and terrorism has continued down to our time. and the twentieth century – a collapse of civilization. With-
out forgetting that, aside from Hitler’s Nazi Germany (1933-
The fall of the symbol of the Cold War in 1989, erected in 45), it paralleled European totalitarianisms, each one with its
76 1961 and known as the Berlin Wall, along with German reuni- own perverse and brutal idea of civilization: fascism in Italy 77
fication, meant the end of an era. In the words of historian Eric (with Mussolini, 1922-1943/45), Franquismo in Spain (1939-
Hobsbawm in The Age of Extremes (2012), the “short twenti- 1975/78) and Soviet Stalinism (1927-53). Portugal accompa-
eth century” with so many wars, revolutions and political, eco- nied these with its long Estado Novo dictatorship, from 1933
until the democratic revolution of 25 April 1974.
� 19 Over 9 million soldiers and 7 million civilians, such was the death toll from techno-
logical and tactical innovation in the trenches (the number of deaths per square metre
was very high); although forbidden by The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, chemical Civilization has then been a word as shining as it is dangerous,
weapons were also used, cf. attachments to the text in note 1, at iscte-iul.academia.edu/
idalinaconde/book-8a-europe-in-cultural-vision-(texts).
and decades afterwards came the post-modern deconstructions
20
According to a list of conflicts in Europe from pre-Christian antiquity until now, cf.
of civilization in the enlightened and hegemonic sense. Among
the text in note 1, at iscte-iul.academia.edu/idalinaconde/book-8a-europe-in-cultural- several epistemological, intellectual and historiographical fil-
vision-(texts)
ters, the post-colonial paradigm has shaken like no other the
21
Operations ceased with the Armistice in 1918, and peace was formally declared in the
1919 Treaty of Versailles, which also called for a League of Nations to prevent conflict. At
notion of civilization, itself replaced with European culture(s)
the end of the Second World War it was replaced by the United Nations Organization on and identity/identities – both in the plural and always the sub-
24 October 1945, which included 51 member states (currently 193).
ject of much writing and discussion. However, here a note on
22
NATO (founded in 1949) to the west, and the socialist-Soviet sphere under the Warsaw
Pact (established in 1954); two blocks in a delicate balance of power and mutual vigilance
the main institutions that emerged in post-war re-foundations
engaged in an arms race. is required, and on the ethical dimension fostered by them.
Along with the political, military and economic diplomacy in- Union (eu), there were three milestones: the Treaty of Rome
volved in the European project, the cultural dimension has had (1957), the Treaty of Maastricht (1992) and the Treaty of Lis-
wider scope to contribute towards re-civilization. bon, signed in 2007, twenty years after Portugal joined the eec
(European Economic Community) in 1986. Spain joined that
The un – United Nations – appeared immediately after the Sec- same year, and, thus did the Iberian Peninsula. Europe was
ond World War, in 1945, and the Council of Europe in 1949 as a our destiny, it was said, but we had always been in Europe even
mainstay of human rights, legality, democracy, citizenship as well through our totalitarian regime. In 1986 we entered into the
as for culture, literacy, heritage, and historical memory in Eu- perimeter of an economic and political architecture that has
rope. In 1950, the Council produced the European Convention become inseparable from the continent’s geography as the eu
for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms expanded, while the continent continues to “conceptualize”
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(in place since 1953, with amendments and protocols), the basis around ideas of Europe within Europe (Pagden 2002).
for the foundation of the European Court of Human Rights in
1952. Almost thirty years afterwards, the European Convention With regard to cultural matters, a counterpoint has been in
for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treat- place between the eu’s political and economic scope (since the
78 ment or Punishment was created in 1987 (in place since 2002, former European Community), and the humanist and cultural 79
after two protocols). There has also been the European Cultural role of the Council of Europe, cooperating with unesco in
Convention, signed in 1954, and the European Social Charter, many situations. Nonetheless, following its previous actions,
from 1961,23 covering the social and economic rights that comple- the European Commission has expanded its cultural agency
ment the civil and political rights in the 1950 convention. In brief, mostly since the 1990s, also thanks to an article in the Treaty
there have been many reference documents created throughout of Maastricht that provided a legal basis for this.25 The recent
decades of dedication to citizens, and with a focus on linguistic, stage has reached the “Creative Europe” programme (2014-
ethnic and cultural minorities and migrants in Europe.24 2020) parallel to other areas addressing citizenship, educa-
tion and cultural literacy as well as the areas of heritage and
The construction of the European Community has run in digitization. Despite the socio-economic rationale that usually
parallel since the 1950s; its executive organism, the Europe- forms the basis for European Commission operations, the last
an Commission, has existed since 1958. Among the treaties, tone even shifted towards the goal of “strengthening European
institutions and stages leading up to the current European identity through education and culture”.26
23
First version in force from February 1965, reviewed in 1996 and in effect since 1999. 25
Since 7 December 2000, and adapted in 2007, there is also the European Union Charter
24 of Fundamental Rights, which includes provisions on human rights; a document promoted
Examples: European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (1992); European Con-
vention for the Protection of National Minorities (1995). by the European Parliament, EU Council and the European Commission.
FINAL REMARKS ing music in the difficult European “concert”. However, they
were the compass with which to create a common space (more
Indeed, not everything is solved through the economy and than a “community”, which is a debatable concept in a space
other values for the “European soul” have re-arisen because of where there are several) offering institutions at the service of
the Eurozone financial crisis that erupted in 2009. In the final citizens. International and European law is a crucial element.
phase, 2013-14, the actual presidency of the European Com- Almost the entirety of the history in this text, largely about war,
mission launched an initiative with appeal to a “new narra- is about moving from the battlefield to tables at which trea-
tive for Europe”, also a value-based narrative.27 The harsh and ties, conventions, decrees, norms and regulations were signed.
prolonged crisis was the equivalent of a war and it shattered In other words, a host of documents were necessary to imple-
the European project,28 which also received further setbacks, ment the rule of law beyond the volatility of agreements and
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such as the influx of refugees and the tragedies in the Medi- commitments. Diplomacy, negotiation and law as weapons,
terranean; Brexit; and terrorist attacks in the name of Islamic thus providing more weapons in the fight for peace.
fundamentalism. Despite all this – and because of it – values
endure as ideals, be it ideals related to the ethical turn in our Now, from ideals to contemporary dystopian visions of Europe,
80 millennium or the legacy of ideals that have contributed to the there is an understandable reductionist leap, considering the 81
reconstructions of Europe. times we live in. Ideals seem like a litany, repeated ad nauseam
in political rhetoric, against a backdrop of conflict, exclusion,
In retrospect, the speed and dignity of the response to the col- inequality and deficit that bring with them a narrative of disen-
lapse brought about by the Second World War is still impressive chantment and failure.Yet, it is one among many ways of seeing
as a kind of re-civilization that embraced the ideals of peace, the contemporary Europe to oversee in other place. As I stated
prosperity and cohesion in tandem with the safeguarding of at the beginning, here I wanted to remember the conquests that
democracy, citizenship, freedom and human rights. Ideals were took place in the name of ideals even if through wars and cri-
a mirage, and they might have sounded like mere entertain- ses. These conquests, incomplete or vulnerable as they may be,
deserve their own narrative alongside dystopian visions. They
� 26 Title of the communication from the European Commission to several EU bodies on
November 2017.
represent a dialectic of/in civilization, like the narratives of war
27
Cf. references about this initiative launched by the European Commission in the first
and peace, both carrying a part of the truth and both endless.
part of Conde (2016).
28
The crisis brought about an intensifying of the divide between rich countries (north)
and deficit economy countries (south). Violence erupted on the streets with various pro-
test movements, especially in Greece, the country at the centre of the crisis and which,
like Portugal and Ireland, had to be “bailed-out”.
REFERENCES
A brief list based on the bibliography available in the online version of the text and PAGDEN, Anthony. 2002. «Europe: Conceptualizing a Continent». In The Idea of
attachments referred in note 1, available at iscte-iul.academia.edu/idalinaconde/ Europe. From Antiquity to the European Union, edited by Anthony Pagden. 33-54.
book-8a-europe-in-cultural-vision-(texts) Cambridge: Woodrow Wilson Center Press/Cambridge University Press.
Arquivo Virtual da Geração de Orpheu. [n.d.]. Modernismo, modernismo.pt PESSOA, Fernando. 2001. The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa.
Arquivo Pessoa. [n.d.]. «Ultimatum, de Álvaro de Campos». Arquivo Pessoa. Translation by Richard Zenith. New York: Grove Press.
arquivopessoa.net/textos/456 PINTO DOS SANTOS, Mariana ed.. 2017. José de Almada Negreiros: Uma Maneira de Ser
ALMADA NEGREIROS, José de. 1997. Almada Negreiros – Obra completa. Moderno. Catálogo da Exposição. Lisbon: Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.
Edited by Alexei Bueno. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Aguilar. SERRA, Filomena. 2013. «Almada Negreiros, a dança e os Ballet Russes».
ANDERSON, Benedict. 2006. Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origins and Literatura e Sociedade 17: 14-28.
Spread of Nationalism. Revised Edition. New York: Verso. WIESAND, Andreas Joh., Kalliopi Chainoglou, and Anna Śledzińska Simon ed.. 2016.
Culture and Human Rights: The Wroclaw Commentaries. In collaboration with
CABRAL, Manuel Villaverde. 2014. «A Estética do nacionalismo. Modernismo literário e
IDALINA CONDE
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Yvonne Donders. Berlin/Boston and Cologne: De Gruyter/ARCult Media.
autoritarismo político em Portugal no início do século XX». Novos Estudos 98: 95-122.
CASTRO, Maria João ed.. 2012. Lisboa e os Ballets Russes.
Lisbon: Universidade Nova de Lisboa.
CONDE, Idalina. 2015. Reencontro com a Pintora Sarah Affonso (1899-1983).
Lisbon: ISCTE-IUL University Institute of Lisbon.
82 CONDE, Idalina. 2016. Diálogo com Imagens: Arte, Património e Narrativas para 83
a Europa. Lisbon: ISCTE-IUL University Institute of Lisbon.
EUROPEAN COMMISSION. 2017. Communication from the Commission to the European
Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the
Committee of the Regions, «Strengthening European Identity through Education
and Culture. The European Commission’s contribution to the Leaders’ meeting in
Gothenburg, 17 November 2017». Strasbourg, 14.11.2017 COM (2017) 673 final.
ec.europa.eu/commission/sites/beta-political/files/communication-
strengthening-european-identity-education-culture_en.pdf
FRANÇA, José-Augusto. 1986. Amadeu & Almada. Venda Nova: Bertrand.
HOBSBAWM, Eric. 2012. A Era dos Extremos: O Breve Século XX.
Lisbon: Editorial Presença.
KOIVUNEN, Hannele and Leena Marsio. 2007. Fair Culture? Ethical Dimension of Cultural
Policy and Cultural Rights. Publications of the Ministry of Education of Finland,
Department for Cultural, Sport and Youth Policy.
culturalpolicies.net/web/files/47/en/FairCulture.pdf
MIRAGLIA, Gianluca. 2011. «The reception of futurism in Portugal». In Portuguese
Modernisms. Multiple Perspectives on Literature and the Visual Arts,
edited by Steffen Dix and Jerónimo Pizarro. 236-249.
Oxon and New York: Modern Humanities Research Association and Routledge.
All My
Independent
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84 85
Wo/men
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Carla Cruz
PART 1
All My Independent Women (AMIW) deals thematically with
the representation of wo/men through the art works that are
presented in its exhibitions. The participant artists, however, are
not exclusively women; they are people who identify as woman,
man, and transgender, and use feminist methodologies and
an embodied position to produce artistic gestures. AMIW uses
curatorial strategies to question the (in)visibility of these artists in
the mainstream artworld. Artists who see their work marginalised
or consciously marginalise their work because of its subject matter
and methodology but mainly as a search for a different way of doing
and making in the art worlds. In AMIW, representation appears both
CARL A CRUZ
as aesthetics, as depiction – as occupying a place in the sensible –

and as a claim for difference – i.e., a difference that proposes an
alternative, that acts. AMIW discusses constructions of sexual and
gender differences, but also attempts to create a space where the
visibility (of these artists) is no longer measured against a centre. 87
86
This wasn’t so from the beginning.
PART 2
In 2005, when I initiated AMIW in Portugal, I believed that the
mainstream artworld did not acknowledge artistic practices that
dealt with gender and feminist critique. I organised AMIW in order
to fight for the recognition of these practices; to insert them in a
given logic. Visibility was a central question. AMIW has always been
a marginal project that hoped at some point to become central. In
its beginning, central according to mainstream art world logic. It was
only after the 2010 exhibition, the 5th one, that the prospect of our
feminist discourses being peacefully absorbed by the mainstream
art discourse, without bringing any real change, became manifest.
When I started to question, what it means to want to inscribe
feminist art practices within the “visible” art arena, knowing that
Poster for All My Independent Women, 2010, Casa da Esquina, Coimbra
Design: Christina Casnellie
the very constructions of what is rendered visible and what is not,
is what we actually need to figure out.
Reclaiming a form of visibility without it being transformative
runs the risk of absorption into the visible – the canon – in a
neoliberal procedure, where differences are transformed into
anodyne characteristics, welcomed and quickly absorbed in an
ever-growing pluralist society that, on the one hand acknowledges
those differences, and on the other cancels out their political
potential. AMIW, from a project of visibility started to position
itself as a project of solidarity. Here I should mention a very
particular characteristic of AMIW and its eight instantiations. AMIW
is a network of friends. It started in 2005 by being an exhibition
of fifteen artists whose common denominator was working from
a feminist perspective and being related to me in some way or
another: shared a studio, studied with, worked/collaborated with.
Today the network is composed of over 90 artists, and it grew from
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the same logic, friends we knew, friends we meet along the way
and that have affiliated to the project.
88 89
PART 3
Thus, I became less interested in promoting individual artists or
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collectives, and inserting them into a given visibility logic, and
more interested in subverting that logic by recollectivizing our
practices. It was at that moment that AMIW’s marginal position
became a very comfortable place to be. This place, where before
we felt that this was where we had been thrown in to, whilst
excluded from the centre, became the place we wanted to inhabit.
AMIW’s situatedness in what can be perceived as the margins of
the artworld, but nonetheless the centre of AMIW’s counterpublic,
allows us to articulate our aims not just within the art sphere but
in relation to the world itself, and imagine new possibilities of
being and making in the different spheres we operate in. From
where we stand we can propose our own fictions, for the creation
of the self but also for the production of art.
All My Independent Women – Novas Cartas Portuguesas
Publication cover by Virginia Valente
AMIW’s situatedness affirms that it is through our location and our
embodiment that we can resist the hegemonic views of subjectivity,
and escape reducing constructions, in the case of AMIW both of
what is to be a man and a woman and what “good” art is. Moreover,
it operates through a temporality of its own, thus producing a
discrete continuity, which can produce something different in
the imagination. AMIW continues to experiment with modes of
engaging, crossing our network with others, expanding its topics
and scope. It wants to be a platform for all of those involved in it to
express themselves through their practices, but also seeks further
collaborative modes of working, where the renunciation of the
isolation of individual practices in favour of a collective endeavour
must be constantly reaffirmed. If one truly wants to challenge the art
system’s status quo, one needs to uphold the network instead of its
individuals — without, however, alienating their singularity. The early
use of the Internet permitted AMIW, whilst based mainly in Portugal,
to be an international platform for debate and research on new
90
methodologies, to rethink authorship, mechanisms of valuation,
distribution, and production in varied art worlds. Furthermore,
the Internet also promoted new rhizomatic connections, once the
different projects were connected in an independent, heterogenic,
and non-hierarchical relationship. Today, AMIW continues to
be exactly that, a network of internationally based friends, who
use different online platforms to share resources, materials and
meanings about feminisms and the arts. Another moment involving
visualization of the network and its current interests might come to
shape – or not – this is not its main goal.
REFERENCES
BRAIDOTTI, Rosi. 1994. Nomadic Subjects: Embodiment and Sexual Difference in

Contemporary Feminist Theory. New York: Columbia University Press.
CARNEIRO DE SOUSA, Catarina and Carla Cruz. 2015. «All My Independent Women:
An Art Network on Gender Issues». The International Journal of New Media,
Technology and the Arts 10: 11-24. Front of flyer/leaflet for All My Independent Women 2005
by Alfaiataria Visual (Christina Casnellie and Rui Silva)
WARNER, Michael. 2002. «Publics and Counterpublics». Public Culture 14 (1): 49-90.
SACRIFICING THE BODY
TO THE MANIFESTO:
LANGUAGE, FUTURISM
AND PERFORMANCE
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92 93
I drag the whole curtain down:
Somersault,
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And leap over the piano…
The show will be wonderful!
I tear the music sheets to shreds,
Smash the whole set to pieces,
Burst out laughing,
And run out through the foyer…
Mário de Sá-Carneiro, Tourniquet, Paris, 1915
Sandra Guerreiro Dias

novation. With a programmatic and militant orientation, the
movement wanted to give a voice to, and be the agent of, an
avant-garde, which finds expression, through a renewed aes-
thetical drive, in a new “way of saying”, namely the manifesto2.
From the statement of this combative intention ensues the en-
counter with theatre and the serata, namely the need to physi-
cally confront the audience, at the heart of public space, as
well as the full doctrinal manifestation of an art of saying that
SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

FUTURISM, POETRY, AVANT-GARDE: ACTION! proposes a radical exploration of the plastic and semiotic ma-
teriality of language.
Over one hundred years on, it would not be redundant to em-
phasize that the initial impetus of Italian futurism consisted In their aesthetical-political dimension these aspects constitute
of an ontological and performative reflection on language. the historical roots of twentieth century performance, a struc-
Deeply influenced by French symbolists Charles Baudelaire turing detail in the history of futurism for the relationships of
94
and Gustave Kahn, as well as by the Phataphysics School of similarity established with Portuguese futurism. While also in 95
Alfred Jarry, F. T. Marinetti, the Italian poet and playwright, this case the historical dis-alignment with the avant-gardes is
was a proselytizing patron of the early twentieth century Paris- a reality, this did not hinder the possibility of a de facto dia-
ian anarchist poetry salons1 which were revolutionizing the art logue, albeit a profusely experimental one.
of reading poetry and proposing an art of “words in liberty”.
The advent of this movement in Portugal took place in a va-
The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism (1909) was literary in riety of ways: grants to study in Paris given to artists such as
nature. In fact, it consisted of textual action that proposed a Santa Rita Pintor, Eduardo Viana, Emmerico Nunes, Domin-
rhetorical-political reconfiguration of literary discourse along- gos Rebelo, who upon their return to Portugal contributed
side a formal renewal in close dialogue with technological in- to the spreading of those aesthetical ideals. With the onset of
wwi some returned, such as Amadeo Souza-Cardoso, Arman-
››› Macdonald p.370
1
After his stay in Paris, between 1893 and 1896, Marinetti often returned to the French do Basto, José Pacheko and Eduardo Viana; while others, such
capital, staying in contact with the city’s literary and artistic milieu. During that period, he
as Sonia and Robert Delaunay, settled in Portugal from 1915
››› Conde p.64
was a regular at the offices of La Revue Blanche, where poetry was violently read, together
with Alfred Jarry; the anarchist community of the Abbaye de Créteil, where the same
type of readings took place; the Samedis populaires organized by Gustave Kahn to restore
2
the intensity of live reading to the printed word and the poetry evenings organized at the Despite the initial symbolist inspiration, it was futurism that definitely established the
Grand Théâtre du Gymnase in Marseille (Beghaus 2000, 272-80). manifesto as a literary subgenre.
to 1917. According to Raquel Henriques da Silva, this wave de Campos’ “Triumphal Ode”; Orpheu 2 announces a series
of artists formed a “peculiar geography” that determined an of conferences which, true to the futurist style, never actually
“intense unfolding” of history (2008, 10), which included the took place, along with a few futurist texts such as Mário de Sá-
history of futurism. In this regard, the Corporation Nouvelle Carneiro’s “Manucure”, Álvaro de Campos’ “Maritime Ode”
project is important for its combination of poetry and paint- and Santa Rita’s hors-texte. As for Portugal Futurista, it features
ing. The project was the result of a friendship and artistic dia- a series of texts ranging from Apollinaire to Blaise Cendrars
logue between the Delaunay couple, Souza-Cardoso, Almada and from Sá-Carneiro to Fernando Pessoa. I have chosen to
Negreiros, José Pacheko and Eduardo Viana3, and benefited systematize this relationship according to an affinity with and

from the crucial role of Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso, the only belonging of futurism to modernism in which the former is
truly international Portuguese artist at the level of, and in con- seen as a trend or variation of the latter. However, this ambi-
tact with, the emerging avant-gardes. His connection to futur- guity becomes clearer when taking into account Pessoa’s own
ism was documented in the famous 1916 interview given to testimony in a letter to an English publisher proposing the pub-
the newspaper O Dia on the occasion of the exhibition at Liga lishing of a sensationalist anthology which, as transvestite as it
Naval, in Lisbon. In this interview, he stated his approval of fu- may appear, explains this relationship in the following terms:
96 turist aesthetical ideals: “All of our life is looking ahead. Let us “We are the descendants of three earlier movements – French 97
glorify the great mechanical and geometrical splendour, large- ‘symbolism’, Portuguese pantheistic transcendentalism, and
scale industry, electric adds, music hall [sic] alongside grand the hodgepodge of senseless and contradictory things of which
modern theatre and art as the sole universal expression of dy- futurism, cubism and others of the same ilk are the occasional
namic sensation”(Souza-Cardoso 1916). The creative dialogue expressions” (1972, 134). Also in line with this connection are
between Pessoa and Sá-Carneiro, from 1912 to 1916, embod- Pessoa’s dialogue with the vorticist current of English mod-
ies the decisive critical reception of futurism in Portugal, with ernism (McNeill 2015) and Sá-Carneiro’s with the Parisian
clear reverberations within the Orpheu project. Despite the cubist avant-garde, as well as the fact that it was only in 1914,
exhaustively studied differences between them, the dialogues when Sá-Carneiro and Santa Rita returned home, that Paris-
are most relevant to the history of the two movements. They ian avant-gardes resonated in Lisbon for the first time, that
are obvious in the two magazines: Orpheu 1 includes Álvaro Sá-Carneiro and Pessoa truly committed to the Orpheu project
and the crucial role of futurism in the Portuguese modernist
3
The objective of the project was to organize itinerant exhibitions of painting, poetry
emergence became observable.
objects, sculpture, etc., as well as to publish painting and poetry albums, including one
of the precursor works of early twentieth century aesthetical avant-gardism, the famous
visual poem in twenty-two panels by Sonia and Cendrars entitled La Prose du transsibé-
In fact, Fernando Cabral Martins underscores the need to
rien, printed as an accordion-using folded cardboard. read Orpheu as “an event” that “exposes the very genesis of the
Avant-garde” (2015, 75), and Celina Silva also highlights its In one word, futurism truly distinguishes itself from modern-
“mise-en-scène aimed at generating a revolution in the cultural ism due to its plastic-literary prank, which in the Portuguese
space-time” (1999, 1295). Similarly, Nuno Júdice had already case ensured its singularity and modernity. This genealogic
outlined the more specifically performative aspects (albeit not link between Orpheu and ideas that were the precursors and
under this designation) of both movements: the framing of lit- the protagonists of futurism via the flow of artists between the
erature in the broader context of the other arts; the dimension French Belle Époque and Lisbon dictated its literary character
of a theoretically based literary group meeting periodically at through its alignment with the avant-garde and futurist perfor-
cafes to “impose themselves as avant-garde”; the use of the mance of the time.

manifesto-magazine format, which translated into an innova-
tion not only in terms of content but also graphic layout; and
a concern with capturing, shocking and educating audiences
(Júdice 1990, 2). PERFORMERS,
MANIFESTOS & ALL:
Despite the dearth of theoretical considerations of performance A BRIEF CHRONOLOGY
98 and literature by performance and literature studies, it is possible 99
to identify in these aspects of futurism, and in the light of perfor- While it is true that it is possible to detect a type of futurism in
mance theory, an “instantiation of text” in its performative char- Portugal akin to the Italian, French or German, an approach
acter insofar as an activation, of its semic materiality, via perfor- from the angle of the presuppositions mentioned above allows
mance, be it in terms of “typefaces, format, spatial distribution us to trace an expanded chronology of the movement based
of the elements on the page or through the book, physical form on the aesthetical-sociological rupture of which it was the pro-
or space” (Drucker 1998, 131-2). This realizes the technical, tagonist. On the one hand, it is possible to observe in Amadeo
semiotic and organic foundation of language. In addition, from de Souza-Cardoso’s parody of Velázquez’ The Drunkards (Par-
the perspective of the classic concept of performance, as out- is, 1908) a premeditation of futurist actions to follow. On the
lined by RoseLee Goldberg, futurist manifestations take on the other hand, it is also possible to see how these were prolonged
“form of solo or group spectacle” presented by the author-actor in a series of texts and actions that very concretely rekindled
in venues ranging from the “theatre” to the “bar”, the “café” or the futurist legacy in the 1920s.
the “street corner”, following no specific script. There is also the
exploration of “large-scale visual elements”, in events that can However, the two magazines Orpheu (1915) and Portugal Futur-
last hours or minutes and which could follow a script despite ista (1917) were the first to become the performative prototype
a significant improvisational component (Goldberg, 1979). of futurist actions. Falling under the category of magazine-op-
eration4, due to the experimental nature of their texts and the trains. A playwright and admirer of Wagner’s total theatre, Leal
public scandal they caused, these publications, along with the im- corresponded with Marinetti, whom he had personally met in
mersive-phenomenological space of the café, newspaper articles, Paris in 1914. Raul Leal was also a polemist, particularly in the
works and conferences (in the case of Portugal Futurista), were the case of António Botto, where he sided with Fernando Pessoa
urban core from which this performative action and language pro- against the conservative morals of the Lisbon Students Action
ject radiated. For instance, Orpheu 1, a venture that included the League between 1922 and 1923, having written the pamphlet
staging of its management (Pessoa 1968, 60), was orchestrated Sodoma Divinizada [Deified Sodom] (1923), which was seized
by Pessoa and Sá-Carneiro at a café table. As for Portugal Futur- a month after publication. Raul Leal was one of the most im-

ista, seized at the printer’s by President Afonso Costa’s republican portant and singular interlocutors of the Portuguese orphic-
police in November 1917, it exemplified the transgression effect futurist spirit. In the human drama of his brilliant madness, he
which translates into the symbolic effect that the seizing repre- personified the existential stance of a true futurist dancer.
sented in the public space in terms of its social, aesthetical and
political impact. Both magazines reflect the performative matrix On the occasion of Pessoa’s death, Almada said: “I did not
of modernism within the Portuguese public space and their role know of any example similar to Fernando Pessoa’s: the man re-
100 cannot be emphasized or researched enough. placed by the poet”, adding: “Until, one day in 1935, the poet 101
personally buried the body that had accompanied him all his
Well before Almada’s 1917 talk at the Teatro da República, there life” (Almada Negreiros 1935, 48). In Portuguese literature,
was Raul Leal’s intervention O Bando Sinistro [A Sinister Band] no one personified the “drama in people” and in language like
in 1915. The poet, a staunch monarchist, was one of the bright- Pessoa, for whom “art is essentially dramatic” (Pessoa 1999,
est performative figures in Portuguese futurism and the pro- 84). A subject that deserves a study in its own right is his cru-
tagonist of one of the first recorded performances in the public cial legacy to a theory of performance and language. In this
space of that period: the distribution of the manifesto entitled context, it is also worth mentioning the mysterious episode, of
Apelo aos Intelectuais Portugueses [A Call to Portuguese Intel- which he was the protagonist, together with Augusto Ferreira
lectuals] against Afonso Costa and the First Republic. Printed Gomes, of Aleister Crowley’s disappearance at Cascais’s Hell’s
clandestinely with the aid of Santa Rita, Leal began by throw- Mouth during his visit to Portugal in 1930. The staging of the
ing copies “from the upper gallery of Café Martinho, the leaf- mystery surrounding the obscure disappearance of “Master
lets flying about and flooding the floor and tables below” (Leal Therion” on the pages of Diário de Notícias and Notícias Ilus-
2010, 25) and then handed them out in one of the Cascais line trado, had lasting repercussions in the press and the impact of
an international practical joke, and it deserves a reference in
4
According to the taxonomic categories proposed by Dias (2016). a chronology of Portuguese performance.
Furthermore, Mário de Sá-Carneiro played a preponderant among others), in his youth the author also participated as an
role here. While it is true that the poet always distanced him- actor in theatrical recitals translating and writing theatre plays.
self from futurism, there are manifold ways of including him But there was also his bohemian café life in Paris, in true fu-
in that project. Starting from the end, it is possible to glimpse turist style, featured in such poems as “Serradura” [Sawdust]
a dialogue between the moment of his death and the open- (1915) or “Cinco Horas” [Five o’clock] (1915).
ing of “Manucure”, the most futurist of his poems. In a letter
to José Pacheko, dated 6 May 1916, Jorge Barradas testifies: From Guilherme de Santa Rita, who had returned to Lisbon
“Before taking the poison, I know he did his nails, put on his in September 1914 with the mission of spreading the futurist

finest suit, combed his hair and, after taking the poison, lay aesthetical ideal, we are left only with the striking testimony
down on the bed to wait for death” (quoted in Nobre 1990, of the painting A Cabeça (Cubo-futurista) [The head (cubo-
16). This should be compared with the beginning of the poem futurist)] (1919-1912), the hors-texte for Orpheu 2 and the
mentioned above: “In the sensation of polishing my nails, / a four paintings for Portugal Futurista. Despite this sparse out-
sudden inexplicable sensation of tenderness. / I include every- put, Santa Rita’s place in Portuguese futurism is central and
thing in Me piously” (Sá-Carneiro 2001, 51). he was continuous and fervently remembered (by Sarah Af-
102 fonso, for instance) for his histrionic and clownish gesture as 103
Despite his known vocation as a playwright, the author never- the “art theoretician” (quoted in Almada Negreiros 1982, 34)
theless made a distinction between literature and theatre, con- or “terracotta model” of futurism, as Carlos Parreira called
sidering them as “two opposite arts”: theatre as a “plastic art” him (quoted in Neves 2006, 169). This is due to the fact that
aimed at “seeing” and literature as an art of feeling (Sá-Carneiro Santa Rita had become, as a body-canvas, a unique futurist
2001, 240-1), as laid out in the article-manifesto “Teatro-arte” work that, despite not having survived, became crystalized in
[Theatre-art] published in the republican daily O Rebate on the anamnesis of that mise-en-scène. Moreover, after having
28 November 1913. In it the author conceptualizes the drama had direct contact with it in Paris, he played a crucial role
in persona that he embodies as the actor of his art-life. Cabral in spreading futurism in the country and turned himself into
Martins has spoken at length on this theme extracting an “ex- an ipsis verbis example of sacrificing the body to the mani-
hibitionist” and “confessional tone” from the rigorous tempo- festo. Ruy Coelho, who lived with Santa Rita in Paris, offers
ral recording of his texts that has crystallized them as “quasi- the following testimony: “Here is the prankster. Here is Santa
theatre” (Martins 1997, 68). Aside from some more markedly Rita. A painter who strolled the streets of Paris until late at
avant-gardist poems, such as the “poems without support” that night, talking and creating the most fantastical theories of art
he dedicates to Santa Rita (“Elegia” [Elegy] and “Manucure”, and who, once lost, did not want to find his way back home.
or “Apoteose” [Apotheosis] and “Torniquete” [Tourniquet], A prank?” (Coelho 2015, 93).
Deeply influenced by the Delaunay couple, José de Almada of the text in the space-time of what Fischer-Litche calls “the
Negreiros is the most consensual artist among Portuguese fu- semiotic body” (2008). His performances include the opening
turists for his consistency, for the diversity and singularity of his futurist conference at Teatro República, in 1917, with Santa
oeuvre, for his expansive and non-conformist personality that Rita, wearing the blue futurist worker’s overall that he had
combines with the leitmotif of movement, for the multiplicity designed for the occasion, and the intervention “o pacto do
and abundance of performances, texts and interventions the grande frete da poesia: enquanto a Poesia não é” [the pact of
legacy of which, in its quantity and quality, is still untapped the great bore of poetry: while waiting for Poetry]. In line with
and calls for a full and detailed systematizing from the point of the notion of the intermedia relation between literature and

view of performance. the other arts, this manifesto was proclaimed by Almada, San-
ta Rita and Souza-Cardoso in front of the painting Ecce Homo,
In his orchestration of innumerable interventions three as- at the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, in Lisbon, in 1917, an
pects stand out: the performances and interventions, the pro- event for which the three artists shaved their eyebrows and
grammatic texts and the countless conference-performances. beards and went for a stroll in downtown Lisbon (Almada Ne-
His major texts include “Saltimbancos” (contrastes simultâ- greiros 1959, 20). Manifesto Anti-Dantas was written following
104 neos)[Wandering jugglers (simultaneous contrasts)], “Mima- the famous controversy with Júlio Dantas, after Almada had 105
Fataxa” and “Ultimatum Futurista às gerações portuguesas seen the play Sóror Mariana [Sister Mariana] at the Teatro
do século xx” [Futurist Ultimatum to Portuguese generations Ginásio on 21 October 1915. The manifesto, published in an
of the twentieth century], published in Portugal Futurista; the experimental brown paper edition, was read aloud to his gen-
1917 surrealist novella A Engomadeira [The ironing woman]; erational companions while standing on top of a table in Café
A Cena do Ódio [The Scene of Hatred], 1915, intended for Or- Martinho. Later, on 15 August 1965, there was a performa-
pheu 3 but only partly published in 1923 in Contemporânea 7; tive reading of the manifesto at Casa dos Galos in Lisbon
the leaflet “Manifesto da Exposição de Amadeo Souza-Car- (Almada Negreiros 2013). In this context, we should mention
doso” [Manifesto for Amadeo e Souza-Cardoso’s Exhibition] Almada’s involvement with the ballets russes when Diaghilev’s
(1916), which accompanied Sousa-Cardoso’s exhibition in company toured the Coliseu and Teatro São Carlos in 1917
Portugal (Lisbon and Porto); the leaflet-visual poem “Litoral and 1918. Aside from the passionate manifesto Os Bailados
[Coastline]” (1916) and K4 O Quadrado Azul [K4 The Blue Russos em Lisboa [The Ballets Russes in Lisbon], the artist
››› Schneider p.51
Square], one of the masterpieces of Portuguese futurism. participated as a director, costume designer and dancer in

In these and other texts, the artist explored the performative such pieces as Bailado Encantamento [Enchantment Ballet],
potential of language in corporeal, plastic, auditory and plano- A Princesa dos Sapatos de Ferro [The Princess with the Iron
graphic terms by developing a spatial-temporal instantiation Shoes], Jardim de Pierrette [Pierrette’s Garden] and Carnaval
[Carnival], by Fokine and Bakst, becoming famous for his In 1916, Francisco Levita published the manifesto Negrei-
performances as Harlequin and Pierrot. ros-Dantas in Coimbra against the “volatile” lust of Almada
Negreiros in his disproportionate attention to Dantas, and
Among his most important performance-conferences is Arte, organized the iconoclastic “Banquete Futurista” [Futurist
a Dianteira [Art, the Frontline], one of his last, held at the Uni- Banquet] together with two of his friends at the Hotel Bussaco.
versity of Coimbra in 1965. It featured a close-up reproduc- The graphic and material performativity of the manifesto, in
tion of a canvas with the famous formula “1+1 = 1” hanging its performative arrangement of visual and spatial experiments
above his head (Almada Negreiros 2006, 343). In his graphic on the page and featuring the text on two folded leafs, in true

presentation of the concept of knowledge as absolute, in the futurist style, along with the experimental happening at Luso,
scope of which he defined art as vital drive, Negreiros pro- allow us once again to trace a vocation of Portuguese futurism
posed a notion of poetry as “voice” and “vocation”, coming for provocation, between intermedia experimentalism, perfor-
to the conclusion that “Poetry is the vigour of personal birth. / mance and language. A few years later, and in the same vein,
One is born a Poet. Everyone. Each one.” (Almada Negreiros the “Coimbra Futurist Movement”5 brought together public
2006, 321-2). This formula sums up Almada’s concept of art space intervention and the manifesto-conference. The beatific
106 as life, an operation in which language plays a primordial role. mission of the “sensational conference” subtitled “Sol” [Sun], 107
which resulted in a happening with programmatic intentions,
was to “exhort humanity to learn how to Be-itself” (S.1925,
5). The conference was presented, and duly baptized with cold
FOR A HISTORY OF EPIGONIC FUTURISM water from a fire-hose, at Teatro Sousa Bastos, in Coimbra, on
IN PORTUGAL 13 March 1925. The same militant intention is apparent in the
tone of the flyer and manifesto simply entitled “Manifesto”,
The studies on Portuguese futurism are unanimous as to its which opens with quotes by Marinetti and proposes “states of
fleetingness and intensity. However, a broader analysis of its mind to be lived in sequence” as well as “dances strong inter-
sociological-performative impact allows us to put this fleeting- sections planes sculptures”, because “forms are not inert but
ness into perspective and speak of an epigonic futurism. Sá- always moving” (quoted by Marnoto 2009, 28).
Carneiro’s suicide in Paris, in 1916, Santa Rita’s and Souza-
Cardoso’s deaths in 1918 and Almada’s departure for Paris in The main figure of this epigonic futurism is António Ferro.
1919 foretold the end of the first cycle. However, a last breath Well before joining the National Information Secretariat (sni),
can be identified in António Ferro’s publication of the mani- 5
Which included António Navarro (Príncipe de Judá), Abel Almada (Tristão de Teive), João
festo “Nós” [We] in 1921 and in the Coimbra group. Carlos Celestino Gomes (Pereira São-Pedro) and Mário Coutinho (Óscar).
Sá Carneiro’s high school friend and colleague brought togeth- tion personally distributed at the door of the Brasileira in the
er pose-theatre, writing and social-cultural intervention, which same year. In that text, written with a theatrical structure in
he cultivated through theatre, literature, cinema, journalism, a dialogue between “I” and “The Crowd”, the author calls for
the graphic arts, scenography, and even couture and decora- the creation of a global theatre – “That life may be a theatre
tion. The triad composed of theatricality, literature and public in white and gold…” in which every word is “a drop of blood”
space intervention, together with his futurist and modernist (Ferro 2006, 159). Then, in 1922 he presented the perfor-
spirit, culminated in a series of interventions and works that mance-conference “A Idade do Jazz-Band [The Age of the
are worth mentioning. Jazz-Band]” in Brazil, which culminated in a happening-con-

cert with a jazz orchestra and a dancer. In 1923, his experimen-
António Ferro’s notion of art can be elucidated by his words tal theatre play “Mar Alto” [High seas], briefly featuring Ferro
concerning the polemical demonstration on the “snba mat- as actor, was presented in Lisbon at the Teatro de São Carlos.
ter” at Chiado Terrasse, in Lisbon, on 18 December 1921: Echoing the Orpheu scandal, this controversial play was for-
bidden. Ferro also designed a Parisian-inspired studio-theatre
All Arts are plastic, all Arts can be reduced to to produce avant-garde plays and experimental scenographic
108 forms. Art is truly the outline of life. There is flow- projects. This dream came true in 1925 under the name Teatro 109
ing hair in a melody by Debussy, there is a ma- Novo at the foyer of Palácio Rivoli with an exuberant deco-
jestic andante in Rodin’s The Walking Man… ration by José Pacheko. The presentation of the plays Knock
In Art everything is plastic; in Art everything is or the Victory of Medicine, by Jules Romains and Right You Are
a body. A sonnet by Eugénio de Castro is plastic, (if you think so), by Luigi Pirandello, considered too bold for
Notre Dame is plastic; Ruskin’s prose is as plastic as Portuguese society of the time, led to the closing down of this
the plastic arts he writes about. In Art all is alive, in aspiring experimental theatre.
Art all is form. (quoted by Rodrigues 1995, 87)
Aside from Teoria da Indiferença [Theory of Indifference]

(1920), in which he states that “Life is the artist’s studio. / FINAL CONSIDERATIONS
Clothes are the posters of the body” (quoted by Henriques
1990,107), there was also the literary manifesto “Nós” (1921; Futurism proposes and brings to fruition a new relationship
the third manifesto of Portuguese futurism6), an author edi- between the word and its corporeal and technical material-
ity. Broadly speaking, its main contribution to the history of
6
Together with Almada’s “Ultimatum Futurista” and Álvaro de Campos’ “Ultimatum”. performance is the destabilizing of genres, the exploration of
literature as praxis, as well as an effective epistemological dia- years later concerning Almada there are “very few truly valid
logue between the arts. It is in this context that the manifesto, documents left from this past of already almost half a century
as performative and experimental language theatre, affirms it- ago that preserve the signature of the impetuous and indomi-
self as a catalysing event of the, and in the, public space. table talent of Almada” (Neves 2006, 36). The same could be
said of all the futurist actions mentioned here. Still, from the
Concerning the Portuguese case, it is symptomatic that José point of view of literary studies, the reception of modernism
de Almada Negreiros, in a retrospective exercise in his Orpheu has been mostly through the perspective of Orpheu and Fer-
1915-1965, repeatedly invokes the following set of nuclear nando Pessoa. As Osvaldo Manuel Silvestre has pointed out,

spaces of this avant-garde: its experimental character, “the en- “the futurist avant-garde calls not only for a critical or histo-
counter of letters and painting” (Almada Negreiros 2015, 24), riographical revisionism, but for methodological and discipli-
the “simultaneity of various kinds of knowledge” (idem, 19) nary rigour. The instrument of this revision is the concept of
and “plenitude, i.e., that the mental and sensible function is performance, or rather, the rereading of the avant-garde under
exercised in a ‘natural freedom’” (idem, 20). These are trans- its light” (2008, 878). In other words, choosing to study these
versal aspects to this history, the protagonists of which literally movements from the perspective of performance implies ques-
110 sacrificed their body Although futurism did not last in Portu- tioning that angle, requiring a redefinition of coordinates from 111
gal, the “sociological scandal” (Melo e Castro 1980, 42) that the literary field and from the arts themselves, namely regard-
it brought about cannot be overlooked in its lasting histori- ing the theoretical recognition and practical criticism of such
cal repercussions. Sharing an aesthetical revolutionary project concepts as intermedia literature and performance.
based on the principles of free art, literature as praxis and the
intersecting of the arts, defence of manifesto-action and radi- It is in the nature of performances and the avant-garde to start
cal and ontological questioning of the world, Portuguese fu- ending fast. The more ephemeral, the more apotheotic its pas-
turism is a unique and undeniable legacy in Portuguese art. sage and escape from time, the more it persists in a “future-de-
sire” (Melo e Castro 1980, 45) of persevering transformation.
The reasons for this lack of recognition, especially in the field As Almada wrote in his manifesto on Souza-Cardoso’s exhibi-
of performance, are threefold: a difficulty on the part of critics tion at Liga Naval in 1916: “We, the futurists, know nothing
to find a framework for art forms that challenged the episte- of History, we know only Life that passes us by” (2006, 20).
mological boundaries between art and life, the different artis- Performance defies loss insofar as its “deposited acts” and its
tic languages, art and science, and the past, present and future. “spectral meanings” (Schneider 2012, 71-72) last. One hun-
Its ephemeral character also amplified the loss, defying histori- dred years on, what we celebrate here is that performance of
cization and reception. As João Alves das Neves remarked a few art and life.
REFERENCES
ALMADA NEGREIROS, José de. 1935. «Fernando Pessoa – o poeta português». —. 2015. «O Intersecionismo Plástico de Orpheu». In Os Caminhos de Orpheu, edited
Diário de Lisboa 4689: 48. by Richard Zenith, Fátima Lopes and Manuela Rêgo, 75-84.
Lisbon: Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal; Babel.
—. 1959. «Amadeo de Souza-Cardozo». Diário de Lisboa 13 092: 17-20.
MCNEILL, Patrícia Silva. 2015. «Orpheu e Blast: Interseções do Modernismo Português
—. 2006. Manifestos e Conferências. Edited by Fernando Cabral Martins, Luís Manuel
e Inglês». In 1915: o ano do Orpheu, edited by Stephen Dix, 167-83.
Gaspar, Mariana Pinto dos Santos and Sara Afonso Ferreira. Lisbon: Assírio & Alvim.
Lisbon: Tinta-da-china.
—. 2013. Manifesto anti-dantas e por extenso. Edited by Sara Afonso Ferreira.
MELO e CASTRO, E. M. de. 1980. As Vanguardas na Poesia Portuguesa do Século XX.
Lisbon: Assírio & Alvim.
Biblioteca Breve. Amadora: Instituto de Cultura e Língua Portuguesa.
—. 2015. Orpheu 1915-1965. Lisbon: Ática.
NEVES, João Alves das. 2006. O Movimento Futurista em Portugal. 2nd ed. Lisbon:

ALMADA NEGREIROS, Maria José de. 1982. Conversas com Sarah Affonso. Dinalivro.
Lisbon: Arcádia.
NOBRE, Gustavo. 1990. «José Pacheko». In Portugal Futurista: Edição facsimilada, 7-16.
BERGHAUS, Günter. 2000. «Futurism, Dada and Surrealism: Some Cross-Fertilisations 4th ed. Lisboa: Contexto.
Among the Historical Avant-Gardes». In International Futurism in Arts and
PESSOA, Fernando. 1968. «Excertos de um inédito de Fernando Pessoa». Colóquio:
Literature, edited by Günter Berghaus, 271-304. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
Revista de Artes e Letras 48: 59-61.
COELHO, Ruy. 2015. «[Sobre Santa-Rita Pintor]». In Os Caminhos de Orpheu,
—. 1972. Páginas Íntimas e de Auto-Interpretação. Edited by Georg Rudolf Lind and
edited by Richard Zenith, Fátima Lopes and Manuela Rêgo, 92-93.
Jacinto do Prado Coelho. Lisbon: Ática.
Lisbon: Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal; Babel.
—. 1999. Correspondência: 1923-1935. Edited by Manuela Parreira da Silva.
DIAS, Sandra Guerreiro. 2016. O Corpo como Texto: Poesia, performance e
112 Lisbon: Assírio & Alvim. 113
experimentalismo nos anos 80 em Portugal. PhD Dissertation,
Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra. RODRIGUES, António. 1995. António Ferro na Idade do Jazz-Band.
Lisbon: Livros Horizonte.
DRUCKER, Johanna. 1998. «Visual Performance of the Poetic Text». In Close Listening:
Poetry and the Performed Word, edited by Charles Bernstein, 131-61. S., A. de. 1925. «O movimento futurista de Coimbra». Diário de Lisboa 1205: 5.
New York: Oxford University Press. SÁ-CARNEIRO, Mário de. 2001. Mário de Sá-Carneiro: Poemas completos.
FERRO, António. 2006. «Nós». In O Movimento Futurista em Portugal, by João Alves Edited by Fernando Cabral Martins. 2nd ed. Lisbon: Assírio & Alvim.
das Neves, 159-61. 2nd ed. Lisbon: Dinalivro. SCHNEIDER, Rebecca. 2012. «Performance Remains Again». In Archaeologies of
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Scores for the Body,
Building & Soul
for the São Luiz Teatro
AUTOR
AUTOR
114 115
Municipal, Lisbon
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
PERFORM THE PIECES IN ANY ORDER, BUT FOR BEST RESULTS DO THEM ALL.
DON’T BE PUT OFF BY THE HISTORICAL REFERENCES.IT IS ALL ABOUT YOU AND YOUR ACTUAL EXPERIENCE.
IF YOU ENJOY THIS, DO IT TWICE.
illustrations: Miriam Hempel (daretoknow.co.uk)
David Helbich
WOW, HUNTER S. THOMPSON
Hang head first over waist-high objects, like the bar counter
on the second floor or the staircase railing to the toilets.
Hang there for at least 30 seconds.
Actually, try even longer.
AUTOR
AUTOR
116 117
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
CHEERS VALIE EXPORT
Go to any particular architectural element present.
Press your body, your side, your back or your front firmly against this
element, as if you try to disappear into it.
Absorb your body, mind and soul into the element.
Finish with this one:

Go to the landing of the main staircase.
Lay down on the floor and squeeze yourself “under” the last step.
Try briefly to forget, where you are.
YVONNE RAINER IS IN THE HOUSE WALL SEX I
Do this in one naturally slow and fluid movement. On the ground floor, to the right of the main entrance,
go to the cloakroom on the left side of the theater
Go stand in front of one of the old heaters – directly lift your space, hidden behind a wall in the corner.
right foot from the floor – stretch this leg to the back – put
your left arm all the way behind the heater – touch the ground Go to this wall and touch both sides of the wall with
with the tip of the lifted foot and make a movement as if you one hand on each side, so that your forehead is
stub out a cigarette – also shove the right arm behind the pressed lightly against the short end of the wall.
heater – slowly turn your face, probably squeezed against
the wall, to the other side. Hold this position for a bit. Try to find the location of the other hand on the other
side and press both hands “together”. Slide both hands
Get out of this position by taking out the left arm – slowly turn lightly over the wall, in sync and exactly not in sync.
your body to the left away from the heater – while leaving pull out
the right arm without looking at it – leave the heater Keep caressing. Enjoy every smallest bit of the wall.
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locationat a slow pace – look back only once. Much later: lick your palms clean, libidinously.
Go to another heater, on another floor and repeat the phrase.

118 119
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120 121
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PILLAR HUG
WALL SEX II
HURRAY, ANDREA FRASER HOLY MOLY GUACAMOLE,
Grab the round walls on the ground floor to the right of the main ALL YOU BEAUTIFUL HIPPIES!
entrance. Spread your arms wide open, grab as much of it as ALRIGHT, MARINA ABRAMOVIĆ,
possible. And even more. Feel the tension within your wide reaching DOES IT WORK OUT, LADY GAGA?
hug. Think of the wall as part of a huge body. Start playing with Hug the pillar on the second floor. Give it a good, warm, strong
the pressure of your finger tips. Later, lift one leg and write a and long hug. Close your eyes and count to 40, slowly.
name with your foot on the wall, carefully, but with dedication. Project yourself inside the pillar.
HELLO BRUCE NAUMAN, NICE TO MEET YOU, DAN GRAHAM
HOW DO YOU DO, AKIO SUZUKI Go to any bathroom in the building and stand in front of the sink.
Squeeze yourself into narrow corners, like, on the second floor, Look straight at the reflection in the mirror.
the corner of the cloakroom. Face the corner and stand very Ignore yourself.
close to it. Touch both walls with your forehead and shoulders.
Stay like this for at least one minute. Slowly move your head out
of the corner. Start really slowly to bounce back and forth.
Consider the changes of the sound reflections as micro-changes.

Imagine your head being a huge ball racing through a space
of moving molecules; think of a centimeter as a meter.
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CHECK THIS, NSA WINDOWS
Press your ear against the loge-door number 24. Stand in front of the big window on the first floor that looks
Do this hard and light. And hard again. out over the city. Find a spot to look out of the window in a way
Make some mental notes and leave. that the frames fit exactly the lines of the buildings behind.
Once you found what you were looking for, hold this body posture
for 10 seconds. Observe, how you become self-conscious.
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MANY WORLDS EARTH HUG YOGA GREETS
In the hall behind the main entrance, go to the inside windows MONTY PYTHON’S STREET CLIMBING
that go to the new part of the building. Stand on the small Lay on your belly on the floor of the entrance hall in the middle of
strip of the floor that slopes very slightly downwards. Stand the red carpet, arms wide spread. Press your ear at the floor, tightly.
in a perfect 90 degrees angle to this plane of the slope. Slowly move your arms in half circles, concentrating on your finger tips.
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HIYA! GERHARD RICHTER WHAT’S UP, VITO ACCONCI
Walk down the stairs, as if you were in deep thought. Look for a more or less private space.
Have an erotic moment by yourself.
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128 129
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PERFORMANCE
AS ART AND
CELEBRATION:
DEMOCRATIZATION,
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130
COLLECTIVE EVENTS 131
AND PUBLIC SPACE

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Isabel Nogueira
The final years of the corporative dictatorship were charac-
terised by mounting crisis. The political and economic crisis,
compounded by the 1973 global oil crisis, turned into a social
crisis in an increasingly claustrophobic and depressed coun-
try. But what happened in the visual arts during those years?
According to historians such as João Pinharanda and António
Rodrigues, the Portuguese 1960s were decisive for the develop-
ment of art, being defined by an attempt to establish a dialogue
with, and accompany, the international trends of the moment
in a country that was clearly peripheral. As João Pinharanda
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wrote: “the 1960s are the most decisive years in Portuguese
art, only comparable to the 1910s – they could be said to have
been a ‘second foundational decade”’ (Pinharanda 1995, 602).
This reflection focuses on the moment that followed the According to António Rodrigues, the 1960s were a privileged
132 25 April 1974 Revolution. More specifically, it is set against decade because of the innovative notions of image and sign, 133
a background that saw the emergence of certain artistic and along with the conceptual and perceptual foundations of the
cultural issues in Portugal at the time. Political openness was object. This innovation was not related to the socio-material
linked to the movement that opened up public and collective conditions of Portuguese artistic life of the time, but to the cul-
space, but also to Celebration (Festa) understood as sharing tural stance of artists and artworks (Anos 60, Anos de Rupturas
and artistic experimentation. In fact, collective events, partic- 1994), i.e., to an effective autonomy of individuals and works
ularly in the context of the visual arts, were a constant dur- and a quest for new horizons of experimentation.
ing those years (R. Gonçalves, 1992). It was as if, in tandem
with regime openness – with its political, social, cultural and However, according to Bernardo Pinto de Almeida, and de-
artistic implications – a similar movement was possible in spite the fact that the 1960s constituted a period of fundamental
the visual arts – particularly concerning their performativity. changes, they were not years of rupture because Portuguese art
This movement was manifested in some collective events that had undergone a long change in status, function and intention
were important not only for the period at hand but which also away from the ideological purity of historical modernism, which
had implications for the history of Portuguese art in its con- was accompanied by an international process that questioned the
nection with the specific revolutionary moment and the broad- very concept of avant-garde (Almeida 1999). Indeed, the decade
er movement of the international neo-avant-garde. proved a crucial period, with the developments in pop art, con-
ceptual art, new figuration – often preceded by informalism –, had left for specifically political reasons. The vast majority had
optical art, land art, process art, performance art, assemblage, etc. left mainly for artistic, intellectual, lifestyle or didactic reasons,
illustrating the ongoing problems of Portuguese cultural and
This fragmentation associated with a creative individualism artistic life, and did not return. In fact, and from the artistic
was due to contact with the exterior through émigré artists – point of view, a pulverizing individual change had been un-
especially after 1957 (with the financial support of the Calouste derway since the 1960s or even the 1950s led by artists who,
Gulbenkian Foundation), there were brief visits to the most independently of their political-geographic space, effectively
influential artistic centres, contact with specialized foreign wanted to be modern, which runs against belief (that was nat-
magazines, direct or indirect contact of journalists and critics urally experienced during the revolutionary period) in the pio-
with major events abroad, and exhibitions of internationally neering impetus of politics over art.
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renowned artists in Portugal (although few and far between).
With few exceptions, from the point of view of the publishing
The first major aspect to highlight was a certain autonomiza- and circulation of art and culture, Portuguese periodicals did
tion of the visual arts vis-à-vis the chronology of political events, not pay any in-depth attention to these themes, and even more
134 which was underway as a process of activation of creative in- so at a time of freedom of speech. In fact, politics dominated 135
dividualities. An understandable historical optimism emerged the order of the day. In this context, the magazine Colóquio/Artes
in the wake of two crucial moments: the so-called Marcelist played a unique role in Portugal. However, other publications
spring and, above all, the April Revolution. However, numer- dealing with artistic questions are also worth mentioning, such
ous artists tried to be modern and pursue modernity, regard- as the magazine Arte/Opinião (launched in 1978 by the stu-
less of the geographical space they occupied or the very real dents of the Lisbon School of Fine Arts), and the magazines
limitations of the Portuguese artistic milieu. Opção (Lisbon 1976-1978), Brotéria (Lisbon, 1925-1999) and
Revista de Artes Plásticas (published by Galeria Alvarez, Porto).
In 1974, the military coup occurred that ended forty-eight
years of dictatorship and the 1933 Constitution. The anti- As for artistic and museologic institutions, aside from the So-
democratic, colonialist, isolated and authoritarian regime fell. ciedade Nacional de Belas-Artes, it is worth mentioning the
However, unlike what might have been expectable, the funda- Portuguese Section of aica, which had been founded in 1955
mental political and social changes operating in a closed, con- and restructured in 1969. A series of important aica/snba
servative country were not by themselves a determining factor exhibitions were organized in 1972 and, in 1981, the aica/
for the development of the visual arts. With the April Revolu- sec (Secretaria de Estado da Cultura) Award was launched.
tion, the only artists who returned to Portugal were those who Other institutions were equally important, such as the Coope-
rativa Árvore (Porto), founded in 1963; the Círculo de Artes era of mural paintings, many of them anonymous and sponta-
Plásticas de Coimbra (capc), established in 1958; and Galeria neous, which unexpectedly invaded the public space.
Ogiva, founded in Óbidos in 1970. However, there were no
modern or contemporary art museums in Portugal at the time. Despite the difficulty, or even the inability of the State, to de-
The National Museum of Contemporary Art/ Chiado Muse- vise a structuring and coherent cultural policy, there was an
um, which had been set up in May 1911, would only reopen, investment in cultural promotion campaigns capable of bring-
after several setbacks, in 1994. However, in 1976 an impor- ing together the State, the Armed Forces Movement (mfa),
tant institution in this context was founded in Porto, the Cen- the National Salvation Junta, the people and the artists.
tro de Arte Contemporânea (cac), which between 1976 and As mentioned earlier, collective actions in the public space were
1980 was located at the Museu Nacional de Soares dos Reis a characteristic of the moment. Therefore, I shall pay specific
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directed by Fernando Pernes. According to the historian and attention to those which best qualify as artistic and performa-
art critic José-Augusto França, cac was “the best creation of tive processes of creativity, and even of Celebration and shar-
the 25 April regime” (1983, 409). As for the Calouste Gulben- ing at a historical moment that brought together political and
kian Foundation’s Centro de Arte Moderna (cam), after many social issues and artistic and aesthetical questions, especially
136 years of waiting, it was finally opened in 1983. This points to those linked to the generic movement of the international neo- 137
a structural stagnation that was not immediately solved by the avant-garde. That is the juncture in which we can locate some
1974 Revolution. of the most particular and significant artistic production of the
period and even of the 1970s.
However, there can be no doubt that the fundamental democ-
ratization of the country was, as expected, a special space for At this moment of mutation and intense and novel experienc-
artistic possibilities. The 25 April Revolution brought about a ing of the public space, I would like to highlight the collective
serious militant approach by a substantial number of artists. actions of two important groups of artists who sought freedom
There was an intense commitment to the notion of culture “at of intervention and creation: Grupo Acre (“Art for everyone”,
the service of the People” (Chicó 1984, 20-21). This was the between 1974 and 1977, including Alfredo Queiroz Ribeiro,
time of slogans and counter-slogans: “Fascist art is a visual Clara Menéres and Joaquim Lima Carvalho, among other col-
fart” (Marcelino Vespeira) – a proclamation at the event organ- laborators) and Grupo Puzzle (“Counter-current”, between
ized by the Movimento Democrático de Artistas Plásticos, at 1975 and 1981, including Albuquerque Mendes, Armando
Foz Palace on 28 May 1974 (mdap 1974) –, “Against aggres- Azevedo, Carlos Carreiro, Dario Alves, Graça Morais, Jaime
siveness, creativeness” or “Aesthetical quality is progressive; Silva, João Dixo, Pedro Rocha and, later on, Fernando Pinto
mediocrity is reactionary” (Salette Tavares). This was also the Coelho and Gerardo Burmester).
In their own way, both were carriers of a plastic-performative
language with a conceptual bent and a concern for social and
artistic intervention, which was innovative in the Portuguese
context. Regarding Grupo Acre and their actions, Ernesto de
Sousa wrote in 1975: “Grupo Acre was built after 25 April as
a serene and conscious attitude. […] The two ‘actions’ carried
out by the group so far (painting the pavement of Rua do Car-
mo, in Lisbon, and rolling out a strip of plastic from the top
of Torre dos Clérigos, in Porto) required collaboration and, in
the second case, complicit participation. […] Grupo Acre is a
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project, and only projects are consistent. Today. Like the revo-
lution. Everything else is outdated. When Grupo Acre rolled
out a strip of plastic from the top of Torre dos Clérigos it was
the dazzling body of Clara Semide that extended out… As well
138 as [the body] of other companions. And our own, as we start to 139
understand all this. Extended (by the invented appropriation)
of Nasoni’s architecture, of Porto, of the City, of the Country,
of Dream, of Utopia. And this is worth as much, or more, than
painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel” [Sousa 1975, 41).
As for Grupo Puzzle, it was born in Porto, in December 1975,

presented in early 1976 at a dinner/intervention at Galeria
Alvarez (Porto) and disseminated at the 3rd International Art
Encounters (August 1976) in Póvoa de Varzim. In 1977, Egí-
dio Álvaro wrote about the group:
I think that underneath the whole activity of the Group there

is a polemic attitude […]. It is polemic because they choose
difficulty, and by doing so belong to the counter-current Acção dos Círculos – Guerrilha Urbana [Action of the Circles – Urban Guerrilla]
Rua do Carmo, Lisbon, August 1974. Intervention by Grupo Acre / Photograph: Clara Menéres
that shuns the facility, be it more or less official, more or falta legenda traduzida
less academic, more or less opportunistic, that was of- Founded in 1958, capc was also remarkably active in that pe-
fered to those who are more apt and ambitious at walking riod. With the aim of promoting contemporary visual arts and
the corridors of power. […] While in the last two years the raising public awareness regarding their fruition, they promot-
stress has been exclusively on political intervention, Puzzle ed experimental, performative and pedagogic programmes and
dare to talk about themselves, about family and everyday activities. To a great extent, this experimental activity became
problems, about the problems of art, about current myths intertwined with that of Ernesto de Sousa, a central catalys-
and taboos (the national flag is just one among many) and ing figure of many of the most important activities and exhibi-
even, and also, about politics, which is seen from an ironic, tions of the 1970s. The first or one of the first contacts between
critical, dangerous point of view […]. The primacy of ideas both took place in 1972 at the Galeria Ogiva, in Óbidos, which
over technique […]. The intense desire to establish an open celebrated its second anniversary. Ernesto de Sousa showed
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dialogue with the components of our culture and with the and spoke about the images he had brought from Documenta 5
masses that are removed from art […]. For all this it seems (where he had met and interviewed Joseph Beuys) and Darm-
to me that Grupo Puzzle occupy a position at the avant- stadt in a conference that saw the intense participation of the
garde of the art field. elements of capc (Diniz 2005, 3). As for Ernesto de Sousa, the
140 (Álvaro 1977, 18-20). episode spurred the first text that he wrote about the Coimbra 141
collective: An intervention-like-the-name-of-Joseph-Beuys [Ag-
In this period, an event that stands out specifically was the Inter- gression with the Name of J. Beuys], which could have turned
national Art Encounters, promoted mainly by critic, curator and sour. But that is how it can go when one finds valid interlocu-
gallerist Egídio Alves and by the Galeria Alvarez (and amply dis- tors instead of a passive, masochistic audience which even ap-
seminated by Revista de Artes Plásticas), which began in 1974 in plauds and pretends to feel insulted.The Círculo de Belas-Artes
Valadares (Casa da Carruagem) and continued in the following (is this really their name?) de Coimbra were present, and their
year in Viana do Castelo, then in Póvoa do Varzim, in 1976, and presence enlivened a dialogue that was exceedingly more im-
in Caldas da Rainha in 1977 (Gonçalves 1977a; 1977b; 1992). portant than many ex cathedra pedagogical flights. “A dialogue
The primary intention of these events was to gather national that perhaps promises a whole future” (Sousa 1973, 4).
and foreign artists – Alfredo Queiroz, Alberto Carneiro, Ângelo
de Sousa, Carlos Barreira, Espiga Pinto, Fernando Lanhas, João In fact, a fertile joint work space had formed between Ernesto
Dixo, Christian Parisot, Pineau and Serge Oldenbourg, among de Sousa, Alberto Carneiro, António Barros, Armando Azeve-
others – in a series of round tables, debates, interventions and do, João Dixo, Rui Órfão, Túlia Saldanha and others (Noguei-
exhibitions focusing on such questions as “art and revolution” ra 2005a; 2005b). The activities of capc extended to exhibi-
and “new trends and the avant-garde” (Álvaro 1975). tions, aesthetical interventions/operations and performances,
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Semana da Arte (da) na Rua [A Week of Art (of) in the Street], Coimbra, Círculo de Artes
Plásticas de Coimbra, 1976. Photograph: courtesy of Círculo de Artes Plásticas de Coimbra
including A Floresta (Porto, Galeria Alvarez, 1973; Lisbon, On the subject of another activity by capc, Arte na Rua [Art in
Galeria Nacional de Arte Moderna/Alternativa Zero, 1977), the Street] (Coimbra, 1974), Ernesto de Sousa wrote: “[No-
Homenagem a Josefa de Óbidos (Óbidos, Galeria Ogiva, 1973), tice] the exaggeration. For instance, to live in Coimbra, to be
Minha (Tua, Dele, Nossa Vossa), Coimbra Deles (Coimbra, capc, from Coimbra, ‘our city that belongs to them’, and to dare a
1973), 1 000 011.º Aniversário da Arte – Ernesto de Sousa de- (visual) activity that may go beyond the limits (of the City, of
veloped this work jointly with capc based on Robert Filliou’s the street) and returns people to the lost dimension (to Para-
original idea – and Arte na Rua (Coimbra capc, 1974), Sema- dise Lost)… to Celebration [Festa] – that is the example of the
na da Arte (da) na Rua (Coimbra, capc, 1976), Cores (by the most complete exaggeration, of the clearest modernity, […]
capc Intervention Group, Coimbra, Caldas da Rainha, Lis- ‘art can be life’” (Sousa 1976, 70).
bon, 1977-1978) (Sousa 1980; Azevedo 2005).
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Experimentation went hand in hand with a new path strewn
In Ernesto de Sousa’s opinion, the group was “the only ‘arts with new approaches and appropriations in a context of live cel-
society’ in the country with a workshop spirit” (Sousa 1976, ebration – Festa – in a totalizing, encompassing and performa-
70). This idea is also reflected in a text by the same author on tive sense. This experience and clear sense of experimentation,
144 the activity of Guerra das Tintas [War of Paints] with the title particularly in the collective public space, and nurtured by the 145
“The avant-garde is in Coimbra, the avant-garde is in you”: democratization of the country, was the hallmark of the Por-
tuguese 1970s. Indeed, in parallel with the Portuguese politi-
CAP or C.A.P. these are the letters to keep in mind by readers cal and social moment, artistic supports (such as video, 8mm
travelling to Coimbra and wishing to talk under the “pretext film, performative body work and the “actions” of “aesthetical
of art” with “art people”. Action arts, fine arts, dark arts operators”) expanded, were recreated and gained a new op-

of freedom: to meet oneself and others. […] What matters erability and consistency. Modes of expression contaminated

is not the whole dreariness of techniques and alienation, one another freely and assertively. The Portuguese 1970s, es-
a convolutedly pre-built and pre-established beauty, that pecially in the wake of the creative freedom brought about by
path leading to all the Academies (and, of course, to mar- the Revolution, were therefore determining and defining of a
ket economy). What matters is that discovery, which can rich and intense time, unique in the broader context of Portu-
only be achieved in a full exercise of body and mind, hands guese and even western art (Nogueira 2005).


and head. Such exercise is the everyday practice of CAPC.
(Sousa 1974, 4,6) However, it is also important to reflect upon an event that was
encompassing and far reaching. The exhibition Alternativa
Zero: Tendências Polémicas na Arte Portuguesa Contemporânea
Círculo de Artes Plásticas de Coimbra at Alternativa Zero:
Tendências Polémicas na Arte Portuguesa Contemporânea [Alternativa Zero:
Polemical Trends in Portuguese Contemporary Art], 1977
Photograph: courtesy of The Estate of Ernesto de Sousa, Lisbon
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[Alternativa Zero: polemical trends in Portuguese contempo- was crucial to the event’s purpose (Alternativa Zero 1977; Per-
rary art], organized by Ernesto de Sousa in 1977, in Lisbon, spectiva: Alternativa Zero 1997).
was the most significant and broadest group exhibition1 of the
1970s. Its aim was to analyse the concept of the avant-garde For Ernesto de Sousa, the purpose of the exhibition was to
and its issues (Nogueira 2007; 2008). In fact, Alternativa Zero fight the isolation of Portuguese artists and critics – both those
was accompanied by three smaller exhibitions, also organized living abroad and those living in Portugal – and to foster a
by Ernesto de Sousa, which took place alongside the main ex- critical perspective and a commitment to moving away from
hibition. These were A Vanguarda e os Meios de Comunicação: commercial interests and the dogmatic attitude of salon critics
O Cartaz [Avant-garde and the media: the poster], which (Alternativa Zero 1977). The benchmark for selection was the
evoked several “avant-garde” shows abroad, namely by Fluxus; formation of a group that represented “only itself”. The art-
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Os Pioneiros do Modernismo em Portugal [The pioneers of mod- ists came from previous experiences (deliberately mentioned
ernism in Portugal], a photographic and documental exhi- earlier in this text), such as Do Vazio à Pró-Vocação [From void
bition focusing on the first Portuguese modernism and the to pro-vocation] (aica/snba, 1972), Projectos-Ideias (aica/
figures of Almada Negreiros, Eduado Viana and Santa Rita snba, 1974) and Semana da Arte (da) na Rua [A week of art
148 Pintor); and A Floresta [The Forest] (a walk-in paper strip in- (of) in the street] (1976), as well as from individual activities. 149
stallation by capc, which worked in tandem with pieces by Looking at the names of the participants one finds members of
Albuquerque Mendes, Armando Azevedo and Túlia Saldanha). capc, Grupo Acre, Grupo Puzzle and Quatro Vintes, but not
The core references of the exhibition were laid out as being the the regular participants in the International Art Encounters.
international (neo) avant-garde, the first Portuguese modern- As for José-Augusto França, here is how he wrapped up his
ism and some “avant-garde” collective actions in Portugal at column in Diário de Lisboa newspaper: “To start from zero is
the time. The artistic and conceptual trajectory of the exhibi- extremely hard and dangerous. To begin with this, because it is
tion curator, in terms of the connection to the avant-garde, dangerous and hard to reach Zero, set as a point of departure,
and which often, if not always, is everything but zero… How-
ever, the truth is that my friend Ernesto de Sousa has no other
1
Alberto Carneiro, Albuquerque Mendes, Álvaro Lapa, Ana Hatherly, Ana Vieira, André Go-
alternative” (França 1977b, 3).
mes, Ângelo de Sousa, António Lagarto, António Palolo, António Sena, Armando Azevedo,
Artur Varela, Clara Menéres, Constança Capdeville, Da Rocha, Ernesto de Mello e Cas-
tro, Ernesto de Sousa, Fernando Calhau, Graça Pereira Coutinho, Helena Almeida, Joana
Rosa, João Brehm, João Vieira, Jorge Peixinho, Jorge Pinheiro, José Carvalho, José Con-
The vast number of participants and the specificities of each
duto, José Rodrigues, Julião Sarmento, Júlio Bragança, Leonel Moura, Lisa Santos Silva/ work enhanced the artistic and aesthetical possibilities of the
Lisa Chaves Ferreira, Manuel Alvess, Manuel Casimiro, Mário Varela, Nigel Coates, Noronha
da Costa, Pedro Andrade, Pires Vieira, Robin Fior, Salette Tavares, Sena da Silva, Túlia Sal-
exhibition. Among disparate works, leaning towards an in-
danha, Victor Belém and Vítor Pomar. ternational neo-avant-garde, eventually with a temporal dis-
tancing from the events at major artistic centres and the fore- not intervene, and the event was restricted to an intellectual
shadowing of post-modern issues that Jean-François Lyotard and elitist class (J. Silva 1977; Listopad 1977; R. Sousa 1977).
would begin to voice in 1979, Alternativa Zero defined a mo- As an example, Heitor Prato (1977, 5) wrote that the exhibi-
ment. There were also music events – with Constança Cap- tion remained at the level of the accessory, the facile and the
deville, Jorge Peixinho, Lídia Cabral, Pedro Cabral, Grupo de superficial and “[…] judging by the public at the opening, only
Música Contemporânea de Lisboa, Grupo ColecViva, Grupo snobbish freaks will visit”.
adac and the Porto group AnarBande and Jorge Lima Bar-
reto (França 1977a) – children workshops, performances, in- To conclude, the selected events, and particularly Alternativa
terventions by the audience, conferences – the most notorious Zero – for its intensifying and unifying character regarding the
was probably André Gomes’ lecture O culto da vanguarda… or experiences of the decade constituted privileged spaces – at
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the importance of being Earnest [The cult of the avant-garde…or times polemical – for the mixing, interaction and overcom-
the importance of being Earnest] –, the presence of the Living ing of language boundaries – theatre, performance, painting,
Theatre in Belém and their actions at Museu de Nacional de sculpture, video, photography, music, intermedia – that were
Arte Antiga or São Miguel Square in Alfama, dinner parties, to a certain extent new in Portugal, especially when experi-
150 etc. (Sousa 1977). This wide range of activities can be justi- enced within a context of freedom, in the Celebration [Festa] 151
fied by Ernesto de Sousa’s defence of the “open artwork” (in welcomed by the public space. The art of the 1970s must be
the wake of Umberto Eco) as anti-academic, anti-elitist, unfin- understood as carrying its own language. Like all art it is natu-
ished and participative. rally influenced by the past and in some cases, it casts predic-
tions (post-modern, referential, ironic) about the future. How-
As to the reaction of the critics to the exhibition, what could ever, it does so by clearly affirming the present in its political,
be garnered of Alternativa Zero in 1977? Firstly, the undeni- social, cultural and artistic complexity.
able significance of the event (Coelho 1977; Porfírio 1977a;
1977b). Despite a discontentment regarding the lack of criti-
cal reflection – as Ernesto de Sousa observed in an overview
– the exhibition garnered supporters and opponents. By and
large, all the commentaries tended to accept the unusual na-
ture of the event, which was atypical in Portugal. Some saw
it as a milestone and a challenge within the Portuguese artis-
tic milieu (H. Silva 1977); others criticized it for the real lack
of alternative that it proposed, since allegedly the public did
REFERENCES
ALMEIDA, Bernardo Pinto de. 1999. «Os anos sessenta ou o princípio do fim do —. 2008. «Alternativa Zero» (1977): O reafirmar da possibilidade de criação.
processo da modernidade». In Panorama: Arte portuguesa no século XX, 213-49. Coimbra: CESIS20/Universidade de Coimbra.
Porto: Fundação de Serralves/Campo das Letras. —. 2015. Artes Plásticas e Crítica em Portugal nos Anos 70 e 80: Vanguarda e pós-
Alternativa Zero: Tendências Polémicas na Arte Portuguesa Contemporânea. 1977. -modernismo. 2nd ed. Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade.
Lisbon: Secretaria de Estado da Cultura. Exhibition catalogue. PATO, Heitor Baptista. 1977. «Alternativa Zero. Da mortificação do dadaísmo ao fricassé
ÁLVARO, Egídio. 1977. «Grupo Puzzle». Revista de Artes Plásticas 7/8: 18-20. sem ponta de frango». O Dia 369: 5.
ÁLVARO, Egídio et al. 1975. «Encontros Internacionais de Arte em Valadares». Perspectiva: Alternativa Zero. 1997. Porto: Fundação de Serralves. Exhibition catalogue.
Revista de Artes Plásticas 6: 8-18. PINHARANDA, João. 1995. «Anos 60: a multiplicação das possibilidades».
Anos 60, Anos de Rupturas: Uma perspectiva da arte portuguesa nos anos sessenta. In História da Arte Portuguesa: Do barroco à contemporaneidade, 3, 602-11.
1994. Lisbon: Sociedade Lisboa 94/Livros Horizonte. Exhibition catalogue. Lisbon: Círculo de Leitores.
ISABEL NOGUEIRA
ISABEL NOGUEIRA
AZEVEDO, Armando. 2005. «A Irmandade do CAPC de 70». Rua Larga 10: 11. PORFÍRIO, José Luís. 1977a. «Alternativa Zero: A vanguarda e os mitos».
Brotéria: Cultura e Informação 5/6: 555-65.
CHICÓ, Sílvia. 1984. «As artes depois de Abril».
JL: Jornal de Letras, Artes e Ideias 94: 20-21. —. 1977b. «Que fazer com a Alternativa Zero?» O Jornal 98.
COELHO, Eduardo Prado. 1977. «Alternativa Zero: artes plásticas, que ideia! Digamos SILVA, Helena Vaz da. 1977. «Alternativa Zero». «Revista»/Expresso, 25 March.
de outro modo: a plasticidade do desejo modulando-se sob todas as formas do SILVA, Jorge Alves da. 1977. «Como Alternativa o Zero». «Revista»/Expresso, 25 March.
imprevisto». Opção 46: 41.
SOUSA, Ernesto de. 1973. «Dois anos». Lorenti’s 12: 4, 54-55.
152 DINIZ, Victor. 2005. «O Círculo de Artes Plásticas de Coimbra». Rua Larga 10: 2-7. 153
—. 1974. «A vanguarda está em Coimbra, a vanguarda está em ti». Lorenti’s 20: 4, 6.
FRANÇA, José-Augusto. 1977a. «Alternativa Zero». Informação Cultural 3: 19-22.
—. 1975. «O Grupo Acre e a apropriação». Vida Mundial 1845: 41.
—. 1977b. «A Alternativa e o Zero». Diário de Lisboa 19 307: 3.
—. 1976. «Arte na Rua». Colóquio/Artes 29: 70.
—. 1984/1993. Quinhentos Folhetins. 2 vols. Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda.
—. 1977. «The Living Theatre – sempre inadequado». Colóquio/Artes 33: 32-39.
GONÇALVES, Eurico. 1977a. «IV Encontros Internacionais de Arte em Portugal».
SOUSA, Rocha de. 1977. «Alternativa Zero: para além das más assimilações e saloísmos,
Informação Cultural 5: 50-53.
o mérito de lançar a polémica». Opção 47: 54-55.
—. 1977b. «IV Encontros Internacionais de Arte nas Caldas da Rainha».
SOUSA, Teixeira de. 1980. «Olhar… entre aspas». Fenda, September.
Colóquio/Artes 34: 71-73.
—. 1992. «O 25 de Abril e as artes plásticas». «Caderno 2»/Diário de Notícias, 44 959.
GONÇALVES, Rui Mário. 1992. «Artes plásticas: do colectivismo ao individualismo».
Em Portugal Contemporâneo 6, 325-34. Lisbon: Publicações Alfa.
LISTOPAD, Jorge. 1977. «Alternativa sem alternativa». «Revista»/Expresso, 25 March.
Movimento Democrático de Artistas Plásticos (MDAP). 1974. «MDAP: a arte fascista faz
mal à vista». Flama 1370: 40-41.
NOGUEIRA, Isabel. 2005a. «Ernesto de Sousa e a promoção das vanguardas em
Portugal». Nu 24: 23-26.
—. 2005b. «O Círculo de Artes Plásticas de Coimbra nos anos setenta: “A vanguarda
está em Coimbra, a vanguarda está em ti”». Arquivo Coimbrão 38: 169-82.
—. 2007. Do Pós-Modernismo à Exposição «Alternativa Zero». Lisbon: Vega.
To trade
everything
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FIRST PUBLISHED (EXCERPTS AND IMAGES) IN AÇÕES ELEONORA FABIÃO,
ED. ELEONORA FABIÃO AND ANDRÉ LEPECKI, 2015. RIO DE JANEIRO: TAMANDUÁ ARTE
(ALSO PUBLISHED IN ENGLISH BY THE SAME PUBLISHER AS ACTIONS ELEONORA FABIÃO).
HERE I EXTEND THE PRESENTATION OF “TROCO TUDO” [TO TRADE EVERYTHING],
ONE OF THE MANY ACTIONS FEATURED IN THIS BOOK. FOR FURTHER
INFORMATION ON THE PUBLICATION, CF. ELEONORAFABIAO.COM.BR.
Eleonora Fabião
PROGRAM:1 low inflatable balloon, said the man in the shadow of Capistrano de
Abreu’s statue. I’d like to trade my health but there’s no way to do it.
To approach strangers and ask: “Will you trade something with me? Listen, I want the jacket you traded with her over there. So go over
I give you something of mine, something I’m wearing or carrying, there and try to trade it with her. Joana, come over here, you’ll like
and you receive it. You give me something in exchange, and I re- this! Capistrano de Abreu was one of Brazil’s first great historians;
ceive it.” The action is only finished when I have traded everything he also worked with ethnography and linguistics.He believed in so-
I had in the beginning. ciological determinism and his research was aimed at discovering
“the fatal laws that rule Brazilian society”. Come back early tomor-
I want this yellow inflatable balloon, said the man in the shadow of row and bring more stuff. Wait, sit here for a while, let’s exchange
Capistrano de Abreu’s statue. In exchange, I’ll give you these brand- ideas. Do you want to trade your two small earrings for a big one?
new shorts. No way, I won’t trade anything that is on my body. Is I lost its pair. Check in your purse. What do you really want? What
it because of religion? I can see you have a R$ 2.00 reais bill; do do you want from me? What do you want in exchange? Here, take
you wanna trade it for this bra? Take my shorts, they’re sweaty but a stone. Give one, take one. Give-and-take. A t-shirt for a t-shirt.
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they’re new. I do not trade anything, my dear. Not interested. Don’t Fits perfectly. A bit tight, but ok. It squeezes me, it is suffocating.
want to. I want this yellow inflatable balloon, said the man in the Not today, thank you. Nowadays things are not like they used to be.
shadow of Capistrano de Abreu’s statue. But what is this? Why do Nothing is worth anything. This is priceless. Everything has a price.
156 you do this? What for? Is it a theatre play? I have this nail polish. Everything, no matter how small, has its value. Where is that green 157
I can trade this tiny calculator; it works marvellously. I have a duster t-shirt, did you already trade it? Do you think it’s a fair trade? Listen
but it’s no good for dusting, is that all right? Why loss? Isn’t your darling, there’s no justice. I have never seen it, I have never found
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business to trade everything? Here’s the deal: first you should ask it, there’s no such thing. I have to warn you that this watch tends
the price of the thing next to the one you really want, as if you were to run fast. But how fast? About fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes
interested in that thing; only then, you’ll ask for the price of what doesn’t make much difference.
you truly want to buy, get it? Let me ask you something: do you
re-trade what you’ve traded before? No, I take it home and I use
it; and, if it is something to eat, I eat it. What about a pen? Wait,
let me check if it works. Do you want a bit? It’s really tasty. Where’s
the bin? There is no bin here, just throw it there. I want this yel-
1
I call the compositional procedure which I have been developing and practicing for the
last ten years “performative program”. On this subject, cf. Fabião (2013).
ELEONORA FABIÃO
ELEONORA FABIÃO
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Ação Fortalezense #3: troco tudo [Fortalezense Action #3: to trade everything] – Lagoinha square and vicinity,
Fortaleza (International Ceará Dance Biennial/De Par Em Par, 2010) / Photograph: Victor Furtado
ELEONORA FABIÃO
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160 161
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Ação Rio-Pretense #3: troco tudo [Rio-Pretense Action #3: to trade everything] – Dom José Marcondes square,
Rodoviária and surroundings, São José do Rio Preto (Festival Internacional de Teatro, 2019) / Photograph: André Lepecki
ELEONORA FABIÃO
ELEONORA FABIÃO
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Série Precários: troco tudo [Precarious Series: to trade everything] – São Cristóvão Fair and surroundings, Rio de Janeiro (2013) / Photograph: Felipe Ribeiro
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164 Precarious Series: to trade everything – Concordia University campus and Viger square, Montreal 165
(IX Meeting of the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics, 2014) / Photograph: Sky Oestreicher
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It was in São José do Rio Preto, with a woman, at a bar. After destruction is not my game. Violent revolutionaries are trying to
a long conversation about value, values, valuing, we made the destroy the establishment. That is good. But how? By killing? Killing
following trade: I gave her a R$ 2.00 reais bill and she gave me is such an artless thing. All you need is a coke bottle in your hand
a R$ 1.00 real coin. and you can kill. But people who kill that way most often become
the next establishment after they’ve killed the old. Because they are
Two bracelets for a banana, a t-shirt with a pineapple for a plain using the same method that the old establishment used to destroy.
t-shirt, a denim skirt for a white skirt, a pair of shades for a green […] Artists are not here to destroy or to create. Creating is just as
sarong, a white shawl for a red felt brooch (symbol of the student simple and artless a thing to do as destroying. […] The job of an
strike in Quebec against tuition increase in higher education in artist is not to destroy but to change the value of things” (2015, 215).
2012), a wristwatch for the image of a Catholic saint, a kiss for a kiss,
US$ 3.00 American dollars for an orange juice, a childhood story A year later, in 1972, inspired by Yoko Ono, Hélio Oiticica wrote:
for a childhood story, short panties for pantyhose, a colour bead “To create is not the artist’s task. [The artist’s] task is to change the
necklace for a little black handkerchief with tiny yellow flowers that value of things” (Oiticica 2009, 108). No more, no less. Thus, what
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belonged to her mother and still has her scent (…). conventionally has a small value will come to have a great value;
and what supposedly has a great value will come to have a small
We reached the conclusion that he no longer needed that lucky value. But not only that – to invert established values is important
166 coin he kept in his wallet for so many years. The passage was done, but not sufficient. What is at stake is the trans-valuation of values, 167
the union strengthened, the house demolished, the swimming pool the Nietzschean legacy – the refusal of absolute values, absolute
buried and, in the end, the important thing was to pass that amulet beliefs and morality, be it Platonic metaphysics, Christian morality
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on. End of a cycle. Thus, the coin with a golden star – “Republica or market-capital totalitarianism. A trans-valuation of values
de Cuba / un peso / 1987 / Patria o Muerte” – was traded for a performed through the recognition of the historicity and relativity
hair clasp as a gift to his wife. I also asked him to kindly take an of supposedly universal values, through the courage and impetuosity
additional gift from me to her: another hair adornment with details of overcoming, through the valuing of the body and of immanence
in green and white mother-of-pearl. for life’s potentiation. The valuing of the body and of immanence
for the potentiation of life as emphasized by performance art.
Duration of the action in Montreal on 27 June 2014: 5 hours and An art that is not simply visual but is the art of giving to see. Giving
56 minutes. to see bodies, circumstances, assemblages, values.
Forty-three years earlier, in May 1971, Yoko Ono wrote: “[Artists] Today, in November 2016 – in times of advanced neoliberal
don’t know whether they are doing something that still has value in capitalism, of widespread terrorism, of rising far-Right movements,
this day and age where the social problems are so vital and critical. of alarming ecological crisis –, I retake Ono and Oiticica’s radically
I wondered myself about this. Why am I still an artist? And why up-to-date ethical-political poetics. As they suggest, the work
am I not joining the violent revolutionaries? Then I realized that of the artist is not to create nor to destroy, but to change, to
modify, to transform values. That is the experimentation at stake. REFERENCES
And yet, how to do this? Acting reactively does not seem to be
FABIÃO, Eleonora. 2013. «Programa Performativo: o corpo-em-experiência».
the best answer for me. To change values is a propositional task,
ILINX – Revista do LUME 4.
not a reactive one. Let me explain: a reaction, by definition, is cocen.unicamp.br/revistadigital/index.php/lume/article/view/276
an action in the opposite direction from the one that caused it. OITICICA, Hélio. 2009. «Experimentar o Experimental (1972)». In Encontros Hélio
Thus, it mainly operates by inverting the direction of the force Oiticica. Rio de Janeiro: Beco do Azougue: 104-9.
that it reacts against, but it does not change its quality, pattern or ONO, Yoko. 2015. «What is the relationship between the world and the artist?»
In Yoko Ono One Woman Show 1960-1971. New York: MoMA: 215-6.
mode. It is a retaliation, not a subversion; a revenge, not a promise.
Only strategic insubordination (instead of impulsive retaliation)
will allow for new modes of action to be conceived (or even be
conceivable). In other words: it is absolutely legitimate, certainly,
to act reactively against what weakens, corrodes, kills, but perhaps
this might not be sufficiently efficient. After all, to react to
something is to recognize the existence of that something, while
overcoming a logic by proposing another logic is to surpass it, to de-
legitimize it. The proposal is to conceive non-escapist escapes, to
168 activate strategic lines of flight; to create fighting instruments that 169
enable combat in ways that matter, to fight subverting the logic of

violence; to operate changes of values in propositional, vitalist and
experimental ways so that body and performance continue being
born, one through the other.
I am searching and I will continue to search. By means of each

action. In accordance with the scale and the reach of each action.
By means of each encounter. Through different kinds of encounters.
From trade to trade, from thought to thought, one day after another.
And another.
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CHOREOGRAPHING
RESISTANCE IN
TURKEY’S GEZI PARK
MOVEMENT, 2013
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I would like to thank Mika Lior for sharing her knowledge
and making comments on the first drafts of this essay.
Sevi Bayraktar
verted to wedding venues or simply shut down and abandoned.
Affordable living became impossible after several urban trans-
formation projects were launched in this area. As a result, mar-
ginalized communities living in Pera/Beyoğlu, whose members
are subject to ethnic and racial discrimination in addition to
systemic poverty, such as the Roma, Kurds, documented and
undocumented immigrants, mostly from the recent war zones
including Syria and Iraq, have been dislocated. These neigh-
borhoods have since been marketed to upper classes by private
companies that were involved in the “renovation” of downtown
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Istanbul. At the same time, many grassroots organizations that
had flourished in Beyoglu, such as feminist and lgbtqi+ com-
munities, alongside left-leaning political groups, had to move
For more than a decade, Istanbul has been an epicenter of out of their offices due to dramatic price increases in real estate.
174 neoliberal policies that have been forcefully implemented in As such, Pera/Beyoğlu has been a major site of urban transfor- 175
the city. These policies, including commercial gentrification mation in which contested discourses are revealed and imple-
of urban spaces, dislocation of their inhabitants, and revital- mented through strategic attempts of spatial re-organization.1
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
izing a consumerist material culture of Ottoman heritage,
have created spatial segregation based on capital and income. 1
Since the eighteenth century, modernity has become the dominant discourse in state
Increasingly during the last decade, real estate development institutions and urban architectural trends as well as in everyday life of the middle- and
upper-class citizens living in Istanbul under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. In particu-
has been accompanied by a large-scale demolition of historic lar, Europeans and the non-Muslim Ottoman citizens in Pera were considered convey-
areas and the removal of marginalized communities in Istan- ors of the modern taste and secular values. Following the establishment of the Turkish
Republic in 1923, Pera and the larger Beyoğlu district became the city’s modern public
bul. In particular, the Pera/Beyoğlu area, a historic European hub, famed for its entertainment venues, Western-style shops, and theaters in the 1950s.
district where Taksim Square and the adjacent Gezi Park are Pera/Beyoğlu later became a popular place for rural-urban migrants and new Turkish en-
trepreneurs to congregate, after the non-Muslim communities abandoned the area due
located, has become a tumult of neoliberal transformation: to heavy taxes, pogroms, and policy regulations related to citizenship. In the 1970s, social
Several nineteenth-century European style buildings have been and political movements, led by student and labor organizations, claimed Taksim Square
and the surrounding area for political demonstrations. The coup d’état in 1980 not only
recently torn down to build shopping malls and luxury hotels, banned protest movements in these urban hubs but also brought new driving forces in
and consequently, low-income inhabitants of the area have the areas of economy and culture. The city thus “opened up” to liberalism and globalism
(Çelik 1994). After the electoral victory of the Islamist Virtue Party (RP) in Istanbul in 1994,
had to leave due to increasing property prices. Similarly, many a “selective nostalgia based on Istanbul’s past cosmopolitanism” (Igsiz 2008, 453) was fol-
classical theatre buildings and cultural centers have been con- lowed by the revival of the historic Ottoman buildings with a new culture of consumerism.
Having changed the economic and cultural fabric of the city, police violence, resulting in the death of eleven people and
these recent attempts at spatial transformation resulted in the thousands of injuries.4
Taksim-Gezi Park resistance, which was sparked in Gezi Park
at the end of May 2013 and spread to seventy-nine cities all Meanwhile, dance and performance gained a significant role in
over Turkey by the end of the second week, involving two and a the Gezi Park movement in opposition to the commodification
half million citizens.2 On May 27, a small group of activists oc- of the city and institutional enforcements aiming to control bod-
cupied Gezi Park in Beyoğlu to stop bulldozers from razing it ies in their everyday life spaces. Multiple forms of performance
to the ground. The demolition was part of a government rede- were registered during Gezi protests, such as couples dancing
velopment plan that included construction of a shopping mall tango, yoga practitioners leading meditation, musicians play-
and the remaking of the nineteenth-century Ottoman Artil- ing their instruments in front of a barricade or a police vehicle,
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lery Barracks, which were to serve as a luxury residence. Gezi ballerinas and mime artists performing their routines, and a
protesters were decrying the lack of transparency about plans whirling dervish spinning in the park and its surrounding area.
for the area’s redevelopment. When local authorities sent riot In most cases, performers were wearing gas masks, as were their
police to disperse those gathered in Taksim-Gezi Park and au- audience members. As the month of Ramadan began, a group
176 thorized the use of water cannons and pepper spray, a signifi- calling themselves Anti-Capitalist Muslims organized a collec- 177
cant number of people joined the protesters. In the early hours tive dining performance to break the fast. This collective prac-
of June 1, between five hundred to one and a half thousand tice of fast-breaking dinner, called Yeryüzü Sofrası [Earth Ta-
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
people marched to Taksim by crossing the Bosphorus Bridge ble], consisted of a seemingly endless line of people sitting on
from the Anatolian side of the city.3 The protests resonated the ground along the most crowded pedestrian street of Istan-
not only in upper-class districts of Istanbul such as Nişantaşı bul, Istiklal Street. Moreover, several popular artists performed
District and Bağdat Avenue, but also in labor class neighbor- in solidarity with the protesters, strumming their instruments
hoods such as Gazi, Okmeydanı, and Bir Mayıs. The move-
4
Some scholars argue that the Gezi movement was mainly a middle-class movement tar-
ment turned into a nationwide resistance against neoliberal
geting the principles of neoliberal capitalism (Tuğal 2013; Keyder 2013; Wacquant 2014).
urban policies and the authoritarian political practices of the Others point to surveys conducted during the resistance to elucidate the pluralistic, mul-
ti-class composition of Gezi even though middle classes were more visible due to their
ruling Justice and Development Party (akp) government that access to social media. This second group of writers has argued that if we look at the
has been in power since 2002. The protests met with extreme particularities of the Gezi resistance we see an uprising against the then Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government (Yörük and Yüksel 2014; Ertür 2014). Konda (2014) sur-
2 veys showed that 51% of the Gezi protesters were participating in a social movement for
Cf. Sardan (2013).
the first time in their lives, and 49% decided to join the movement after seeing the police
3
A popular newspaper, Radikal, reported the number of protesters as one and a half violence against protesters in the park. Although the resistance included a considerable
thousand (Radikal 2013), whereas independent news agency Bianet noted five hundred amount of individual participation, left wing and revolutionary groups also have gained vis-
participants (Bianet 2013). ibility during the protests (Furman 2013).
Protesters’ banners and signs decorated the AKM’s façade the dilapidated arts center
Photograph: Sevi Bayraktar
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as skillfully and as technically as possible in the midst of police as a restricting, oppressing, disciplining, surveilling, and con-
violence. Feminists occupied public spaces and painted over trolling force upon bodies. In this fashion, SanSan Kwan
gendered and sexist graffiti, or transformed it through verbal (2003) demonstrated how a traditional sitting meditation was
and visual manipulations. The relationship of protesters with popularly performed in protest movements in Hong Kong.
urban space required both mobility and immobility because

they were constantly moving from one location to another while In Turkey, historian and Performance Studies scholar Arzu
simultaneously occupying the Park (Gambetti 2014). The Gezi Öztürkmen (2014) examines the wide use of traditional and
Park resistance demonstrated the ways in which performance non-traditional performances during the Gezi Park resistance.
can be used to re-configure and reclaim urban space through Öztürkmen claims that “unexpectedness” has been the key to
its peaceful occupation. It also introduced new sociabilities and the way we perceived and remembered Gezi. She further argues
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novel forms of bodily interaction. The protests showed that that performances between authorities and Gezi Park protest-
performance art in public space is a powerful tool to negotiate ers and their supporters were dialogic and open to surprises.
violence through non-violent methods of direct action. This surprise effect turned everyday occurrence into a perfor-
mance in Gezi Park (idem, 41). In addition, performance artist
180 Marina Abramović, who has explored long periods of stillness 181
in her embodied art beginning in the 1970s, offers a specific
THE NATIONAL BODY AND CORPOREAL AGENCY definition of performance as an energy-dialogue between the
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
performer and audience members (Abramović 2015). Due to
Recent social movements, such as the Arab Spring in several the nature of this ever-changing energetic dialogue, there is
countries in North Africa, the Occupy movements in the us, always the potential and possibility for change in performance
and the Indignados in Europe, followed by the uprisings in Tur- art. Therefore, the performative character of social action al-
key and Brazil, have inspired an extensive literature in Dance lows for the potential for such change and magnifies it through
and Performance Studies to look at forms of embodiment the moments of surprise.
in political protests. Among those scholars, Anusha Kedhar
(2014) examined the gesture of “hands up don’t shoot” in the The question then arises, how could we analyze the spontane-
United States and showed that choreography, movement, and ous assemblies and surprising interactions of the Gezi resist-
gesture were not peripheral but central to the politics of pro- ance by using the methods of dance and performance studies?
test. By looking at the Occupy movements in New York City, Also, how does choreographic thinking help us demystify the
André Lepecki (2013) developed the terms “choreo-politics,” surprise effect and render multiple iterations of the gesture/
a kinesthetic struggle for freedom, and “choreo-policing,” movement possible? In this regard, focusing on choreography
to understand individual and collective agencies in social move- repetition of these acts, protesters train themselves at the mo-
ments, dance scholar Susan Foster (2003) examines diverse ment of the resistance, and they master their bodily intuitions.
protests in the United States from the mid- to late twentieth Repetitive acts of performance create a pedagogic process in
century and theorizes social, individual, and corporeal iden- which embodied action can be collectively learned and prac-
tities in these social movements. Her analysis sheds light on ticed in a precarious urban space where violence has been form-
how distinct bodies work together, how they read each other’s ative, particularly for the members of dissenting populations.5
movements, and how they create new meanings through acting Second, in the process of interaction, certain cultural meanings
collectively and tactically against the status quo. Foster argues are reproduced or rejected. As such, social choreographies can
that tactical movements of protesters often involved rehearsed be used both to affirm and contest power. Particularly in the
and cultivated techniques through which people learned how Gezi resistance, protesters tactically deployed and transformed
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to move coherently. Therefore, physical training and learned some disciplinary gestures and oppressive choreographies to
bodily techniques including quotidian movements are the provoke corporeal agency and mobilize participation within
basis of spontaneous collective actions. In contrast, Danielle the public. During the resistance, the city was converted to a
Goldman (2010) claims that social movements happen spon- rehearsal space, in which new forms of moving and interacting
182 taneously without requiring any previous training of the body. were constantly and repetitively practiced and mastered. 183
Goldman examines social actions performed by the u.s. Free-
dom Riders in the 1960s to address similarities between po- In the following pages, I will examine two performances widely
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
litical protest and contact improvisation dance techniques. adopted in Gezi, both of which mobilized large groups and
According to Goldman, how to move and how to connect with created powerful affects in society: Standing Still, an act of still-
other moving bodies in protests entail a constant awareness of ness in the public sphere as a form of civil disobedience, and
social norms because collective moving is a spontaneous act the Mother’s Chain, a human chain performed by women, which
requiring a series of ongoing and improvisational gestures that eventually turned into folk dance as a political statement for
are negotiated freely at the moment of social action.
5
Judith Butler’s theory of “grievability” (2009) explains normalization of violence by em-
phasizing the reiterability of coercion for certain populations in society. She explains that
I argue that neither of these arguments in Dance and Perfor-
whose bodies are disposable and whose lives are counted as mournable and grievable in
mance Studies scholarship adequately explains how partici- the contemporary era of war-on-terror also define whose bodies are continually violated.
Butler states that violence operates through bodies via iteration, and in each iteration,
pants were mobilized and moved in Turkey’s Gezi protests. this violence becomes the normative condition of some bodies whose lives do not regis-
First, moving and performing in the immediacy of the protest ter as having value. Other scholars in dance and performance studies have analyzed how
bodies use iterability, enactment, physicality, kinesthetics, and spectatorship, providing
require the knowledge of certain bodily techniques and devel- tools to think of corporeal agency under the conditions of violence (Taylor 1997; Morris and
opment of new skill-sets within collective action. Through the Giersdorf 2016; Giersdorf 2013; Martin 1998; Lepecki 2000).
solidarity and dissidence. The standstill gesture motivated spo- man”. The following day, a standing woman, Yonca, stood still
radic, individual bodies to move in their own pace, time, and for thirty hours in Ankara, next to the site where police had
space; whereas the human chain of women encouraged coher- killed 27-year old Ethem Sarısülük during the protests a few
ent and harmonious ways of moving together in collectives. days earlier. The movement multiplied immediately in various
I will unpack each example and analyze their components at locations, including shopping malls, tv and newspaper out-
the movement level to elucidate the ways in which a corporeal lets, courthouses, and in front of trees and embassies. Standing
vocabulary of resistance has been practiced in Gezi. Still quickly reiterated, multiplied, and became a well-accepted
form of resistance in Turkey.
Standing in stillness as a modern performance technique was

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STANDING STILL developed by Steve Paxton, a dancer and social rights activist,
THE EMERGENCE OF A NATIONWIDE MOVEMENT in the 1970s. Paxton’s dance technique of contact improvisation
offered stillness not as passivity but as a “small dance,” in which
On June 17, when the governor of Istanbul suspended the right the body is in full vibration. As opposed to the modern concep-
184 to public assembly, one person began standing still, by him- tualizations of the body that is always in motion towards “pro- 185
self, in Taksim Square. He faced his body towards the Atatürk gress” (Lepecki 2000, 344), a still body emphasized the quotidian
Cultural Center (akm), closed since 2008 due to its long-last- power of the “other” body. Similarly, by standing in stillness in a
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ing process of “restoration.”6 The image of this young person central square in which everything is expected to be in motion,
standing still for eight hours in Taksim Square was spread on the performer called our attention to question the problem in
twitter and Facebook in the same evening. The young man, the public sphere. Gündüz’s intention in stillness was to prompt
a contemporary dance performer named Erdem Gündüz, soon people to ask, “Why is this guy standing in Taksim?” (Mee 2014,
became known as “Duran Adam”, “Standing Man” – although 79). Regarding the idea of progress reproduced through bodies
another accurate translation of the term would be “stopping in constant motion, standstill gesture is also understood as a
response to the ideals of capitalism. As opposed to the idea of a
6
The Atatürk Cultural Center (AKM) is the first opera hall of Istanbul, established in the
1960s. The AKM was used as a multi-purpose cultural center located in Taksim Square
continuous progress in capitalist societies, this gesture manifests
but has become dilapidated since it was decommissioned in 2008. The functionality and that people are capable of radically bringing activity to a stand-
simplicity of its architecture reflect the Republican ideals of Western modernism, which
make the building wholly disparate from the image of the Ottoman Empire that has been
still, converting the motion to a still image (Gronau 2016).
reproduced by European orientalists (Bozdoğan 2001). After a decade of dilapidation, the
AKM came to the public agenda in November 2017, through a publicity meeting in which
President Erdoğan introduced “the new AKM” as a multi-functional opera hall “not for the In Turkey, as a historical and cultural phenomenon, people
elite but for the public”; it is projected to open in 2019 (Milliyet 2017). have long been choreographing standstill gestures through
national memorials and social events. For instance, on eve-
ry November 10 at 9:05am people stand still for a moment
of silence in order to pay homage to Mustafa Kemal Atatürk,
the founder of the Turkish Republic, who died on that day
in 1938, fifteen years after the inauguration of the Republic.
On this date and time, people standstill for two minutes wher-
ever they happen to be at that moment: Some people, if driv-
ing, pull their cars over to the side of the road and get out in
order to stand still; some others stand inside shops and houses;
and many stop working momentarily to present their standstill
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bodies before one of the ubiquitous images of Atatürk as the
embodiment of national values on this day of mourning. Until
AUTOR
recent years, students had also been performing this stand-

still gesture in schools every morning as they were reciting the
186 national oath all together. In this sense, standstill gesture has 187
been reproduced not only to show the alignment with national
values of the early republicanism, but also to unite individuals
CAPÍTULO
POINTS OF FRICTION
as the body of the nation. As such, a malleable and disciplined
national body has been performed reiteratively by the majority
of Turkish citizens.
Standstill is integral also because it serves as a central performa-

tive gesture defining Turkey’s culture of the “military-nation.”7
On the one hand, fulfilling the military service is compulsory
7
In her comprehensive study, Ayşe Gül Altınay demonstrates how militarism and culture
work together in Turkey to support the discourse of nationalism. She explores the term
“military-nation” to elucidate the ways in which militarism is often considered inherent in
Turkish culture, and its ways of operation define institutions and everyday conduct in socie-
ty. In this regard, for instance, the popular saying, “Her Türk asker doğar” (every Turk is born
Standing still quickly reiterated, multiplied, and became a well-accepted form of resistance
a soldier) “is repeated in daily conversations, school textbooks, the speeches of public of-
in Turkey. Photograph: Sevi Bayraktar
ficials and intellectuals, and is used as a drill slogan during military service” (Altınay 2004, 13).
for all male citizens, and it applies from twenty to forty-one qualities of martial stillness. The ordinariness of this gesture
years of age. Such compulsory military service is considered facilitated its spontaneous interpretation. Diverse bodies man-
a “key rite-of-passage for hegemonic masculinity” in Turkey ifested their opposition to uniformity and homogenization by
(Açıksöz 2012, 7), as male citizens are considered to become multiplying the standing gesture creatively in diverse locations
men after fulfilling their national duties by serving in the mili- and periods. Some people interpreted this gesture as a silent
tary. Fostered through this assumed link between militarism respect to Mustafa Kemal, whose immense portrait then deco-
and Turkish nationhood, a national body is cultivated as a het- rated the akm’s façade after the building had been cleared of
erosexual, masculine, and disciplined body. As a result, other the protesters’ banners and signs. Others performed the stand-
bodies distinguished from this body of the nation through their ing gesture to convey their own ideas using individual inter-
culture, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality have been marginal- pretations. “Men-Standing-Against-the-Standing Man” later
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ized and considered non-national. Therefore, violence against appeared in the square, clad in uniform white t-shirts with a
these non-national, and even un-national, other bodies has red-painted hand making a “stop” sign at the center, appar-
been legitimized and normalized. Overall, stillness has long ently against the Standing Man and social diversity manifested
been deployed to cultivate docile bodies through institutional by standing people. Nevertheless, the standstill gesture contin-
188 mechanisms. In Turkey, Standing Still as a reiterative, perform- ued to multiply and migrate to other cities inside and outside 189
ative gesture has been reproduced in innumerable ways and of the national borders.
institutionalized mainly through public mourning, the educa-
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POINTS OF FRICTION
tion system and compulsory military training. The success of the gesture lies behind its power to summon
people together once again after the Gezi Park occupation had
However, in Taksim-Gezi Park, the Standing Man’s stillness been dispersed. Moreover, this achievement not only proves
seemed laid back and natural in contrast to earlier represen- that ordinary stillness of vulnerable bodies is a powerful act of
tations of bodies in standstill postures. His casual outfit and resistance, it also perfectly demonstrates how performance cre-
bodily mode displayed ordinary movement qualities: bent ates confusion and dismantles the power of authority. For in-
knees, a deflated torso, and relaxed arms with his hands thrust stance, in Taksim Square, the police were unable to read the
in his pants pockets. His eyes were soft yet decisively looking standstill posture for about three hours – Was he performing one
forward towards akm, the dilapidated arts center. Not only of those standings in homage? Had he gone crazy after being ex-
did his body claim space in the forbidden topography of Tak- posed to so much police violence in Gezi Park? Was he just waiting
sim Square, but also his ordinary standing rejected the angular for someone? Was he dangerous while standing in Taksim Square?
movement vocabulary of institutionalized forms of standing When the police were searching his backpack on his back he did
and celebrated the quotidian qualities of life against robotic not move at all.When his pockets were being searched, Standing
Man moved for the first time, still without showing any facial MOTHER’S CHAIN
expression or emotion. When he moved, he began to unzip his FROM A HUMAN CHAIN TO A CIRCLE DANCE
pants, and the police hastily shouted, “No, no, no! What are you
doing?!” Standing Man then went back to his casual standstill Particularly since 2007, the government institutions have im-
posture, yet his long-sleeved white shirt became untucked on plemented policies that aim to discipline women from diverse
the left side and his backpack ended up on the ground in front political and cultural backgrounds. These policies and misogy-
of him (Get the news 2013). After about five hours since he had nist official statements are based on the regulation of gender
begun to stand in silent stillness, a few individuals came and be- and sexuality in everyday life and include the demands that
gan standing with Gündüz, together igniting a nationwide pro- women have at least three children, not laugh out loud in pub-
test. After a few among the other standing people were arrested lic, and not walk around while pregnant without a man ac-
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by the police, the performer ended his performance and left the companying them. Physical and legal vulnerability has come
square in silence. However, the movement continued its life in to define the existence of women and girls both in the street
other bodies. The ordinary iterations of the silent standing act and at home, especially after the attempted anti-abortion law
by a multitude of individuals rendered the gesture illegible, and in 2010, the abolition of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs in
190 thus, state officials and representatives could not determine the 2011, the reduction in penalty for honor killings in 2013, and 191
legal status of the act of standing in stillness.8 recent bills that are about to open a path for child marriages.
These attempts aim to regulate women’s everyday life through
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POINTS OF FRICTION
Since the standstill movement became part of Turkey’s social imposing a restrictive corporeal regime. In opposition to such
movement repertoire, the gesture has been reenacted in several discourses, women have occupied the front lines in political
cases. Ways of standing are still being explored and enacted
individually and collectively in various social protests.9 The pri-
�9 Dissenting citizens continued occupying public spaces using subtle variations of
mary technique was grasped and mastered in each practice of the standstill technique. For example, the standing woman in Ankara, Yonca S., went to
Diyarbakır, a predominantly Kurdish city in the southeastern Turkey, to meet Fahriye
Standing Still during the Gezi resistance, and the movement has
Yıldırım, the mother of Medeni Yıldırım, a 17-year old killed during protests against the
been reinterpreted constantly in the aftermath of the protest. construction of a colossal police station in June 2013. The two women, holding each oth-
er’s hands, stood still facing the police station. Similarly, just before the general elections
8
Responding to standstill protests, the then Turkish Deputy Minister Bülent Arınç con- in June 2015, a group of women in Iğdır city protested the Prime Minister during his visit
firmed that standing still was a peaceful and legal method of protest; nevertheless, he by collectively standing still, turning their backs, and making the “victory” sign with their
suggested that citizens stand still only for eight minutes instead of eight hours as the latter peace fingers. When they were accused by the authorities for their “improper” standing,
might be harmful to their health (Verstraete 2013, 3). Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan other women reproduced the gesture, took photographs, and shared those images in
also interpreted the gesture as opposed to the progressive ideals of the government. In social media (SonDakika 2015; Ecem 2015; HurriyetDailyNews 2015). Although turning one’s
his public speech in Kayseri, he states, “We say, there is no stopping, we will continue on back was a protest technique from the 1960s civil rights movements, Turkish and Kurdish
our path; what are they saying? Standing Man!...They stood still for decades…They are the women performed the gesture reproducing new cultural codes and connotations referring
best at standing and stopping [others]” (ArafKltrSnt 2013). to the contemporary political context.
protests and have become prominent in grassroots organiza- Their mobile, circular human chain soon turned into a halay
tions. During the Gezi resistance, the national and internation- dance, a generic name of traditional circle dances common in
al media circulated images of women resisting in the streets: eastern Turkey. Having linear and circular group formations
jumping over a gas canister, constructing barriers by hanging similar to Balkan (h)oros and Near Eastern dabkes, halay is
banners and Turkish flags, and standing still for long hours. performed within a group, holding hands or shoulders, and
executing movements with a particular focus on footwork in
One of those examples occurred when the then governor of unison. National and international media shared news about
Istanbul, Avni Mutlu, called for parents to urge their children the “mothers” occupying Gezi Park to protect their children
leave the Gezi camp on June 13 (Gezer 2013). This directive over the following few evenings. The “mothers” were depicted
was not only infantilizing protesters by calling them “children” in the press as superheroes, who appeared out of the clouds of
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but also reminding parents, particularly mothers, of their as- pepper spray to rescue their children.
signed duty of managing and promoting certain moral values
in the family. In fact, mothers have frequently been called on Diana Taylor (1997) examines how Plaza de Mayo Mothers in
by the state officials to perform the duties of reproducing mo- Buenos Aires have carried on a continued protest through dis-
192 rality and encouraging docility in their households.10 It was playing photographs of their children, who were disappeared 193
also an implicit announcement of a new wave of coercive pow- during the military junta regime in the Argentina’s Dirty War
er that would be exerted to “clean” the park from the protest- (1976-83). The activist mothers in Argentina reproduced
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POINTS OF FRICTION
ers. Following this call, about a hundred women came to Gezi dominant discourses about proper motherhood while simul-
Park in the evening to “protect their children” and joined the taneously subverting those discourses through their public
protest. Women formed a “human chain” shouting, “moth- demonstrations. Likewise, in Turkey, motherhood as a form
ers are here” and “everywhere mother, resistance everywhere” of political agency has been politically activated through street
(Tuna and Ekin 2013). They set this human chain between demonstrations of the mothers of the disappeared since the
protesters and the police, and so that they first separated the 1980 coup-d’état (Aslan 2007; Karaman 2016). Over the past
two parties. Next, their choice of alignment reflected their in- two decades, Kurdish and Turkish mothers have been carry-
tention of protecting the protesters because they were mostly ing photographs of their disappeared family members and de-
facing towards the police. When they walked around the park, manding a trial for the perpetrators. Recently, the Gezi Park
the women held each other’s hands and created a big circle. mothers, who lost their children to brutal police violence during
the protests, have become visible through their public mourn-
10
The Gezi was not for the first time that the state officials told mothers to prevent their
children from participating in street action. In 2010, Kurdish mothers were also urged to
ing. They also demanded in-depth investigations of their cases
take their children away from the streets (T24 2008; Cumhuriyet 2010; YeniAsir 2014). and a trial for the perpetrators. In addition to these examples,
women who went to the park in response to the governor’s call Similarly, halay dances have been also used as a pervasive form
on the evening of June 13 introduced another mother-subject of protest in the Kurdish cultural rights movement since the
position through their choreographies in the public sphere. late 1990s in major cities. In the 1930s, folk dances, presented
“Mothers” were in the park at night during the time that they as the purest form of Turkish cultural expression, were pri-
were assumed to be at home. As they were quickly circling the oritized to promote national values and create the aesthetic
park, dividing the space through their alignment, and wearing principles of modern Turkish citizenship. In the mid-twentieth
goggles, gas masks, and hardhats, women both resisted and century, folk dances, intended to cultivate a disciplined, youth-
affirmed prescribed qualities of an idealized Turkish mother, ful, and homogenous collective of the modern nation, were
such as morality, responsibility, and self-sacrifice (Bayraktar popularly expanded among the young urban audience. Until
2014). Through converting a human chain to a traditional line the 1970s, these dances were collected and repurposed, and
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dance circle, they were also practicing collective kinesthetic all existing or perceived non-Turkish elements in the forms
knowledge and an alternative embodiment of motherhood as (non-Turkish names, narratives, costumes, and props) were
cheerful, dynamic, and spontaneous. replaced with Turkish counterparts or substitutes. In this con-
text, beginning from the 1990s, halay dances play an essential
194 The human chain practice resembles with Muslim women’s role in the Kurdish struggle for political acknowledgement and 195
protests in Turkey in the 1990s for their right to wear head- cultural identity (Karakeçili 2008; Nyberg 2012). Although
scarves in state institutions, such as public offices and uni- folk dances were used in public political gatherings such as
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
versities. The headscarf was banned in Turkey’s public institu- Mayday celebrations in the mid-1970s, they have not been at-
tions from the early twentieth century until the ban was lifted tributed political meanings identified with oppressed and mar-
in 2013. In 1998, against the headscarf ban at Turkish univer- ginalized groups until recently. In this sense halay, as a popular
sities, a group of students from Istanbul University formed traditional dance genre, emerged as a political gesture against
a human chain. Their chain has been expanded with the par- homogenization and gained the potential to unite dissenting
ticipation of secular activists, particularly women from feminist citizens from diverse backgrounds.
and grassroots organizations. The human chain performance,
called Özgürlük için El Ele [Join Hands for Freedom], met po- Demonstrating such a capacity for resistance, a certain level of
lice violence and several students were arrested. Therefore, at technical knowledge can be gained through practicing certain
a quick glance of the recent social movement repertoire of Tur- dance and movement forms in social and political demonstra-
key, the human chain protest has been developed and power- tions. In this sense, the city provides activists with a rehearsal
fully practiced at least for a couple of decades before it was space for additional training to be used in further assemblies.
re-interpreted in the Gezi resistance. The immediacy and spontaneity of protests allow pedagogic
process to be only fragmented and partial. Each new technique CONCLUDING REMARKS
and movement vocabulary are mastered gradually over time as
a person continues to join street activism and grassroots move- In the 2013 Gezi protests, dance and performance brought
ments. As part of this activist pedagogy, experienced protest- people together for social action, forced authorities to dialogue,
ers often lead such corporeal alignments and choreographic subverted dominant discourses, and transformed precarious
configurations in the space. Improvisation and experimenta- spaces into familiar ones. The gestures of the resistance have
tion are also encouraged because bodies always prove their since been circulating globally and continue to inspire people
competency and intelligence through engaging in new forms in several countries. Since then in Turkey, the constitution has
of interaction and creating new meanings through their bod- been changed toward a presidential system, two million Syrian
ily acts. When there is no music providing a common rhythm, war refugees have been trapped at the borders of Europe after
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bodies find their own rhythm to synchronize movements just crossing through Turkey, several isis attacks on peace rallies
as the women did when they converted their human chain, and other social and political gatherings have caused hundreds
a form of nonviolent direct action, to a line dance, another of fatalities, and once again violence and death has swept bod-
form of nonviolent action. In these ways, they demonstrated ies away in public spaces. Women keep struggling against mi-
196 the capacity to operate and navigate in a leaderless organiza- sogynist policies under the impact of the recent state of emer- 197
tion, which is a significant ability required in contemporary gency decrees. Despite the impossibility of social movement,
forms of mass protests. By rehearsing their chain-dance in con- dance and performance manifest a political stance and support
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secutive evenings, Gezi mothers were equipped with a power- life against death, ecology against the neoliberal privatization
ful tool through which to move together. During each evening of land, and ethnic and cultural minority rights against the ho-
of rehearsal, they demonstrated their resistive potential as they mogenizing discourses of nationalism and militarism.
enriched their movement vocabularies and polished their styles
of execution, despite the vulnerability of the rehearsal space. The two examples that I examined above, Standing Still and
the Mother’s Chain, are inspiring social performances as they
are learned, rehearsed, and interpreted through repetition of
various similar practices and embodied in protests to create al-
ternative meanings and mobilize resistance. Such collective ex-
ecution of particular gestures and movement sequences create
new ways of negotiating existing cultural and political identi-
ties in public space. Activists add these performances into their
social movement repertoire, master them over time, and intro-
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lrb.co.uk/blog/2013/06/19/caglar-keyder/law-of-the-father/
VERSTRAERE, Pieter. 2013. «The Standing Man Effect». Istanbul Policy Center (IPC)-
KONDA. 2014. «Gezi Report: Public Perception of the ‘Gezi protests’ Who were the Mercator Policy Brief, 11. Istanbul: Sabancı University.
people at Gezi park?». June 5. konda.com.tr/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/
WACQUANT, Loic. 2014. «Bourdieu, Wacquant, ve Gezi Parkı’nın Küçük Burjuvaları»
KONDA_Gezi_Report.pdf
[Bourdieu, Wacquant and Petit Bourgeois of Gezi Park]. In Toplumsal Tarih,
KWAN, SanSan. 2003. «Hong Kong Incorporated: Falun Gong and the Choreography of interviewed by Ayşe Çavdar, 18-24.
Stillness». Performance Research: Journal of the Performing Arts 8 (4): 11-20.
YENIASIR, 2014. «Cocuklarinizi Sokaklardan Cekin…». Yeni Asir, October 12.
LEPECKI, André. 2000. «Still: On the Vibratile Microscopy of Dance». In ReMembering yeniasir.com.tr/gundem/2014/10/12/cocuklarinizi-sokaklardan-cekin
the Body, edited by Gabriella Brandstetter and Hortensia Völckers, 334-66.
YORUK, Erdem and Murat Yüksel. 2014. «Class and Politics in Turkey’s Gezi Protests».
New York: Distributed Art Publishers.
New Left Review (89): 113-124.
—. 2013. «Choreopolice and Choreopolitics: or, the task of the dancer».
TDR: The Drama Review 57 (4): 13-27.
MARTIN, Randy. 1998. Critical Moves: Dance Studies in Theory and Politics.
Durham: Duke University Press.
THE HOUSING
CRISIS, ART, AND
PERFORMANCE
AUTOR
AUTOR
202 203
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
My thanks to performance companies
getinthebackofthevan (Hester Chillingworth,
Lucy McCormick and Jennifer Pick) and Sh!t Theatre
(Rebecca Biscuit and Louise Mothersole)
for generously sharing material.
Jen Harvie
Jackson’s embodiment in Pose simultaneously evoked strength
and vulnerability: she looked strong; her pose was undoubt-
edly uncomfortable. As Gardner noted, her positioning right
on the edge of, and looking back at, the financial centre of
London proposed an urban counter-narrative to the priorities
of the City’s gleaming towers (Gardner 2015). Jackson specifi-
cally straddled part of Toynbee Hall, a building established in
1884 as a residential headquarters for volunteers intervening
in the enormous poverty of Victorian East London and still
operating today as an anti-poverty charity in the London Bor-
ough of Tower Hamlets, where 44 per cent of residents live
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in poverty (Toynbee Hall n.d.). In the siting of Pose, Jackson
not only faced down the corporate City, she acted as a herald
PROLOGUE for anti-poverty, and she performed the precarity of a woman
204 today in relation to a domestic-scale, residential architecture. 205
In autumn 2015, at East London’s red brick Toynbee Studi- Pose staged a young woman both vulnerable and powerful in
os, performance artist Poppy Jackson1 performed Pose: she sat relation to housing in a time and place where access to the
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straddling the front apex of a second storey rooftop, naked, basic human right of decent, affordable shelter is increasingly
for four hours at a time, with occasional breaks.2 Guardian precarious.3
newspaper theatre critic Lyn Gardner argued that the work
was “beautiful, disturbing […,] disruptive”, and “moving to
behold”, and that it invoked ancient quasi-erotic pagan build-
ing embellishments such as stone carvings of Sheela Na Gig
found in Ireland (Gardner 2015; Sheela Na Gig Project 2015).
Lewis Church wrote that Jackson sat “quietly, dignified and
statuesque” (Church 2015).
3
The United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights notes in Article 25: “Every-
1 one has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself
Jackson performed Pose Friday 30 and Saturday 31 October, 2015, as part of Spill Festival
and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social
of Performance (Cf. Jackson n.d.).
services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, wid-
2 owhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control”. (United
Pose caught the scandalized attention of tabloid newspapers the Evening Standard and
the Daily Mail (Marshall 2015; Linning 2015). Nations 1948).
INTRODUCTION living. Using strategies of urban intervention, poetic architec-
tural distortion, narrative, embodiment, performance style,
I start with this example because it encapsulates some of the collaboration, affect, and more, these artists trouble relation-
pressing social and political urgencies and performance re- ships between property, propriety, the private, the public, and
sponses I address in this essay.4 My context is the contempo- precarity. In the case of the performance makers I discuss in
rary United Kingdom, though many of the ideological and so- particular, they “optimistically” stage alternative kinship and
cial conditions are much more widespread, geographically and support networks; and perhaps angrily, they perform semi-
historically. Since 2010, the uk has been led by a Conserva- comic scenarios perhaps more akin to situation tragedies than
tive party committed to austerity economics and neoliberal sit coms.6 These artists stage current problems but only partial
capitalism, to supporting individual and corporate pursuit of “solutions”, emphasising how solutions to our current socio-
wealth, and to eroding wealth re-distribution through taxation economic impasse must be social and systemic, not simply the
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and structures of social welfare and cultural funding.5 The re- individual acts of some of those people whom this impasse
sults have been materially and socially devastating. most profoundly disempowers.
206 Thankfully, people including artists have not simply succumbed My essay is organised in three parts. In the first part, I outline 207
to these massive political, structural, ideological, and crucially some of the detail of the housing crisis in the uk – in Lon-
social changes. The work I look at here responds particularly don in particular – and some of its effects. In the second part,
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POINTS OF FRICTION
to being part of a new class known as Generation Rent. Facing I survey a range of urban art interventions which respond to
what critic Lauren Berlant has influentially termed the “cruel this crisis. In the final part, I examine two recent performanc-
optimism” of desiring something which actually inhibits their es by young, London-based feminist performance art/theatre
flourishing (Berlant 2011, 1), the artists whose work I discuss companies which respond specifically to this crisis.
stage desire for but exclusion from the kind of “good life” that
might take them out of profoundly constrained conditions of
4
I first presented a different version of this paper at the 2015 conference of the American
Society for Theatre Research (ASTR), Debating the Stakes in Theatre and Performance Schol-
arship, which invited participants to address “new pressing political urgencies” (ASTR 2015).
5
The government’s arguments for its strategies are classic neoliberalism; as David Harvey
puts it, this approach assumes that “human well-being can best be advanced by liberating
6
individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within an institutional framework charac- Berlant suggests that conditions of cruel optimism generate new genres such as situa-
terised by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade” (Harvey 2009, 22). tion tragedy (2011, 6).
PART ONE: HOUSING CRISIS over a third of privately rented homes fail to meet the decent
homes standard (Shelter n.d.b.). And over 12 per cent of the
I live in the United Kingdom, in London, where the devastat- uk population lives in households where housing costs more
ing and widespread conditions of the uk housing crisis are than 40 per cent of income (Connolly 2015). This is a con-
becoming painfully familiar. From 1980 until 2000, in a tsu- sequence of not only property price inflation but also wage
nami-like policy change initiated by Margaret Thatcher, two deflation: between 2008 and 2013, hourly earnings decreased
million homes owned by Local Authority governments were by roughly 65 pence (or one us dollar or 76 Euro cents) in
sold off.7 To contextualise that, the uk has a strong history real terms (Equality and Human Rights Commission 2015).
of providing social housing, much more so than Portugal. Between 2010 and 2013, homelessness increased by a breath-
According to the research network Housing in Europe, in 2010, taking 37 per cent (Johnston 2015). By 2013/14, more than
social housing made up only 3.3 per cent of housing stock in 81,000 households were homeless (Shelter n.d.a); at the same
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Portugal (Housing Europe 2010b), but about 18 per cent in time, more than a million homes in England and Wales were
the United Kingdom.8 Between 1997 and 2010, the number empty (Owen 2014).9 In the area in and around Liverpool in
of households in England waiting for social housing rose by 2010 for example, there were 13,000 empty homes and simul-
208 81 per cent, to 1.8 million households (Shelter n.d.c.). One taneously 23,000 people seeking housing (Mendoza 2016). 209
consequence of those conditions is that, since 2001, the pro-
portion of housing that is privately rented has skyrocketed by Among other things, these conditions have spawned Genera-
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POINTS OF FRICTION
69 per cent. Accountants PwC have predicted that, from 2001 tion Rent, a large young generation unable to escape the over-
to 2025, private rental accommodation will treble, with “7.2m priced and often substandard private rental sector because
households… in rented accommodation [in 2025], compared they cannot secure mortgages in an inflated housing market
with 5.4m [in 2015] and just 2.3m in 2001” (Osborne 2016). where prices significantly outpace wage growth.10 In summer
Within ten years, one quarter of households will rent privately, 2016, home ownership in England reached its lowest level in
but over half of 20-39-year-olds will do so (Osborne 2016). thirty years (Osborne 2016). A mapping tool produced by the
Rental housing is, in itself, not a bad thing; but it is bad when Guardian indicates that for a would-be homebuyer on an aver-
the housing is substandard, overpriced and insecure. Sadly, age income in 2014, 93 per cent of properties in England and
7 9
These homes were sold at a discount of approximately 50 per cent of market price (Har- Many of these were foreign-owned and/or holiday homes, but many were social housing
vie 2013, 129; Lowe cited in Harvie 2011, 125). targeted for “redevelopment”, often into price brackets outside the means of the “de-
8 canted” former residents.
“Social housing accounts for 17.5% of the total homes in England, while it is about 24%
10
of the total housing stock in Scotland, about 17% in Northern Ireland and about 16.4% in Research shows “71% of people born in 1970 were homeowners by the time they were
Wales” (Housing Europe 2010a). 40; for those born in 1990 the figure is likely to be just 47%” (Osborne 2015).
Wales were unaffordable (Guardian 2015). A 2015 pan-Euro- tentially negatively affected when those adult children cannot
pean housing report showed that, of eight European capital afford to move out of the family home. On that note, by way of
cities, London fared worst in house purchasing price to in- comparison, a 2015 European report recorded that “the num-
come ratios (Connolly 2015). bers of young adults aged between 18 and 34 who are living
with their parents is now at an all-time high [in Europe]”; 55%
By no means do I think widespread property ownership is the in Portugal.11
best social solution; for many anarchists and socialists, follow-
ing Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, all property is theft (Proudhon The housing crisis is a crisis in democracy and the public sphere
1840). But the private rental sector in the uk is profound- because it is both a symptom and a cause of ever-growing so-
ly under-regulated and, so, often substandard and unstable. cial deprivation and inequality. The housing crisis is desecrat-
Furthermore, in a wider neoliberalising economy where young ing democratic access to what Henri Lefebvre called the “right
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people are accruing greater debts from education, interest rates to the city” (Lefebvre 2003). Urban access becomes a privilege
on savings are virtually negligible, and pensions and public of class; urban eviction or marginalisation becomes a condi-
healthcare are being eroded, property investment is increas- tion of low income or poverty. This is specifically neoliberal
210 ingly not just investment in stable current living conditions, but gentrification, where public spaces and housing are passively 211
insurance for older age. Home-ownership offers an increasing- and actively eroded, and takeover by privatised entrepreneurial
ly crucial security, the likes of which are no longer guaranteed spaces is actively encouraged through preferential legislation.
POINTS OF FRICTION
by the uk’s formerly strong post-war commitment to care for

its citizens from cradle to grave. Two important questions follow for me: what needs to be done
about this crisis? And, what are art and performance doing
Crucially, the housing crisis I have outlined destabilises not about this crisis?

only housing but households – the people who live there. When
people’s housing is insecure, so is their schooling, work, leisure, In answer to the first question, we need more and better housing
and healthcare. The housing crisis destabilises a sense of place market regulation, with rent caps, limits on multiple property
and belonging, feelings of security, and a sense of self. Most ownership, prevention of non-occupied ownership, restrictions
dangerously, the housing crisis destabilises relationships and on occupation density, and properly enforced housing quality

networks of friendship, kinship and care. And it does so across requirements, including a kind of Hippocratic Oath for ethi-
a huge range of people. The worst affected are those with the
least wealth and the least security. But even fully employed 11
“The situation is worst in Slovenia, where 74% still live at home, in Italy it’s 66% and in
middle-aged middle-class parents and adult children are po- Portugal it’s 55%” (Connolly 2015).
cal landlord behavior. We need greater housing supply, which There are many things art and performance can do for the
means building more new homes, reviving underused homes, housing crisis. I concentrate here on what I see as two of the
and filling empty housing. We need support for communities most important things art and performance do: (1) raise the
and community sustainability, rather than the kind of passive visibility of housing precarity, and (2) expose its damaging so-
or active erosion of existing communities that neoliberal gen- cial and emotional effects. Although the housing crisis is geo-
trification fosters. Fundamentally, we need changed ideologi- graphically and demographically widespread, and although it
cal, political and material commitments. Instead of existing is widely recognised, its deeply damaging effects are often ex-
ideological commitments to neoliberalism, privatisation and perienced in isolation and in private. When its effects are emo-
individual wealth-creation, we need to prioritise a shared re- tional – which they often are – they can effectively be invisible.
sponsibility to universal, decent, humane living conditions, in- Furthermore, neoliberalism’s biopolitics obfuscate the system-
cluding decent housing. ic, structural failures that produce the housing crisis, and en-
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courage people in insecure housing to feel personal failure and
So to my second question: what are art and performance doing shame. These feelings not only further damage wellbeing, they
to contribute to these necessary material, social and ideologi- can also inhibit rage and collective action. The causes and ef-
212 cal changes to shift the housing crisis? Many things. In autumn fects of the housing crisis, including its emotional effects, need 213
2016 at the London School of Economics, I took part in a long to be shown as collective – and a collective responsibility – and
table discussion on the housing crisis and art activism.12 Speak- they need to be made public. These are important things art
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ers there argued that art activism can resist the housing crisis and performance can do.
by supporting community strength and cohesive resistance;
documenting problems; showing and enabling aspirations; In what follows, I next survey a selection of city-sited visual
raising awareness; countering and undermining propaganda and sculptural art works that make visible, in particular, cur-
and mystification; facilitating communication; and challeng- rent housing precarity and the negative, sometimes devas-
ing housing hegemonies.13 tating feelings it provokes. I then focus my analysis on two
performances by young London-based feminist performance
companies: Number 1, The Plaza, first produced by getinthe-
12
“What Can Art Do for Housing Activism: A Long Table Discussion”, organised by Dr Katie
Beswick, Resist Festival of Ideas and Actions, London School of Economics, 29 September
backofthevan in 2013; and Letters to Windsor House by Sh!t
2016. The long table format for public engagement in discussion was developed by Lois Theatre, which premiered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in
Weaver (Weaver 2013).
summer 2016.
13
Such challenges are visible in the art work, performance and design of, for example,
Jordan McKenzie, Marcus Coates, the Space Hijackers, Focus E15, and 2015 Turner Prize
winners Assemble.
ART IN THE CIT Y ugly. Others saw it as both a prescient and a haunting evoca-
tion of changing patterns of life in London’s rapidly gentrify-
The examples I look at here, mostly from London where ing East End adjacent to massive corporate developments at
I live, use a variety of artistic strategies to comment on Britain’s Canary Wharf that were then recent in a barely post-Thatcher
current insufficient housing provision and its over-competi- era (Harvie 2013, 138-9).15
tive, over-inflated, class-dominated private housing markets.
The aesthetic strategies I focus on are: principally visual and Fast-forwarding fifteen years, for his 2008 work Seizure, origi-
aesthetic, posing current housing as dystopian. In one instance nally produced on a disused housing estate near Elephant and
the strategies are textual, narrating the crises. Routinely, the Castle, Roger Hiorns, again with Artangel, filled a small flat
strategies are spatial, occupying public spaces to disrupt the with copper sulphate solution, and then drained it to reveal
flows that naturalise catastrophic urban change. Most of the the entire flat covered with brilliant blue crystals. The work
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examples I look at I call “mutated homes”. These examples did not dispute the principles of social housing, but for Hiorns
portray homes as insecure, absurd and unheimlich or unhomely and many visitors including me, its claustrophobia, darkness
by using materials and structures that mutate, are themselves and literal spikiness highlighted the small flat’s insufficiency as
214 insecure, or somehow disturb their contexts.14 a human environment, and thus the insufficiency of its realisa- 215
tion of some of the most important principles of social housing
In London, the iconic debut in this story is Rachel Whiteread’s (Harvie 2011).
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
1993 House. She and important arts commissioners Artangel
poured concrete into a disused Victorian three-storey house More recently, Argentinian artist Leandro Erlich, hosted by
on Grove Road in East London’s Tower Hamlets, about two the Barbican art centre, built 2013’s Dalston House, also in
miles east of Toynbee Hall. They then effectively peeled off the East London. Horizontally on the ground, he laid a life-size
house to reveal the space inside made concrete. According to three-storey Georgian house façade, complete with brass door
a recent commentator, it was “an impenetrable inversion of knob and knocker and interior lighting and scenes. That house
domesticity, a machine for not living” (Warde-Aldem 2013). It front faced a tilted, suspended mirror. Visitors were welcome
famously divided opinion. Some saw it as patronising and/or to move on the horizontal façade, appearing in the mirror as
though they were hanging from the door frame or sitting on up-
14
One of the most important predecessors in this strand is Gordon Matta-Clark’s 1974
Splitting, in Englewood, New Jersey. In likely the most famous instance of his anarchic in-
per window ledges, apparently placed in unlikely positions or
terventions in architecture, his “anarchitecture”, Matta-Clark cut two parallel slices from locations (Metro News Reporter 2013). In some cases, this pro-
the wood frame house and removed the cut-out material, leaving a home literally split
apart, fundamentally disrupted and rendered unusable while barely changed and entirely
15
recognisable. See also work by Michael Landy in Harvie 2013, 139-40.
duced strong images of physical precarity, suggesting housing time, they stage the fantasy of a house and a home. Cultural
precarity. Other times, people took the opportunity to articu- critic Lauren Berlant might identify these as examples of what
late aspirational – or optimistic – visions rather than dystopian she calls cruel optimism, “the condition of maintaining an at-
realities by making strongly proprietorial images – for example, tachment to a problematic object in advance of its loss” (Berlant
with a couple, dressed as though for a date or a celebration, 2006, 21; emphasis original; see also Berlant 2011). In these art
holding flowers and holding hands, and floating near the top works, despite deteriorating social and economic conditions un-
of the front door. The mirror also invoked this kind of housing der neoliberalism which corrode lives and might, for example,
security as a mirage, a phantasm of Berlant’s cruel optimism. prevent home ownership, people tenaciously hold on to fanta-
sies of the “good life”, fantasies such as that of home ownership.
British sculptor Alex Chinneck has made several mutating build-
ings and homes (Chinneck n.d.). 2013’s From the Knees of My My final example of visual art features not allusive imagery
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Nose to the Belly of My Toes took an unused three-storey house but explicit critical commentary. In artist Rebecca Ross’s 2015
in Margate, Kent, and created a slipping façade for it that ap- London Is Changing, she solicited online comments and post-
peared to warp into the front garden and exposed the interior of ed them on electronic billboards in central London locations.
216 the top storey. In the same year, for Bankside’s Merge Festival, Comments included, “Our studio complex is being redevel- 217
his Under theWeather but over the Moon changed the façades of oped into flats”, from a printmakers based in South London;
two adjacent three- and four-storey properties at the south end and “London is miserable unless you’re rich” by an artist “re-
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POINTS OF FRICTION
of London’s Blackfriars Bridge so that the buildings appeared locating from Hackney [in East London] to the United States”
to be upside-down. For the 2014 Merge Festival, on the site of (Lewis 2015). The campaign made explicit the gentrifying,
a former candle factory in London’s Southwark Street, Chin- displacing conditions experienced by respondents.
neck built a two-storey Georgian house, apparently solid red-
brick but actually made of wax. Titled A Pound of Flesh for 50p, These examples interrupt public space with their visible dif-
the house was gradually melted over thirty days (Merge 2014), ferences and counter-narratives and challenge increasingly ac-
perhaps literalising the overheated market in housing. cepted and naturalised urban norms such as the prioritisation
of profit, capital and business over the social needs of people.
All of these examples disorient audiences’ relationships to ur- Even more so than in the case of works I discussed above, Ross
ban space, urban architecture, and human spaces of living in the placed her testimonies of housing crisis in the flow of urban
city. They speak with poetic urgency to the insecurity, precarity, traffic. They occupied not just traffic corridors and the sight-
and insufficiency of housing now, performing housing that is lines of passers-by, but the very billboards usually deployed
largely unwelcoming, inhospitable, and disturbing. At the same to advertise things for sale, including property, in this western
capitalist city quite typically dominated by consumerism. For are usually performed by McCormick and Pick, who refer to
me, all of these works made powerfully visible housing precar- each other by their real names, as personae who may well be
ity and its painful, sometimes traumatising effects. versions of their actual selves. In the pair’s established onstage
dynamic, Pick is more rule-bound and sardonic and McCor-
I start with these art works to demonstrate how prominent and mick is, apparently, cheerier, and given to wild excess (Pringle
urgent the housing crisis is as an issue for contemporary artists 2015). This dynamic is captured in a publicity still for 2013’s
in the uk, how its visibility is increasing too for audiences in Number 1, The Plaza: in a bright, white loft apartment tasteful-
public space, and how it is specifically articulating feelings in ly furnished with select antique furniture and plants, Pick sits
response to the crisis, feelings of precarity, loss, displacement, tidily, legs demurely crossed, hair pulled tight back, looking
and disturbance. with possible disapproval at McCormick, who leaps in front of
her in a bright pink, black-fringed sort of cheerleading outfit,
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I turn now to look at how the housing crisis, its stories and its her midriff and panty crotch exposed and her face obscured by
feelings have been addressed in recent performance by two long blonde hair.
young feminist companies: getinthebackofthevan and Sh!t
218 Theatre. The title Number 1, The Plaza locates the pair in a suggested 219
luxury accommodation; it is number one, in a location so spe-
cial it can abandon banal suffixes “street”, or even “avenue” for
POINTS OF FRICTION
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the distinctive prefix “the”. (Reviewer Matt Trueman observes
GETINTHEBACKOFTHEVAN’S NUMBER 1, THE PL AZA its resemblance to a show flat at Number 1 The Avenue in East
London’s Bow. [Trueman 2014]). Set in both “their” home and
getinthebackofthevan is artistic director Hester Chilling- a show home, the show, though staged sparsely, features two
worth, and performer-makers Lucy McCormick and Jennif- gleaming chrome bar stools, references to a breakfast bar and
er Pick (getinthebackofthevan n.d.a.). Since about 2008,16 the invitation, “Red front door. Gold number 1.Tiny peephole.Take
thevan has made raucous, playful, sometimes aggressive, di- a look around. getinthebackofthevan want to open up and let
rect address, theatre/live art installations and performances you in. Right in. So you can really get a feeling for what it’s like
that cast a fascinated and disgusted eye on the warped values on the inside” (getinthebackofthevan n.d.b.). McCormick
of contemporary culture, especially its sexual politics. Shows and Pick wear tight, low-cut, glittering cocktail dresses, long
hair extensions, and large mics, their battery packs strapped to
16
Stewart Pringle notes the company has been making work together for seven years in
their thighs like garter belts… or the strap that secures a weap-
his review of Number 1, The Plaza (Pringle 2015). on to the leg of action heroine Lara Croft (see figure 1). They
carry drinks; wine for McCormick and whisky for Pick. They
chat with the audience and sing musical numbers from Willy
Russell’s 1983 musical Blood Brothers, about twins separated at
birth, one raised in wealth, and one in poverty. They give us a
tour of their flat. They argue, wrestle, and throw and smear co-
pious quantities of a substance that they present as shit – and
that looks like shit – all over the stage and all over each other.
Their dresses ride up and they are not wearing underwear (see
figure 2). Reviewer Stewart Pringle observes that, though the
show is billed as “an evening with”, “it’s more like a night in,
one that’s gone on too long and devolved into karaoke and re-
JEN HARVIE
criminations” (Pringle 2015). According to thevan’s own pub-
licity, “Someone’s left a passive aggressive note on the kitchen
table; it’s about entitlement, property and privacy. Welcome to
the show home, everyone. Number 1,The Plaza is a souvenir al- 221
bum from a joyride through extravaganza, cabaret, reality, live
art, theatre and filth” (getinthebackofthevan n.d.b.).
POINTS OF FRICTION
Number 1,The Plaza presents a fantasy of urban “good life” fea-
turing a swanky address, stylish design, dressing up and cock-
tails. But this is definitely a fantasy, at best only partially real-
ised, more likely nowhere near achieved. In the dichotomy of
those who have and those who have not invoked by this show’s
references to Blood Brothers, McCormick and Pick are have-
nots who fantasise about a better life. They wear party dresses,
but their diets reportedly feature the inexpensive, carbohydrate-
rich staples of children and students: pasta and pasties. They
carry their “shit” in Tupperware, one of the most important
FIGURE 1 Jennifer Pick (left) and Lucy McCormick (right) in GETINTHEBACKOFTHEVAN’s tools of the thrifty household. Their flat is literally shitty. And
Number 1, The Plaza, directed by Hester Chillingworth. Photograph: Ludovic des Cognets
most importantly, though their relationship has elements of af-
fection, camaraderie, and collaboration, Pick repeatedly puts
down McCormick, the women fight, verbally and physically,
and they smear each other with shit. There is affection here,
but also dislike and punishment. Why do they live together?
This is not the fun-times flat-share imagined in the nbc tv sit-
com Friends that ran for a decade from 1994. This is the hard
times of the situation tragedy of young women’s urban lives in
the uk in the twenty-teens.
Number 1, The Plaza is not a bleeding-heart plea for pity; Pick

and McCormick’s aggressive self-exposure, shit-slinging, and
JEN HARVIE
clear preference for alcohol leave no room for tea and sym-
pathy; as much as it is the performance personae who fail to
achieve the good life, it is the audience who are positioned to
feel uncomfortable. However, the show does stage a metathea- 223
trial exposé of the pressures on and in this pair’s relationship
and on whatever hope they might have for conventional fan-
POINTS OF FRICTION
tasies of a good life that neoliberal contexts have put so far
beyond the means of so many. Number 1, the Plaza playfully
and aggressively makes public so much that would be private;
it reveals how these women interact behind closed doors, it
exposes their bodies, and it displays their shit. In so doing,
the show explores the troubled dynamic between propriety
and its near-namesake property, between public and private in
contemporary culture.17 These performers work hard to take
charge of those public/private dynamics but these dynamics
ultimately do not advantage people such as these in contem-
FIGURE 2 Lucy McCormick (left) and Jennifer Pick (right) in GETINTHEBACKOFTHEVAN’s 17

I am grateful to Lynne McCarthy for her work on property rights that informs my think-
Number 1, The Plaza, directed by Hester Chillingworth. Photograph: Ludovic des Cognets ing here.
porary neoliberal culture. The uncomfortable affect the show Sh!t Theatre replace the “i” in Shit with an exclamation mark.
produces places performers and audience within these failing, Duo Mothersole and Biscuit have been making work together
unstable conditions that fail nothing so much as they fail so- since at least 2010 (Sh!t Theatre n.d.). They perform as “them-
cial reciprocity. Reviewer Billy Barrett concludes, “The sight selves”, use direct address, and mix comic style with sequences
of two performers pretending to be in a luxury London pad of song in a kind of vaudeville, addressing political issues such
while actually rolling around in sewage is a pretty grim sign of as underemployment head on. They perform in partial drag,
the times” (Barrett 2014). always appearing in full-face make-up that often makes Moth-
ersole look surprised and Biscuit slightly displeased. They usu-
ally wear matching cheap and unglamorous costumes – shirts,
shorts and bandanas in Letters to Windsor House (see figure 3).
SH!T THEATRE’S LET TERS TO WINDSOR HOUSE
JEN HARVIE
JEN HARVIE
As the opening sequence of Letters toWindsor House makes clear,
Letters to Windsor House premiered in summer 2016 by Lon- Windsor House is the actual and quite run-down ex-local au-
don-based Sh!t Theatre and also addressed the housing crisis, thority flat Mothersole and Biscuit live in in a poor area in north
224 particularly its effects on so-called Generation Rent and on London, though this building once had illusions of grandeur, 225
the friendship of the Sh!t’s two members, Louise Mothersole being named after a royal castle, as are its neighbours, Bucking-
and Rebecca Biscuit. This show too made visible the precarity ham House and Holyrood House (Sh!t Theatre 2017, 19-20).
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POINTS OF FRICTION
of housing now, but its narrative and performance forms espe- The show’s opening sequence is accompanied by slide images
cially allowed for detailed exploration of some of the emotion- and illustrates how Windsor House is surrounded by poverty and
al damage caused by housing insecurity. Sh!t Theatre describe deprivation: a psychiatric hospital, the visibly poorly resourced
the show in their typical semi-ironic style as a “Detective show St John’s Deaf Centre, a homeless encampment, and a hotel
for Generation Rent” (Sh!t Theatre n.d.). For me, the show with bedbugs rated “1.5 out of 5 on TripAdvisor” (idem, 23-
is funny and ironic but also painfully revealing about how the 24). Also nearby are two new luxury housing developments on
headline-grabbing but abstract “housing crisis” actually mani- the site of former social housing, “55% of which have been pre-
fests in acute, traumatising, and tragic personal pressures, es- sold to investors in Singapore”, notes Mothersole (idem, 24).
pecially on friendship.18
Letters to Windsor House features slide shows, comic action with
cardboard boxes and a bouncy sofa, brass instruments, a disco
18
Sh!t Theatre’s Rebecca Biscuit and Louise Mothersole describe making Letters to Wind-
sor House in detail with me in my podcast Stage Left with Jen Harvie, episode 1, “Sh!t
light, and harmonised songs, many from Lionel Bart’s 1960
Theatre” (Harvie 2017). musical Oliver! based on Charles Dickens’ 1837-9 novel Oli-
FIGURE 3 Sh!t Theatre’s Louise Mothersole (left) and Rebecca Biscuit (right) in Letters to Windsor House / Photograph: The Other Richard
ver Twist. Through the evidence presented by previous tenants’ L[ouise]: Simplest explanation –
mountains of accumulated mail, the show narrates Biscuit and B[ecca]: Rob Jecock was receiving baby milk,
Mothersole’s investigation into the lives of those many previ- Rob Jecock is an
ous tenants. What emerges is a picture of people “hailed” by Resigned nods:
their mail as would-be tax-payers, precarious workers, debt- B & L: Adult baby. (idem, 54; emphasis original)
ors, and consumers, as most mail is from advertisers, former
employers, and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs – the It is a reasonable conclusion in an economy which inhibits in-
uk’s tax-collecting agency. Eventually, Mothersole and Biscuit dependent adult living, infantilising its citizens. Biscuit and
open some mail and extrapolate from it to concoct former ten- Mothersole, too, play dress-up, jump on the furniture, and
ants’ life stories marked by underemployment and compara- build shelters out of cardboard (idem, 31, 60). They present a
tively minor league tax evasion amongst a class of Generation slide from Stephanie Polsky’s book Ignoble Displacement:
JEN HARVIE
JEN HARVIE
Renters who live in housing insecurity. The Sh!ts’ treatment of
other people’s mail ultimately points up not their disrespect There are many similarities between the Victorian liberal
for other people’s property but rather the cruel displacements, agenda and the neoliberal agenda of the present-era Cam-
228 acute instability and often undesired hypermobility that are eron government concerning the housing of low-income 229
experienced by so many in the unregulated commercial rental people. The logic of contemporary Conservatism is truly
sector. Here, personal communications – and implicitly, per- Dickensian: their main concern is to prevent the poor from
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
sonal identities – literally become part of the collateral damage, making demands on society.
where rents rise frequently and rapidly and tenants are forced (cited in Sh!t Theatre 2017, 46)
to move even faster in search of affordable accommodation.
Mothersole and Biscuit are certainly neglected by the state, and
Eventually, Mothersole and Biscuit discover that their landlord likely abandoned by it. In these circumstances, they have be-
is illegally subletting his council flat to them, implicating Moth- come mutually dependent, over-attached, and unable to sepa-
ersole and Biscuit who are nevertheless trapped. They cannot rate: Biscuit responds to Mothersole’s private messages (idem,
afford to move, though in many ways they would like to: the 32); neither can move out or on. “You feel responsible for my
flat is small, with little privacy and no social space besides the welfare”, says Mothersole; “I feel trapped”, says Biscuit (idem,
kitchen. They are trapped in a rental limbo that is not only po- 52-3). Their relationship is mutually sustaining, but also, in
tentially criminal but developmental. One previous male ten- the circumstances, mutually constraining (see figure 4).
ant receives leaflets for baby formula. Speculating why, they
ultimately conclude that it is for his own consumption:
It is not only citizens who cannot mature in these contexts.
Britain itself has regressed, as the show makes repeated reso-
nant references to the pre-Welfare State of Victorian London
depicted by Charles Dickens in A Tale of Two Cities and Oliver
Twist. An audio bed of the song “Consider Yourself ” from the
musical adaptation Oliver! reminds audiences how the charac-
ter Fagan traps vulnerable children in his exploitative crimi-
nal enterprise by giving them something approximating love:
“Consider yourself at home! Consider yourself one of the fam-
ily” (idem, 30). Letters to Windsor House stages Fagan as com-
mensurate with the Sh!ts’ criminal landlord; hateful, inescapa-
JEN HARVIE
ble but also himself a victim of disadvantageous circumstances,
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possibly himself also a Generation Renter.
230 Repeatedly, the show poses contrasts between fantasies and re- 231
alities of British life. The fantasies are posed most audaciously
by a promotional video for the new private development coming
POINTS OF FRICTION
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soon near Windsor House, a video which visually implies that
the location is near Harrods department store and a branch of
Marks and Spencer – it is not – and claims the area is a sort of
rural idyll, “a beautiful piece of rural England”; it is not (idem,
40). To semi-occupy these fantasies of bygone British leisure
and plenitude, the Sh!ts do Morris dancing and play Rule Bri-
tannia (badly) on brass instruments. As I discuss below and
as illustrated in figure 5, they literally inhabit red pillar box
post boxes, a British design icon spread throughout its empire.
The Sh!ts wear “Ladies Printed Country Blouses” from a “re-
ally upmarket Scottish clothing company” (idem, 69) that their
flat has received promotional post for; the blouses are tastefully FIGURE 4 Sh!t Theatre’s Louise Mothersole in the arms of Rebecca Biscuit in
Letters to Windsor House / Photograph: The Other Richard
patterned with animals such as grouse and pheasant, animals
“where the plural is the same as the singular”, and animals “you has one hand accessible through a side of the box, enabling
can shoot” (idem, 70). In contrast to those fantasy pseudo- them to hold and read letters. With physical and verbal awk-
memories of British/London life hinting at bucolic and leisured wardness, they read these letters to each other, confessing their
rural living, the Sh!ts show locally-recorded videos and photos strong but conflicting feelings about living together: Mother-
of squalid dumped garbage, homeless housing encampments, sole wants to sustain the mutual dependence; Biscuit wants to,
drug-taking in a phone box, and atrocious housing conditions. but cannot, move on; they love each other; but it is not easy.
Letters’ set is crowded by cardboard boxes, which signify as the These are parts of what the housing crisis does: inhibit move-
playthings of their childlike selves, but also as homeless housing ment, inhibit expression, restrict development, and put acute,
and discarded, accumulated rubbish (see figure 1). They show potentially traumatising pressure on friendships.
the fantasy precisely as fantasy. They jump on the furniture,
“as though trying to grab for something just slightly out of reach”
JEN HARVIE
JEN HARVIE
(idem, 46; italics original in stage direction).
CONCLUSIONS
Caught in a situation tragedy, Mothersole and Biscuit cannot
232 prevent themselves repeatedly imagining tragic, even melodra- This work by artists of Generation Rent indicting the conditions 233
matic conclusions to the previous tenants’ stories. They imag- they are living in is a lo-fi theatre of economy with a narrative
ine that a new mother dies (idem, 55); a man gets caught up which explicitly addresses the attractions of a better quality of
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
with the Turkish mafia and becomes so stressed, he suffers a independent living and the limitations of living without that as
debilitating stroke (idem, 48-51). The real tragedy that unfolds well as the restrictions to achieving it. The work narrates the
is that of Mothersole and Biscuit’s friendship, which strains particular pressures on relationships that current conditions
under the pressure of their housing insecurity. Mothersole fan- produce. Especially in the case of getinthebackofthevan, the
tasises that they are a family; Biscuit wants more independence. work is unabashedly scatological, not politely smoothing over
the conditions of oppression, but proliferating, smearing, and
In one of the most poignant sets of sequences of the perfor- spreading them. Both companies transgress conventional pro-
mance, Mothersole and Biscuit stand on far sides of the stage prieties, thevan physically and the Sh!ts in stories about their
and don cardboard constructions shaped and painted in loving sex lives and relationships and in opening other people’s mail.
detail as red pillar box post boxes, with Queen Elizabeth II’s E These revelations put pressures on conventions of propriety,
II R insignia replaced with a carefully crafted B & L for Becca privacy, and privacy’s putative opposite of publicness, all in an
and Louise. They alternate peering and speaking through the underlying context of compromised property and social rela-
postal slots (idem, 32-3; 52-3; 81-2; see figure 5). Each of them tions. Both companies’ performance of the double act dem-
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FIGURE 5 Sh!t Theatre’s Louise Mothersole in Letters to Windsor House / Photograph: The Other Richard
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Hit, Hit Maker,
Hit Parade
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A SERIES OF PERFORMANCES USING MICROPHONES AS PERCUSSIVE INSTRUMENTS TO SOUND

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A SPACE. REPETITIVE AND PERSISTENT BEATS THAT ENTWINE SOUND, SPACE, AND TIME THROUGH
A LOGIC OF LABOUR AND ENDURANCE. THE PERFORMERS ARE LIKE STUBBORN AUTOMATONS
SEEKING TO TRANSPIERCE THE MATERIAL THEY ARE HITTING. AS SOUND FACTORY WORKERS,
THEY LEAVE THEIR MARK. THE COLLECTION OF OVERLAPPING CHAOTIC BEATS RESULTS IN A
RESONATING RUMBLE THAT RESEMBLES THE DULL ROAR OF URBAN ACTIVITY. A LIVE RHYTHM
MACHINE MADE UP OF ARMS ARMED WITH MICROPHONES USED AS HAMMERS. THE PERFORMANCES
PUNCTUATE SPACE AND PARCEL UP TIME. WHAT IF EVERY MOMENT OF OUR LIVES WAS A HIT?
Christof Migone
HIT
Performers hit various surfaces with the microphones. The rudimen- Hit (Nuit Blanche). Twenty-five participants performing up to thirteen at
tary rendering can be heard as a lulling meditative murmur or a grating a time. Part of the zone curated by Christine Shaw under the exhibition title:
The Work of Wind, for the 2015 edition of Nuit Blanche in Toronto, sunrise
aggravating noise; the volume ebbs and flows as the organic collective to sunset, October 3-4, 2015.
apparatus expends its energy. The piece lasts as long as the event it
is a part of. The sound they produce is heard acoustically, but is also Hit (Sounds Like). Seven participants performing two at a time. Part of the
Sounds Like festival, Saskatoon, 18h30-22h, July 27, 2013.
amplified and, in the case of the Nuit Blanche version, transformed
into a live composition over an array of speakers.
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Hit (Nuit Blanche) / Photograph: Marla Haldy Hit (Sounds Like) / Photograph: Christof Migone
HIT MAKER
Ten participants are sought throughout the city and are asked to Hit (Porto). Part of the Trama Festival, October 15, 2011.
hit a surface with a microphone one hundred times. The sound of Hit (Sudbury). Part of the FAAS 3 (Fore d’art alternatif de Sudbury), organized
each person’s actions is amplified. Each person can choose their by the Galerie du Nouvel-Ontario, May 10-11, 2012.
own rhythm and intensity. Hit Maker, unlike Hit and Hit Parade, is
less of a happening or an event, and functions more as a surprise,
a little moment of noise, a strange little gesture, a sonic capsule of
labour, a marker of time at work or out in the city.
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Hit Maker (Porto), Bernardino Pereira, 82 years old, retired, Batalha Square (bus stop)
Photograph: Christof Migone Hit Maker (Sudbury), Terri McTembsey, 12 years old, student / Photograph: Christof Migone
HIT PARADE Hit Parade (Seoul). Ten participants. Part of SFX SEOUL, September 8, 2007.
Participants lie face down on the street or ground where they Hit Parade (Montreal). Eleven participants. Part of the Suoni per il Popolo
occupy a sidewalk or atrium or public space and proceed to pound festival at the Sala Rossa on June 9, 2008.
the pavement or floor with the microphone one thousand times. The
Hit Parade (Quebec). Fourteen participants. Part of C’est arrivé près de chez
sound of hitting is amplified. Each person has their own amplifier. vous at the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec, curator Nathalie de
Blois, January 17, 2009.
They have to reach to one thousand. Because each performer
chooses their own rhythm and intensity, the ending is staggered. Hit Parade (Dundee). Twelve participants. Part of Kill Your Timid Notion,
As the activity dwindles the public is unsure when or if it has ended. presented by Arika at Dundee Contemporary Arts, February 27, 2010.
The ambiguity is welcome. Hit Parade (Winnipeg). Fifteen participants. Presented by Plug In for the
Send+Receive Festival, October 7, 2011.
The parade is static, it does not go through the city but you
hear it from blocks away. Hit Parade announces itself through Hit Parade (Porto). Twelve participants. Presented at the Trama Festival on
October 14, 2011.
the ears well before the eyes. Part-celebration, part-protest,
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part-noisefest. Hit Parade (New York). Thirteen participants. Part of Arika’s programming
for the Whitney Biennial titled A survey is a process of listening, May 3, 2012.
Instructions are simple, no skill required. Count as you hit, stop
Hit Parade (Toronto). Seventeen participants. Part of the 7a*11d International
246 when you get to 1000. As the piece has evolved, certain additional Festival of Performance Art, in the lobby of the Ontario College of Art & 247
parameters have been inserted into the score. At first it was just Design, October 27, 2012.
the inclusion of open-ended pauses at key moments in the count.
Hit Parade (Rotterdam). Ten participants. Part of the International Film
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Then each performer received one the following: Hit as slow as Festival Rotterdam, part of Signals: Sound Stages curated by Edwin Carels,
possible for the first half and as fast as possible for the second; Hit at the Schouwburgplein, January 28, 2013.
as fast as possible for the first half and as slow as possible for the
Hit Parade (Kitchener). Fifteen participants. Part of the Between the Ears
second; Make each pause twice as long as the last one; Alternate portion of CAFKA 13 in Kitchener City Hall, May 31, 2013.
each section between pauses between hitting softly and hitting
hard; Hit increasingly fast and loud; Start fast and loud, finish slow Hit Parade (Milan). Twelve participants. Presented in the context of the Cildo
Meireles exhibition Installation. Curated by Pedro Rocha, at HangarBicocca
and quiet; Ignore my instructions about pauses and take them in Milan, July 10, 2014.
whenever you feel like it; Don’t take any pauses; Make each hundred
opposite of the preceding hundred (up to you to interpret); Within Hit Parade (Melbourne). Thirty-nine participants. Presented by the Liquid
Architecture Festival in the Great Hall of the National Gallery of Victoria,
each block of one hundred ramp up and then down (could be in September 28, 2014.
terms of speed or intensity or both); Follow the score and nothing
more; Hit hesitantly sometimes; Take longer than others to start; Hit Parade (Zagreb). Twenty-four participants. Presented as part of the
Expanded Cinema section of the 25fps festival, September 27, 2015.
Try to finish first; Try to finish last.
Hit Parade (Cagliari). Twenty-two participants. Presented at the MEM –
Mediateca del Mediterraneo, November 20, 2015.
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Hit Parade (Seoul) / Photograph: Jean-Pierre Gauthier
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Hit Parade (Montreal) / Photograph: Alexis O’Hara
1 (pause) 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 (pause) 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 (pause) 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 (pause) 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
(pause) 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 (pause) 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 (pause) 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 (pause) 71 72 73 74 75
76 77 78 79 80 (pause) 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 (pause) 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 (pause) 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109
110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145
146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180
181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 (pause) 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212
213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244
245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276
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The
Performance
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is the
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Message
Rui Mourão
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Artivist performance OS NOSSOS SONHOS NÃO CABEM NAS VOSSAS URNAS [OUR DREAMS DON’T FIT IN YOUR BALLOT BOXES], 2014 / Photograph: Madalena Ávila
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Artivist performance OS VOSSOS SONHOS NÃO CABEM NAS NOSSAS URNAS [YOUR DREAMS DON’T FIT IN OUR BALLOT BOXES], 2014 / Photograph: Ricardo Castelo-Branco
ARTISTIC MAKING AS REVELATION PERFORMANCE
Despite becoming what we do, we are what we dream. We are what

we do with dreams. We find ourselves in between what we continue
to dream, what we no longer dream of and that which we turn the
dream into, which is never a crystalized thing. In this trajectory,
we are all the narratives through which we constantly create and
recreate ourselves. We are a changing narrative, a narrative that we
structure as much as it structures us.
In my case, the dream and the narrative always involve art. Although
I have been working intensely in visual arts since 2005, especially
with video, my artistic trajectory began in performing arts. However,
I did not want to interpret the worlds of other artists. I wanted
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to interpret the world as an artist. Video art has allowed me to
engage in that search, as I record situations from reality, which
I then isolate and link in representations that go beyond it. Shot
260 261
composition, the grammar of editing, the polysemy afforded by
video installations and the diversity of subjects of analysis (artistic,
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social, cultural, economic, political or sexual issues) have allowed
me to try to understand the other, while I understand and position
myself in relation to the subject of analysis.
In fact, I have never left the performative realm. It is just that I am

no longer others. I move towards others. Capturing and interpreting
their performativity, I seek to give them a voice. And I find my own
voice in theirs. The relevance of anthropology to my work emerges
precisely as an interpreter of the other. It is as if the situations that I
shoot, and in which I also somehow participate, are recombined in a
specular way, in a contemplative stepping back by which everything
is dislocated from its original context. Everything is reperformed to
reveal itself; to reveal myself.
Artivist performance OS VOSSOS SONHOS NÃO CABEM NAS NOSSAS URNAS
[YOUR DREAMS DON’T FIT IN OUR BALLOT BOXES], 2014
Photograph: Ricardo Castelo-Branco
POLITICAL ACTION AS PERFORMANCE ART
Although actions are not always consciously performative or

political, from the perspective of Performance Studies all human
action is performed, in the same way that from the perspective of
Political Science all human action is politicized. Playing with these
notions, interconnecting the political as performative and the
performative as political, in 2014 I conceived an “artivist troika”
(both artistic and activist), consisting of: a book (Ensaio de Artivismo:
Video e performance [Essay on Artivism: Video and Performance],
multichannel video installation (with ten image projections of artivist
performances in Portugal) and a live performance (in three acts that
I shall briefly explain). Act I happened unexpectedly both for the
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audience and the staff of the Chiado Museum – National Museum
of Contemporary Art. During the opening of the video installation
and the book launch session, a supposed spectator (singer Ana
262 Maria Pinto) started to sing “Acordai [Wake up]”, composed by 263
Fernando Lopes-Graça, and walked towards the chaise longue on
which Antigone (actress Joana Freches) lay asleep, to awaken her
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spirit fighting for ethics. Dozens of guests pulled sleeping bags and
posters from the chaise longue. The posters contained slogans
against the privatizing of the museum, against the disinvestment
in the arts and for a democratization of the access to Culture).
I read the artivist manifesto and the museum was occupied for the
night. Act II followed one month later, with seventy-three people
dressed in black mimicking the statues and paintings at the National
Museum of Ancient Art (evoking the right to Culture in article 73 of
the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic) and repeating over
and over: “We are art, in front of art, mourning for art, fighting for
art”. Act III took place the following month, with a choreography at
Ajuda Nacional Palace – the seat of public power overseeing Culture
in Portugal – including anthropomorphized pigs, umbrellas, poetry
Artivist performance MORREM LENTAS AS URNAS ONDE NÃO CABEM OS SONHOS
[BALLOT BOXES WHERE DREAMS DON’T FIT SLOWLY DIE], 2014 / Photograph: Rui Mourão and a drone filming the event from above.
Act I was titled OS NOSSOS SONHOS NÃO CABEM NAS VOSSAS URNAS ritual performative experience and performance art, we
[OUR DREAMS DON’T FIT IN YOUR BALLOT BOXES], Act II OS VOSSOS realize that both require an attitude of commitment without
SONHOS NÃO CABEM NAS NOSSAS URNAS [YOUR DREAMS DON’T masks to create a transforming potential.
FIT IN OUR BALLOT BOXES], MORREM LENTAS AS URNAS ONDE NÃO
That was the potential that I experienced, in a much deeper way than
CABEM OS SONHOS [BALLOT BOXES WHERE DREAMS DON’T FIT
I had expected, in artivist performances. I experienced it through a
SLOWLY DIE].1 This veritable artistic and political lab involved the
true surrendering to ideas, but also through the relational dynamics
participation of over one hundred people and was strategically
with the supporters and detractors of the three acts, whose
mediatized on the Internet, press, television and radio, thus
positions echo both in the museum and the public cybersphere of
proving that it is possible to create artistic forms that engender
social networks.
political actors with a voice in the public sphere.2 Subverting the
status quo with low economic resources and high ideals generates Despite the support of several artists, activists and patrons of the
empowerment through art, breaking the paradigm of “art for art’s arts, I met with the opposition of the official mediators of the art
sake” in favour of “acting art” and questioning injustices, inequalities that I wanted to defend. The curator of the exhibition herself, Emília
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and poor public choices. Tavares, staunchly opposed my political-artistic act despite having
written, in the wake of Léger: “Works like Rui Mourão’s suggest the
Unlike large street demonstrations, which rely on the largest possible
possibility of resilience in the face of dictums that the art system
264
number of people for impact, the force of artivist performances in 265
expects from artists, i.e., ‘produce constructive criticism of the
the public space is more qualitative than quantitative, imparting
system, but do not threaten public institutions, hierarchical classes
them with a vocation for counter-power and counterculture.
and other legacies of bourgeois liberalism; intervene on culture,
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but do not appear aggressive or ready to fight for political equality’”
THE REVELATION OF THE MEDIUM (Tavares 2014, 17).
AS TRANSFORMATION PERFORMANCE
Once the mediating discourse that expects a separation between
For Richard Schechner, a reference in Performance Studies, ethics and aesthetics is emptied, all that is left is the rhetoric that
in both theatre and ritual there is a passage from the everyday turns art into an instrument of power relations linked to an elitist
into the performative dimension, but the actor who is aware of cultural capital. Therefore, how not to question the meaning of the
the character is “transported” by the performing experience, art of my time, seeking for the value of art beyond the frame of
while in ritual performance the agent is “transported” by the successive times? Which is to say, I went into the Chiado Museum
experience, incorporating an inner condition from which he/ with convictions and left with doubts. I went in defending a system
she will not return unchanged. Drawing a parallel between that I subverted and left subverting my place within that system. I
went in as an artist and left as a person.
1
Online videos of the three acts: vimeo.com/119287387; vimeo.com/120016187;
vimeo.com/120014664 Where, when and how artistic production occurs tells us as much
2
I analyzed the subject in depth in Mourão (2015). about the creator as it does about the medium that defines
presentation conditions. Taking into account that “the medium REFERENCES
is the message”, Marshall McLuhan’s famous formula, it could be
MOURÃO, Rui. 2015. «Performances artivistas: incorporação duma estética de dissensão
deduced that the form and place in which performance is expressed numa ética de resistência». Cadernos de Arte e Antropologia 4 (2).
is in itself a message about the place occupied by the artist. The cadernosaa.revues.org/938
economic, institutional and political constraints of the art medium TAVARES, Emília. 2014. «Palavras leva-as o vento: uma arte de compromisso».
In Ensaio de Artivismo: Vídeo e performance, 11-18. MNAC – Museu do Chiado: Lisbon.
that I subverted, by exposing them, revealed a message: their
limitations are in place to generate creations that fit the respective
mould. Artists must choose between turning art into a medium
moulded by the validation of the dominant sociocultural group,
which thereby perpetuates itself, or turning art into a medium of
inner and outer transformation that would ideally allow everyone to
evolve. Even if the process means to destabilize, stir and question.
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WHEN PERFORMANCE
MEETS THE MUSEUM:
A DIALOGUE WITH
CATHERINE WOOD
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Liliana Coutinho
Wood is clear in the definition of her programming field, link-
ing it clearly to Tate Modern’s mission – i.e., to collect and
construct a historical perspective for modern and contempo-
rary art –, as well as for the physical and social space that it
occupies in the city of London and in the international con-
temporary art panorama. This dependence on the mission is a
prolific intervention space at various levels. On the one hand,
the presence of objects as singular and diverse as the objects
of performance art allows for a rereading of our understand-
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ing of what constitutes an art object, while clearly transferring
the focus from the object-material to the object-relationship.
The entry of this practice into the contemporary art museum
opens up space for an increasingly clear understanding of the
art object as an object that is constituted through a process of
270 relations rather than remaining a timeless icon – in Wood’s own 271
In the last few years, we have witnessed an increasing hosting words –, whose formal and significatory configuration could
of performance arts in large-scale institutional contexts, such well be already defined before being given to the spectator’s ex-
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as the museum and the academy, both of which with their own perience or placed on stage in the museum and in the discourses
projects and historiographic missions, reflexive analysis, con- that it constructs. We will also see that, within this perspective,
servation or exhibition of the contemporary artistic experience. to gaze at the art object leads to a revaluation of both the ma-
In this interview with Catherine Wood, curator in charge of terial objects (in the context of performative practice, the one
Tate Modern’s Performance Department, we will look at an to be conserved in a collection, depending of their place and
institution that was paradigmatic in bringing the performance function in the artistic experience to be activated or evoked)
into the museum. The themes examined here range from the and the historical narratives that articulate their meanings.
relationship of the artistic practices of performance to the Tate
Modern collection, to the construction of archives and docu- Furthermore, from the point of view of the relationship be-
mentation, to the transformation of Art History narratives when tween her work and Tate Modern’s mission, Wood’s curatorial
seen in the light of performance, to the migration of forms of approach privileges the relationships between artistic practic-
artistic making into different institutional spaces, to spaces for es, relating performance to painting, sculpture and installation
performance in the museum and the museum as public space. and promoting a concrete, transformative dialogue able to shed
a new light on art periods and works. Within these relationships This potential repositioning of internal hierarchies through a
there is a possible definition of performance art, valid in the creative relationship with public related services also leads to
context of this interview: a collection of artistic practices that another reflection in the interview: to consider the museum as
concern not only the presence of the body, but are based on the a public space to test social relationships and experiment with
creation of events, or live situations, which share imaginaries possibilities of relationship between collective behaviours, typ-
and modes of production with other arts, where the pictorial or ical of places dealing with large numbers of visitors (and with
sculptural dimension is more present, adding to them the tem- wide public exposure, such as in the case with the Tate Mod-
poral dimension. Instead of being presented as a new medium, ern), and more intimate experiences of cohabitation with the
or artistic discipline, performance art also emerges as a way artwork. Could the museum be a place to test both the pos-
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of reflecting on museological practice itself – see, for instance, sibilities for conciliation and for conflict between these two
what is mentioned about the piece Musée de la Danse. This in- dimensions of human experience in the public space?
tersection between artistic fields is sometimes hindered by the
organization of artistic production structures, with disciple-di-
vided services and departments. For this reason, performance
272 seeks other allies within the institution, reformulating social re- 273
lationships and hierarchies within the museum by providing
visibility to services and activities that, important as they might
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be to its daily life, are often still seen as secondary, or as mere
supports, to the departments which are considered crucial to
implementing the institution’s mission (conservation and cu-
ratorship departments). These other allies operate precisely
within the scope of the relationship with visitors and, therefore,
form the structure of the museum as public space (visitor expe-
rience service, educational service, etc.). A creative relationship
with these departments demonstrates that the entry of perfor-
mance into the museum interferes with the regime of produc-
tion of knowledge of the contemporary art museum, also act-
ing on its social hierarchy system by positioning areas formerly
considered as support structures on the plane of production of
conditions of experience and meaning for the artwork.
PERFORMANCE AT THE MUSEUM Gaye Chetwynd, Mark Leckey or Carlos Amorales, to name a few -
INTERVIEW WITH CATHERINE WOOD, and how they incorporated “performance” into a broader prac-
HEAD OF PERFORMANCE AT TATE MODERN tice that wasn’t necessarily anti-gallery or anti-museum, I wanted
to reflect contemporary practice in our programmes and collec-
tion displays. It was from there that I began to draw out the his-
tories that were influencing these artists too, and began to try to
Tate Modern has an extensive collection of modern and join them up. These narratives are not medium-specific, but set
contemporary art. Can you let us know, in broad strokes painting and sculpture in dialogue with actions and events.
and from the start of your work at Tate, what is the role of
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performance relative to the collection and the exhibitions? Is there any cross-departmental or cross-disciplinary work,
In the early 2000s, after undertaking research on the cross-dis- involving other curatorial departments?
ciplinary experiments of 1960s New York – in particular, looking at Not exactly, in the artistic “cross disciplinary” sense. Before Tate,
the relationship between minimalist sculpture and dance at the I worked at the Barbican Centre which had a theatre depart-
Judson Theater in New York, and the work of Yvonne Rainer – ment, a music department, an art department and, ironically,
274 I became, in parallel, very interested in a new generation of art- despite my desire it seemed to be almost impossible to work 275
ists who were working with “performance”. But it wasn’t “per- cross-departmentally because everybody had their “medium”
formance art” in a body-centred sense. It was about initiating and related budget in their own discipline. This was sad.
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situations that were live or event-based, sharing constructions
that were pictorial or sculptural in nature but often composed of Conversely, at Tate, it’s only visual art, yet my projects – more than
moveable elements, gestures and images and unfolding through most exhibitions or commissions often touch dance or theatre or
time. An emerging interest in an expanded notion of “moving music and we have collaborated with other institutions in Lon-
image” was beginning to interest a younger generation of art- don such as Sadlers Wells or the National Theatre. But in terms
ists, and I began at Tate by trying to find a space to present this. of the museum’s own departments, most projects have involved
Historically, Tate had occasionally – since the 1970s – programmed intense and productive collaboration with Visitor Services, the
performance works as part of a secondary programme, for spe- Information assistants, the Learning department, the Community
cial patrons events or as educational activities. Artists including department. The life of the museum that is in theory not the “art
Cesar, Marc Camille Chaimowicz, Rose English and Joseph Beuys specialist” part has been incredibly important – their skills and
had been part of this. There were also performance-related experience essential, in fact - and artists have often brought this
works in the collection, by Bruce Nauman, or Mona Hatoum. human infrastructure or architecture into the frame of visibility,
But, in looking at a new generation of artists – including Marvin deliberately, and found new ways of working into it.
Do you think that the presence of performance in the muse- dance. This makes me think about the significance of the
um challenges the art history narratives put up by the Tate discipline of dance in its relationship to the museum and
collection? the way museum spaces are venues for the presentation of
Yes, absolutely. artists who also present themselves in major theatre venues
“Performance” is much more than an event programme or a me- – I am thinking, for instance, of Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker
dium for live art works. It can be considered as an attitude, and or Alexandra Bachzetsis’ work. What kind of reflection on
a perspective on the entirety of the museum’s holdings. Its ex- the museum did Charmatz’ proposal allow for within Tate
pansiveness in drawing attention to the many active elements of Modern, and how do you approach this connection between
a situation in which art is encountered is significant for all forms the museum experience and dance?
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of art production and presentation. There has been a lot of debate about “dance in the museum” in
recent years and lots of traffic across the boundaries between
Taking the point of view of performance as an attitude, it can in- theatres and museum or gallery spaces. But it’s been a two-way
flect our reading of the status and meaning of any of the works in traffic, in the sense that many visual artists in the past decade have
Tate’s collection. I see many of our collection objects as pauses borrowed ideas of “choreography”, “theatre”, “dance” in their
276 or moments in an ongoing artistic dialogue, or prompts towards work from a non-disciplined point of view, at the same time that 277
action as much as valuable artefacts per se. This is something I at- curators have invited those trained in the above into their spaces.
tempted to stage in the show I did titled “A Bigger Splash: Painting I think this process of exchange has been healthy, if not always
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after Performance”, looking at icons of the collection by Pollock mutually sympathetic: the visual artists often borrow forms from
and Hockney in terms of what they opened up for choreography other disciplines as “readymade” formats and styles, putting them
and theatre. And subsequently in the opening programme of the in quotation marks, deliberately “cutting and pasting” or displac-
Switch House galleries: in “Between Object and Architecture” ing outmoded forms into the world of their work. The gallery situ-
displays, and in the Tanks where we showed Charlotte Posen- ation offers both freedom and friction for professional dancers
enske, Robert Morris and Rasheed Araeen as score-like, objects and choreographers: the lack of audience/performer set-up or
as performances. But it is also part of an ongoing strategy as re- other technical infrastructure can be liberating, but the lack of
gards collecting and considering how the “uncollectable” can be provision (sprung floors, dressing rooms, showers etc) can make
woven into a collection. What do we value? What do we keep? it tough. Practical issues aside, I feel that within visual arts we
have gleaned a lot of nuance and complexity from the craft and
In 2015 you worked with Boris Charmatz’s proposal If Tate sensitivity of those practiced in theatre and dance seen within
Modern was Musée de la Danse?, a project that proposed our spaces. It might be (and is) the case that this work can be
a transformation of the art museum through the lens of seen down the road in theatre, but the proximity of practices in
the same space opens up better potential for dialogue and posi- fact that it’s always full of people – as a part of its character to
tive “cross-contamination”. work into, rather than an afterthought (artists were rarely imagin-
ing a project in a blank white space or black box).
Boris Charmatz is one choreographer who has been fascinated
with and working on the dialogue between visual art and dance It also meant that the entirety of Tate Modern became inflect-
for a long time. His projects such as Brouillon or Expo Zero radi- ed with a theatrical or performative quality, because the work
cally reimagine what an exhibition format might be, incorporat- might erupt anywhere.
ing live action. Distinct from other artists such as Tino Sehgal or
Xavier Leroy he has specifically investigated the material object However, now that we are able to inhabit the Tanks spaces – two
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artwork in relation to danced gestures. His Musée de la Danse pro- beautiful round concrete chambers on the lowest basement lev-
ject as a “mental space” was something important that I thought el of the building, plus a concrete foyer area and two square gal-
we should bring to bear upon our thinking at Tate, to challenge leries, plus a small “drum” space – we have a real anchor point in
the fundamental basis of what we value, what we show, and how which we can programme this kind of work with more generosity
we think about the museum as an institution: prioritizing less the of time and infrastructure, and – importantly – set it into dia-
278 building, perhaps, and more the human infrastructure. I was fas- logue with film, sculpture and installation. 279
cinated by how this proposed transformation could initiate a shift
from the fetishistic choreography of “care” around a static per- Did the opening of the new Tate Modern building prompt any
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manent collection into a living set of relations and movements transformations in Tate’s performance curating strategy?
that put people and things into a state of equivalence. When we opened the building, we wanted to do a few things
as regards performance. Firstly, I was concerned that we didn’t
What kind of spaces for performance exist at Tate Modern? make performance into a “ghetto”activity confined to the Tanks.
Actually, because we had no space for performance for the first Or an “after-hours” event programme. What we wanted was to
decade of programming, we had to use any spaces we could find: show that the increasing interest in performance since the 1950s
the collection galleries or corridors, the turbine hall or the lawn was fundamentally related to shifting attitudes to the encoun-
outside. Even the façade of the building or the café! This “para- ter with the art object, the deconstruction of painting, instal-
sitic” relationship of the apparently minor form of performance lation art and art’s relationship to a broader situation or archi-
to the major formats of the museum (exhibition and recreational tecture being made explicit. So one of the approaches I took
spaces) was not easy, but it made for a creative approach to in- was to display sculptures of the pivotal 1960s period – by Char-
venting the situation for the work to appear in each time. It also lotte Posenenske, Robert Morris and Rasheed Araeen – in the
meant that we treated the publicness of the building – the given South Tank, and also position these artists works in the “Between
Object and Architecture” display in the upstairs galleries on level 2. In this sense we are distinct from an “ICA” or kunsthalle model.
Down in the Tanks, the works were displayed in the interactive However, this area of practice has led me to question the nature
form they were intended: manipulated, rearranged, phenome- and ideology of collecting, its possibilities and its values: why do
nologically moved with. They were also, here, displayed along- we collect and what is collectable? Collecting and preserving art-
side performance works by Alexandra Pirici and Manuel Pelmus, works opens up the possibility of being able to access art from
and Tarek Atoui. Upstairs, works by the same artists were set in different periods of time, and different locations in a single space:
dialogue with sculpture by artists from many different places in- the heterotopia that Foucault talked about. But the drive to pre-
ternationally who, between the 50s and the 1990s, were making serve art’s history and encounter it in the present is also to do with
work that directly addressed the body of the viewer or the space valuing a reflective, memorializing process of considering where
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in which it was positioned. Between these two modes of display, we are in the present in relation to those pasts, or those “other
the overriding concept of “when art became active” with which places” than where we are standing. Collecting favours certain
we worked for all of the Collection Displays in the new building kinds of art (in material form, or with material traces) and confers
came into focus. In combination, we also used the opportunity one kind of value and status and builds a certain narrative: we
of the new building to showcase five important performance ac- know that the museum’s foundation is a vast warehouse of works
280 quisitions made in the past decade: by Tania Bruguera, Amalia that form its underlying language and belief system, elements of 281
Pica, Tino Sehgal, Roman Ondak and David Lamelas. These were which are continuously brought to visibility in display: exhibited.
in different spaces throughout the building, rather than in the But performance or live work, as well as temporary installations,
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Tanks, and thus naturally in dialogue with other kinds of work, as prompt the question of how memory functions in a different way:
is appropriate to all of these artists’ practices. the impact of Olafur Eliasson’s Turbine Hall commission, or of the
transformation of Tate as musee de la danse, or Trisha Brown’s
Museums are places for exhibition and public relationships, man walking down the side of the building: these highly affecting
but they are also places for conservation, collection and experiences, witnesses by our audiences, become part of the col-
documentation. What kind of objects can we find at Tate lective memory in ways that are not to do with whether there is a
Collection related to performance practices and how, in physical trace of the project lasting. These experiences increas-
this context, does the practice of art collecting intersect ingly come to be understood in productively entangled dialogue
the practice of archive-building? with the collection narrative. I try to consider how repeat visits to
This, for me, is an essential point as regards the kinds of program- a familiar work (the famous Rothko Seagram murals for example)
ming of performance work that we’re doing at Tate. We are de- might have an assymetric parallel in the repetition of live works at
fined, as a museum, by being a “collecting institution”. Our collec- intervals: how memory builds experience that is a different order
tion forms the spine of all the museum’s activities and its identity. of “permanence” than owning its material form or trace.
In practical terms, the past decade has been an exciting journey, scores, photographs, video, installations of props or sets, and
working with Frances Morris and previously Jessica Morgan, as also – I would argue – as a kind of “secret history” within the
well as our then-Time Based Media conservator Pip Laurenson, traces of many action paintings or interactive objects, whether
who were all very open to and encouraging of an adventure to a painting by Nikki de St Phalle made by shooting, or a “revolving
acquire live works: Tino Sehgal, Roman Ondak, Tania Bruguera, vane” sculpture to be walked through by Charlotte Posenenske.
David Lamelas and others. We set out new parameters for col- Dorothea Von Hantelmann rightly says that there is no art that
lecting that enabled us to acquire a script or even a verbal set of is not performative, in the sense that every artwork “performs”
instructions, and we worked across departments and with other its meaning within a language and system of meaning and space.
institutions (the police in Bruguera’s case) to realize these works. But I take the idea of performance slightly more literally: how
LILIANA COUTINHO
LILIANA COUTINHO
The acquisition of Suzanne Lacy’s The Crystal Quilt was also a does a viewpoint that acknowledges the inclusion of actual live
challenge, because the work took the form of an “archive”, but it action, and the reminder that live action has underwritten many
did not seem appropriate for it to be placed in the Tate archive of the objects we show, inflect our understanding of what artistic
since it was a fully realized artistic parallel for a live work: and form is? If we begin with the idea that art is not a timeless icon,
more than that, the “documentation” had always been imagined but a relationship, to where do we get?
282 by Lacy as a strategic amplifier of the live action that had taken 283
place in Minneapolis in 1985: via both press photography and live Some of the historical performances that you have already
broadcast on TV. The precedent of having acquired Jeremy Del- worked with, such as Hélio Oiticia’s Parangolé or Kaprow’s
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ler’s Battle of Orgreave, itself taking the form of archive, enabled happenings, point very clearly to art as a relationship. Those
Tate’s collection committee to understand Lacy’s “archive” as a works also have a very powerful strong relationship with the
work, and also the influence of Lacy’s generation of feminist art- public space, establishing a continuity between aesthetic
ists making social practice and their impact on the 1990s genera- experience and everyday life. This relationship with the eve-
tion: demonstrating that often it’s through the lens of the prac- ryday and the public sphere is often a challenge to museum
tice of younger artists that we revise our understanding of what conservation and exhibition. How do you approach the re-
is valuable from history. lationship between the museum, the wider public and the
sphere of everyday life?
I am currently working on a deeper strategy related to “collecting When I first visited Tate Modern, when it opened in 2001, I was
the uncollectable”: to push further for the inclusion and repre- troubled by what appeared to be the vast “void” at it’s heart:
sentation of performance and ephemeral works within the main the Turbine Hall. Somehow, initially, there was a sense of empti-
body of works that Tate acquires and displays. But performance ness there, and that the art had been squeezed into the galleries
is represented in many and various ways, whether as scripts, on the north side. This impression has entirely turned around as
Tate Modern has evolved and grown since then: the Turbine Hall I do not believe that we are “upscaling” artworks to fit our spaces,
is always, now, a space for people. It is an extraordinary kind of but rather following the logic of Tate’s potential for mass experi-
public space: part public square, but part gallery, so that what- ence as one of the few opportunities to look at and understand
ever activity takes place there – which when there is no art on what public space is and how it might be imagined in this age.
display is often very free, with kids running around, people eating
their lunch – is somehow “framed” by the awareness that we are
in a visual art museum.
Tate is a very popular museum. It’s big and it has a mass public.
LILIANA COUTINHO
LILIANA COUTINHO
Whilst on the one hand, the performance (and film) programme
has allowed us to foster micro-communities of interest that
come together for certain things in a more intimate way, some-
thing I think has been important for artists especially. One of the
things I wanted to do at Tate was to work with the “given” fact
284 of its mass-ness: to consider people’s presence as much as the 285
architecture when it came to commissioning projects and inter-
ventions. So as well as the projects you mention, which worked
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perfectly in our populated spaces, artists including Jiri Kovanda,
Carlos Amorales, Nina Beier and Marie Lund, or Dora Garcia have
worked on the public spaces at Tate Modern: whether inviting
the intimacy of Kissing Through Glass in Kovanda’s case, trans-
forming the entire museum into a sports arena in Amorale’s, or
initiating an action that instigated mass-clapping throughout the
levels of the building by Lund and Beier. I think that this border-
line between private and public, not just economically but also in
terms of how subjectivity is formed and shaped, how people un-
derstand themselves as individuals or as part of networks, is one
of the key questions of our time, and somehow the very spaces
of Tate have allowed us to test this boundary in active ways by
working on both a small intimate scale, and with a mass crowd.
APPEARING IN PUBLIC
AS PUBLIC
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286 287
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Peggy Phelan
in conversation with
Ana Pais and Ana Bigotte Vieira
PEGGY PHEL AN
The timing of the topic performance art and the public sphere
is uncanny, given that we write surrounded by a heart-rend-
ing series of performances about space, location, and life.
PEGGY PHEL AN, ANA PAIS, ANA BIGOT TE VIEIRA

I am referring of course to what is called here in the United
States “Europe’s refugee crisis”. This naming eliminates the
word war, the word survivor, the word witness, the word victim.
It fails to name the United States, Syria, or any country in the
Middle East. The grammar of the phrase suggests that the cri-
sis is possessed by Europe. Curiously, however, the media here
often implies that war survivors, especially those from Syria,
This conversation took place through email during the have absolutely possessed Europe. Thus the phrase “Europe’s
course of seven months, from January to July 2016, refugee crisis” enacts several things simultaneously:
across three cities: Lisbon, Palo Alto and Salvador da
288 Bahia. We discussed concepts and practices related to 1. The complete displacement of the many effects 289
how performance art intervenes, enacts and performs of the current crisis – the starvation, impoverishment,
(or not) the public sphere and to how performance stud- physical and emotional ruin, as well as the fatal danger
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ies can be helpful to understand its processes and impli- caused by bombing and war.
cations. We drifted, moved on, switched to, came back
and round to burning issues in politics, activism, per- 2. The question of the proprietary relationship
formance art, philosophy and the media that the events between Europe and the displaced people who now
occurring in that period of time, though not exclusively, seek shelter and refuge: Europe, the presumably stable
raised for us: the refugee crisis in Europe, the Occupy entity in the world, seems to author the crisis at the
Movement in the US, the global circulation of images, same time as being the victims of it.
Dilma’s impeachment act in Brazil, the presidential cam-
paign in the US, the Brexit referendum in the uk. The col- 3. The disowning of the role of powers outside of
lected emails have been edited to make the argument Europe, especially the United States, in the crisis itself.
more concise. References to dates indicate the duration Thus, by constantly invoking “Europe’s refugee crisis”
of the conversation, rather than historical events. those outside of Europe are able to evade responsibility
Ana Pais for the humanitarian crisis as a whole.
Given the complexity of these geo-political events, it may seem ANA PAIS
somewhat beside the point to raise questions about the role of Indeed, hospitality was crucial not only to fuel the debate re-
art, especially performance art, in the public sphere. First, is garding the potential directions to be taken by the field of Per-
there any such thing as “the public” anymore? Or have we be- formance Studies outside the Anglo-Saxon context (even out-

come so fragmented and torn that we must resist using the def- side academia) but also to open up a space built collectively
inite article altogether and say only “public spheres”? What, in during the event. The event was both hosted by PSi interna-
particular, can Performance Studies and performance art offer tional and by Espaço do Tempo, in Montemor; in turn, we also
those who seem to clarify, provoke, or illuminate issues of col- hosted participants during those four days. Thus, hospitality
lectivity and (dis)unity in this crisis? Let me begin with the lo- came about as an important practice to bring people together.
cal circumstance of our own correspondence and relationship. This idea was also explored in the opening dinner which the
performer Chefe Ro (aka Rogério Nuno Costa) organized for
In your recent email, you described the PSi cluster you organ- the event. In a playful twist of the concept of “haute cuisine”,
ized along with Ana Bigotte Vieira and Ricardo Seiça Salgado “Hôte Cuisine” (as in host or parasite) was a performance-
under the title “Generative Indirections“. You said you were dinner prepared by both hosts and guests.
290 moved by “the practices of hospitality” to generate and create 291
encounters throughout the gathering1. Perhaps it can be illumi- Yet, circumstances and contexts can radically change the terms
nating to think about those practices in relation to “Europe’s of receiving and being received and that has to do with the
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refugee crisis”. In drawing these two disparate things together conditions and the desire to host. On the one hand, hospital-
I am not trying to equate one with the other. I am only trying ity is supposed to be temporary: you visit friends for a couple
to find a floor secure enough for us to begin approaching the of days, you are a visiting scholar for a couple of months, you
complexity of the crisis in public space dramatized by the trau- visit a country on vacation and so on. When the stay or the
matic displacement of the refugees. guest risk being permanent, the specter of the parasite rises
motivated mainly by a territorial fear. As the parasite lives at
the expense of its host, the exchange becomes unbalanced.
I guess this primary survival instinct could be the main re-
source of the emotional manipulation around the refugee cri-
sis for political advantage as well as at the base of engrained

1
Generative Indirections was organized in Portugal, in 2013, taking practices of hospital- social preconceptions that challenge a continent historically
ity as a means of promoting encounters between the 55 participants gathered in Espaço
do Tempo for four days. This was the first Performance studies international (Psi) event in used to conquering, occupying and colonizing.
Portugal. Cf. generativeindirections.wordpress.com/curatorial-vision/
The “refugee crisis” brought more than a million migrants and and healthcare to 400 guests (among them 185 children) from
refugees to Europe, escaping from war and dictatorial political countries such as Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan.
regimes, the largest since World War Two. Just recently, Scan- It is a project very much worth following, especially at a mo-
dinavian countries announced severe measures to restrict hos- ment when hospitality seems so out of the European agenda

pitality to refugees (Danish law enabling police to confiscate – I am thinking of the agreement with Turkey, or of this Brexit
cash and valuables, Swedish deportation politics and German nightmare… As they say: “City Plaza has no pool, no minibar,
restriction measures). I share the same anxieties: can perfor- no room service, but it is still the Best Hotel in Europe”.
mance art intervene, participate, subvert, recreate public spac-
es and make a difference in the world?
PEGGY PHEL AN
Thank you so much for bringing The Best Hotel in Europe
ANA BIGOT TE VIEIRA to my attention, abv. I was unaware of this interesting and
Reading Ana’s remarks made me think not so much about per- admirable project. And I also appreciate your attention to a
formance art per se, but how “performance thinking” lead us, in sometimes-forgotten distinction between “performance think-
292 Montemor, to address issues of hospitality as a kind of perfor- ing” and performance art per se. 293
mance. How do we host “a field of research”? And, at the same
time, how would we host our guests arriving to town? How would Certainly, The Best Hotel in Europe can be analyzed from
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we share those days with them? How would we live together? a Performance Studies point of view: that is, its actions can
What set of relations are we putting forth and proposing? How be seen as a series of performative interventions designed to
are these relations changing over time, and how do they change be both practical and symbolic. Calling it performance art,
us? In this sense, hospitality would go beyond the temporary/ however, may put at risk something vital about its mission to
definitive opposition to become something like a contingent and link health care to human rights. Emphasizing, indeed theat-
contextualized openness to the other and an ability to share. ricalizing, the connection between human rights and health
seems to be the main motivation for the work of The Best
Curiously, one of my favorite projects concerning the so-called Hotel in Europe.
refugee crisis in Europe is precisely one related to hosting.
I am speaking of City Plaza,The Best Hotel in Europe2, a squat- Nonetheless, considering the project as performance art raises
ted hotel in the center of Athens which provides food, home illuminating questions about what counts as action. The per-
2
Cf. website of the project best-hotel-in-europe.eu and the introductory video
son who seeks shelter in The Best Hotel in Europe is engaged
vimeo.com/169673037 in a radically different action than the person who donates the
cost of “a double room” on The Best Hotel in Europe’s web- that the “state of emergency” in which we live is not the excep-
site and to call both “performers” seems to flatten those dif- tion but the rule” (1968, 257). Globalization, climate change,
ferences too much. This project, in other words, immediately and terrorism, using different means, may each be dramatizing
makes clear both the limits and the benefits of bringing the the temporary nature of our position, not only as parasitical

discursive and actual tools of performance to a discussion of guests but also as hosts. Clearly, humans have not been good
the public sphere/s. With the exception of act up and oth- stewards of the planet or the environment generally. Thus, we
er activists’ work around hiv and aids, health care activism may be engaged in addressing a public sphere at precisely the
in the United States is relatively tepid. President Obama has moment it has ceased to exist at all.
done much to advance access to health care here, but it would
be inaccurate to say that we have a national health care sys- Having just re-read the above paragraph, I now think that my
tem. And I think that The Best Hotel in Europe proceeds from account is too dour. Certainly, my argument seems too rapid-
an advanced ethical and political understanding of the need ly apocalyptic. (And yet the acceleration of geo-political events
to create a global health care system that simply cannot be makes me think we have all been much too slow in our think-
matched by activists here. ing). Maybe we can draw a dotted line between performance
294 and the public sphere if we break down each unit of the com- 295
Before I consider other specific artistic responses to the crisis pound word, “para-site”. If we think of performance as akin to
there that have registered here, I want to respond to your in- the “para”, that which sits a bit to the side of the site, or sphere,
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teresting reference, ap, to the parasite, a term that has been dis- then the “para” can be understood as an enactment of the crea-
cussed and employed for several decades now in performance tive re-framing of the public sphere generally. If the public sphere
theory.When you invoke the word parasite here, I recognize that is more than a concept, it must be activated by human perfor-
you are not necessarily thinking about speech acts as proposed mance in order for it to make meaning and have an effect on
by J. L. Austin in How to do Things With Words (1962). Your use art. In other words, maybe it is only by resorting to that which
of the term seems to suggest that hospitality is, fundamentally, sits outside the public sphere as such that its force can become
temporary. A guest who does not leave, the logic goes, loses the politically infectious and “parasitically” generative for art.
rights of a guest and becomes a parasite, an unwelcome bug
who threatens the stability and health of the host. What I think
we are beginning to grasp in recent months, however, is that ANA PAIS
the hitherto clear boundary between host and guest is much Thank you for these stimulating thoughts about performance
more porous, indeed parasitical, than we realized. “The his- and parasites. Performance as the encompassing force that
tory of the oppressed,” Walter Benjamin observed, “teaches us shapes, configures, subverts or cracks open public sphere is
an inspiring way of thinking the role of art in complex times. Thus, whatever else the link between performance and the
Activation is, I believe, key to investigating performance art’s public sphere entails, at a minimum performance activates the
role. To activate means to trigger the action of something that public sphere as a (para)site for action – and even more pre-
is already in place or on the side of the place, as a potential- cisely, as a site for staging the appearance of action.

ity of unrevealed affect. In this sense, could the function of
performance art be one of rearranging connections between Let me try to specify: here in the us many conversations about
existing materials, matters, objects, people in the public sphere the Occupy Movement hinged on the location of the activists.
precisely because it infiltrates from the side of the site? Perhaps In New York, most slept in a privately-owned park and thus
performance art activates the public sphere through an injec- the police had relatively little power to move protesters out
tion of “side-affects” undermining prevalent public feelings set of the park4. In Oakland, most of the activists were staying in
in circulation by the media. Sarah Ahmed argues that emo- public space, near the town square. So the police had an easier
tions shape our contact with the world insofar as they mark the time, legally, moving them out and hosing down their dwell-
bodies of others negatively or positively. This happens through ings and essentially evicting them. In both locations, though,
the repetition of ideological narratives that shape the surface different activists called their protests “art,” and more specifi-
296 of individual and collective bodies, intensifying social spaces cally, “performance art”. Assuming for the moment that those 297
(2014, 10). Thus, by disturbing public feelings through sparks are valid claims, we then must observe the irony that claims to
of solidarity, empathy, generosity and kindness, is performance free speech and the right to protest in a democracy are more
POINTS OF FRICTION
art able to reshape, reconfigure and change social spaces? protected in private space than in the public sphere. And we
must also ask: how does the distinction between New York and
Oakland illuminate the crackdown on activism in Tahir Square

PEGGY PHEL AN or Hong Kong?
Hannah Arendt’s remarks on the public sphere are also rele-
vant to our discussion. In The Human Condition Arendt speaks I would describe Arendt’s definition of the polis as “the or-
of the public sphere as “a space of appearance”3. This phrase, ganization of the people as it arises out of acting and speaking
and the logic underlying it, prompts us to reconsider the role together, and its true space lies between people living together
of action, or indeed performance, within the public sphere. for this purpose” (1998, 198) as a theory of political or social


Politics, for Arendt, is the mobilization of action – imagina- performance. It is through performing together that people de-
tive, rhetorical, physical, symbolic, ideological, philosophical. velop the desire to appear as a public – to appear coherent, ar-
3 4
Cf. also Arendt (1998, see especially pages 199-219). For a fuller discussion of the Occupy Wall Street protest in New York, cf. Phelan (2014).
tistic, loving, queer, intelligent, black, religious, conservative, ternational Monetary Fund/European Central Bank/European
leftist or what have you – for each other and for themselves. Union) as a consequence, it felt very appropriate for the protest
The collective desire for the staging of this appearance is pre- to be held there – right in the middle of the financial district,
cisely what allows the polis to come into being. Like any stag- some blocks away from this very rating agency’s headquarters.

ing of appearance or disappearance, it requires space between Approaching protests like ows through a Performance Stud-
people (and within oneself) so that both the appearance and ies’ perspective requires, in my opinion, understanding them as
the disappearance can be registered, observed, felt. And it is localized performances on a multi-scalar level.
in this ongoing staging of appearance and disappearance that
human life finds purpose and force. The square movement and ows in particular made crystal-clear
how the contemporary metropolis is a terrain for struggle. The
proximity to banks, rating agencies, and the stock market made
ANA BIGOT TE VIEIRA these institutions stand as practices - concrete decisions taken
Precisely. And with people eating, sleeping, reading, playing, by concrete people in concrete places, global cities in this case –
praying in the public square, all the issues of housing, learning, and not as some sort of distant power arising from some hidden
298 healthcare, appear organized – kitchen, library, drum circle, nowhere. The very fact that the New York Police Department 299
sofas, stands. As Judith Butler wrote, all these issues (housing, could not intervene earlier due to the weird status of Zuccotti
food, education) emerge as something we have to think about Park as a Privately Owned Public Space5 which would place this
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and organize together, something we have in common, some- square outside nypd jurisdiction made the composite nature of
thing we build together, with our skills and our work, and not the metropolitan “public space” seem very obvious. Personally,
as something we must pay for, or get indebted in order to have it struck me to see how close everything was. To give you an
access to (2012). example: In 2012, right after ows got evicted, part of the camp
moved to Wall Street 60, an indoor square inside the Deutsche
As regards Zuccotti Park as the site for ows to take place, Bank Headquarters, one of the indoor pops in the Financial
I must say it felt quite important to me for it to be there and District area. In the midst of a cold winter, Wall Street 60 was a
not somewhere else in nyc. In other words, ows was about oc- warm place, therefore food distribution was set up there.
cupying Wall Street and not about occupying New York City,
even if it was also about that. Thus, for me as a foreigner being Later in the year, the camp reappeared in Union Square (Af-
in nyc in the Fall of 2011, at a moment when rating agencies fect Group 2012). Interestingly enough, the camp in Union
such as Fitch and Moodys were rating Portugal and Greece
economies as “junk”, and the intervention of the Troika (In- 5
Cf. apops.mas.org/about/
Square felt much more like Acampada do Rossio (Lisbon, June On the anniversary of the city of Salvador, Bahian musicians
2011). Its demographics became automatically more diverse Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil gave a concert at Farol da
(ows was often accused of being mostly young and white), Barra, an iconic lighthouse by the sea known as the first to be
but in my opinion, it moved away from the Financial District built in Brazil in the 17th century. Before the show, the “anti-

and lost a bit of its symbolic status. In other words, I suppose golpe” watchword (“não vai ter golpe”/there will be no coup
ows would have been quite different in terms of global im- d’etat) was voiced when the local journalist was talking to the
agery if it were located at Union Square and called Occupy cameras introducing the show. When Caetano sang the song
New York City. “Odeio” [I hate] soon enough the audience added the name
“Cunha” (the president of the deputy council that opened
the impeachment process against Dilma) to the chorus...
ANA PAIS (“I hate you, Cunha”/“Odeio você, Cunha”). The anti-golpe
I am now in Salvador da Bahia (Brazil) and the public sphere slogan came back and Caetano couldn’t help smiling at the
here is focused on Dilma Rousseff’s possible impeachment. crowd. This response created a mixed atmosphere: the aver-
Since the process started, millions of people have been dem- sion carried by the word “hate” was transformed into com-
300 onstrating in Brazil against the political coup d’état. “Não vai plicité fueled by Caetano’s reaction. I am surely not implying 301
ter golpe” is the repeated watchword on the left against the that this was performance art. I am simply drawing a parallel
conservative “Fora Dilma/Fora Lula”. Salvador is quite a dif- between the power of protest (as performance) and the pow-
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ferent historical, economic and social landscape from Rio or er of performance art in activating or redirecting circulating
São Paulo, where demonstrations are taking place on a daily affects in social spaces.
basis and, from what I hear from friends, people are resorting
to violence and aggression on a disturbing scale. The divide Both Gil and Caetano have been overtly against the undemo-
between rich and poor people seems to me even wider than cratic process of Dilma’s impeachment. Both Gil and Caetano
in Rio or São Paulo, which is rooted in racial and educational lived in exile during the dictatorship in the 1960s/1970s.
differences: although the majority of Salvador’s population is The context of their exile was, however, different in terms of
Afro-descendant, the majority of university graduates is white, the extent of media power in influencing public opinion. Today,
for example. Communities do not mix in their daily lives (no- information travels in a second through cable tv, online news-
where in Brazil really) and in a way, days go by without much papers, and social networks. If tv Globo had not supported
being said or heard about the political crisis, except after the the carefully planned coup d’état actively campaigning against
impeachment vote. But every public opportunity is welcomed Dilma Rousseff since the impeachment process started, the
as a chance to voice political concerns and felt injustice. result would have most likely been different.
PEGGY PHEL AN cropping, and all other tools of visual iteration and citational-
Pretty much all I know about Dilma’s situation and the Euro- ity became part of the performative force of the photograph.
pean refugee crisis comes from the media, and journalism here Demir’s photograph staged not only the fact of Kurdi’s death
is increasingly imaged-based. The literature on “atrocity photo- but also created a space for the public to express our feelings

graphs” makes clear that there is a deep connection between ide- about the crisis generally. Memes and re-stagings appeared
ological attitude and image selection – which images get printed and disappeared as the image “went viral”7. Indeed, the pho-
where – stems from a prior discursive frame that includes an ide- tograph became a kind of visual parasite that included this
ological orientation toward the event itself (Batchen et al. 2012). performance staged by Moroccan activists who restaged the
Thus, it is not for nothing that the image of the drowned child image in a way that gave collective life to the image. It was as if
did a lot of political lifting in the international debate about the the photograph “planted” a garden of gigantic humans, in the
crisis. This is because there is a pre-existing framework of “the manner of Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, who all drowned.
(innocent white) child” that frames the circulation of the im-
age of that particular boy, Aylan Kurdi, half-buried in the sand. One of the activists, journalist Rachid el-Belghiti, explained
The corpse of a Rwandan child, conscripted into war as a child the group’s motivation: “We are here to say that the Mediter-
302 soldier, simply would not and did not motivate the conversation ranean should remain a space for sharing and exchanges, not 303
about “action” in the same way. The photograph of Kurdi, tak- a barrier for those who are victims of dictatorships, civil wars
en by Nilüfer Demir, a photo-journalist employed by Turkey’s and terrorism.” (quoted in Stanton 2015) Thus, the re-staging
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Dogan News Agency, washed across oceans of print, video, and of the photograph is also a reclamation of the sea as itself an
broadcast journalism. While the boy died, the image did not. open public space.
Interestingly, the image’s power came from its enunciation of
a general “call to action”, rather than a resonantly particular It is this kind of performance response that interests me when we
narrative of Kurdi’s life and death. And indeed, the shallowness talk about performance and the public sphere in the digital age.
of the narrative of the boy’s life was part of its appeal as a kind The Occupy Movement inspired and was composed by specific
of grief-stone, a marker for all the lost life stories. The image of- local actions, and the images of these actions joined a stream
fered a stage for others to fill in and embody. of images and discourses that exceeded each performance. In-
deed, the images were embedded in financial journalism, anti-
Prior to the digital revolution, a photograph called our atten- racist discourse, and sociological texts about class and income.
tion within an aesthetic framework, now photographs are pow- 6
Cf. Ritchin (2008) for a fuller discussion of the distinctions between digital and analog
erful in relation to their capacity to be embedded and reframed photography.
7
within other communication streams6. Re-editing, re-framing, This action is akin to creating a digital parasite.
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304 305
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Performance by Morrocan activists paying homage to Alyan Kurdi, in Rabat / Photograph: Senna Fadel /AFP
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306
Alyan Kurdi, three-year-old Syrian boy drowned in the Mediterranean Sea, September 2 2015. Photograph: Nilüfer Demir (DHA)
POINTS OF FRICTION PEGGY PHEL AN, ANA PAIS, ANA BIGOT TE VIEIRA
307
ANA BIGOT TE VIEIRA I would agree on its “social” character, for it has an immense
I did not know Moroccan activists restaged this image. Actu- social impact. Of course, in the summer 2015 this seemed pow-
ally, knowing that the image comes from Morocco makes it erful enough to suspend the Schengen border system control
even stronger, as 2012’s February 20 Movement (m20f) can in a positive way, which is very different from what is happen-

be said to signal not the fall of the Moroccan regime – which ing now... We have a need for images other than the ones we
perhaps even got stronger – but the fall of the fear of politics, receive, either addressing the issues from another point of view
as Hugo Maia states (2015). (such as calling the refugee march a “March for Hope”) or cre-
ating performance responses which produce powerful counter
It is amazing to see activists in Morocco, a politically repres- images (such as the one created by Moroccan activists).
sive country which often gets paid by the eu to “contain” mi-
grants, not being fearful of coming to the public sphere in The latter work employs a performance strategy (something
performance, denouncing a border control system in which like a “multiplication by empathy”) that has been largely pre-
Morocco (as Libya some years ago, or Turkey nowadays) plays sent in the activist repertory since, at least, the “we are all il-
a central role. And they did it through performance. Due to legal/no one is illegal” slogan from the No Border movement
308 the dissemination capacities of the internet, Rabat beaches be- in the early 2000s. By wearing a bright red T-shirt and shorts, 309
come the site for a performance response producing a counter similar to those worn by the little boy Aylan Kurdi who was ly-
image, or an image other than the one we got from the media. ing face down in the Udayas beach in Rabat, Moroccan activ-
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
ists made Aylan Kurdi’s death not only present but common,
Working on border issues, with Jogos Sem Fronteira/buala8, banal, alive and contagious, as it got multiplied by different
I felt the need for images other than the ones being broadcast- bodies, bigger bodies, male and female bodies.
ed. Not only tragic images in which the migrant is depicted
as a desperate Other, but also testimonies of solidarity and
self-organization, for so many people travelling together surely ANA PAIS
forge intense bonds. When Germany opened the borders for a Images of Dilma’s impeachment vote were broadcasted live, on
brief while in the summer 2015 and thousands of people were a Sunday evening, by tv Globo/GloboNews (strongly connect-
marching across Europe, border activists talked of a “March ed with the dictatorship), replacing regular entertainment pro-
of Hope”, reasserting the “social movement” character of the grams, in a clear manipulative operation to reinforce the general
refugees’ collective action. “Movement” it is for sure, and belief that the “no” was inevitable. Brazilians have called it “the
show of the impeachment”… Right after the vote, an image
8
Cf. buala.org/en/games-without-borders went viral across social networks. It listed the key justifications
made by each deputy in an exhausting and supposedly open The ubiquity of cable news and other platforms in the us have
declaration of vote: the ones who voted yes alleged: “for my made this particular presidential campaign unusually explicit
family, for my children, for my wife, for my mother”. The ones about the interrelationship between political power and media
who voted no stated: “for black people, for women, for lgbt, coverage. Trump’s success on television forced those broad-

for indigenous people, for people with disabilities, for working casting companies interested in hosting debates (debates that
people”. You could guess by the way they introduced their vote had bigger audience numbers than previous recent campaign
how it would go. At the Farol da Barra, supporters of the no debates) to accept some of Trump’s terms. After the one de-
gathered during the afternoon, after a long day of concerts and bate he refused to attend, polls showed his support had weak-
speeches and after a one-day camping demonstration of the ened. Thus, one cannot simply say Trump controlled the press;
Sem Terra movement (mst). All sorts of people could be found rather, the synergy between Trump and the media has brought
in front of the screen streaming the vote. Predicting such sad to light the ways in which one needs the other. If the media
result,Yemanja (the orixa of the sea) cried a heavy rain from the landscape, including social and broadcast media, has effective-
moment the vote began. People fled gradually, frozen-hearted. ly become the public sphere then we need to think about that
rigorously. And it seems ever clearer that the media, like the
310 presidency itself, is essentially a mode of performance. 311
PEGGY PHEL AN
We have not yet discussed the rise of Donald Trump in the In this context, it is useful to consider Trump’s explicit ac-
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
us presidential campaign or racism and police killings, or any knowledgment that he separates his performance during the
number of other crises now embroiling the public sphere in campaign from what he calls “being presidential”. Trump in-
the us. But even in our modest way we are close to assessing sists on a distinction between the “realities” of the campaign
what Arendt described in The Human Condition as “the pecu- and the theatre of the presidency. Taking a page from Ronald
liarity of the public realm” (1998, 200). Arguing that the unity Reagan, now the revered saint of the Republican Party, Trump
between speech and action defines and stabilizes the public underlines the force of performance in the age of the celeb-
realm, Arendt insists that the dismantling of that unity is what rity president. While Reagan said that he could not imagine
broadly leads to the fall of civilizations. Arendt’s argument someone without acting skills being successful in the White
does not consider the role of television or the media-scape and House, Trump’s campaign is a continual “a wink and nod” to
when we speak today of the public realm, we cannot ignore the an electorate that wants change but will settle for a good show:
range and force of these transmitters of “speech and action”. Trump is wagering that the world is (once again) ready for an
Globo tv and News may be far more powerful political forces entertainer as world leader.
than either Lula or Dilma.
So far, the left has not really countered this understanding REFERENCES
of politics in the media age and I am not so naive as to sug-
AFFECT GROUP, 2012. «Strike is a verb! From taking over space to taking over time:
gest that Arendt’s warnings will be heeded. Trump’s campaign Occupy Wall Street as seen by the Affect Group».
makes clear that we have failed to provide the public with good blog.stress.fm/2013/03/strike-is-verb-part-1.html

AHMED, Sarah. 2014. The Cultural Politics of Emotion. 2nd ed.
primers for reading performance – indeed, for accepting that
Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
politics is a mode of action, as Arendt argued, and as such ARENDT, Hannah. 1998. The Human Condition. 2nd ed.
must be read and interpreted in those terms. Such an analysis Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
must begin with the recognition that political action is the ap- BATCHEN, Geoffrey, Mik Gidley, Nancy K. Miller and Jay Prosser, eds. 2012.
Picturing Atrocity: Photography in Crisis. London: Reaktion Books.
pearance of action, an appearance designed to be broadcast BENJAMIN, Walter. 1968. «Theses on the Philosophy of History». In Illuminations:
and interpreted as action. Essays and Reflections, edited by Hannah Arendt. Translated by Harry Zohn.
New York: Schocken Books.
BUTLER, Judith. 2012. «So what are the demands?». Tidal Magazine: Occupy Theory/
Occupy Strategy, March 2. tidalmag.org/issues
ANA PAIS MAIA, Hugo. 2015. «Social Protests in Morocco and the So-called Arab Spring».
In Jeux Sans Frontières: On Spaces of Resistance and Practices of Invention, edited
The ambiguity between acting to make an appearance and to
by Ana Bigotte Vieira, Sandra Lang and Nuno Leão, 54-69. Lisbon: JSF/BUALA.
312 appear as acting in the public sphere seems to be one of the PHELAN, Peggy. 2014. «On the Difference between Time and History». 313
most baffling aspects of contemporary society. Performance Research 19 (3): 114-9.
RITCHIN, Fred. 2008. After Photography. New York: Norton.
POINTS OF FRICTION
POINTS OF FRICTION
STANTON, Jenny. 2015. «Artistic tribute or tasteless stunt? Thirty people recreate death
The Brexit referendum and the victory of the leave vote comes of Aylan Kurdi by laying in the sand on a Moroccan beach dressed in the same
to mind. It is hard not to mention the possibility of the disin- clothes as the drowned Syrian boy». Daily Mail, September 9.
dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3227703/Thirty-people-recreatedeath-Alyan-Kurdi-
tegration of Europe not only as an economic alliance but also laying-sand-Moroccan-beach-dressed-clothes-drowned-Syrian-boy.html
as a cultural identity that has been hardwired in European citi-
zens for those who were born around and after 1974. Build-
ing a common identity has been sponsored by the eu through
an array of mechanisms. I am European and I feel European.
If the eu disintegrates, will its cultural identity disappear too?
Will we stop being European? Paradoxically, it seems that Eu-
ropeans themselves want to leave Europe while thousands of
non-European migrants want to stay. If that is the case, we
might as well make room for new guests and allow them to
become new hosts.
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314 315
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Love
is in the
AUTOR
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316 317
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Air
Ana Borralho & João Galante
PARTICIPATIVE SOUND PERFORMANCE
Ana Borralho & João Galante, 2017
PERFORMERS
Any anonymous person with or without performative experience
ACTION
Recording and public or private broadcasting of real
sounds of people making love/having sex
DURATION
Indefinite
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318 319
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Ana Borralho and João Galante after sexual intercourse, 21 June 2002
Photograph: Ana Borralho & João Galante
PERFORMANCE SCRIPT
1. 3.
RECORDING/PERFORMANCE BROADCASTING/PERFORMANCE
Choose a/the partner and record the sound of your lovemaking/sex Broadcast the recording in a public and/or private location where there
session. You can record a session with one or more partners at the might be people unaware of the nature of the performative act that will
same time. The point is for the recording to be as realistic as possible, be broadcast (such as a bus stop, public toilet, family dinner, subway,
i.e., we are not interested in a pornographic fiction of the sexual act. taxi, hotel room, elevator, bar, etc.). The recording can also be broadcast
You can, if you so wish, record other people making love/having sex via any sound device (such as a smartphone, tablet, computer, PA,
(such as neighbours, friends, strangers, family, etc.). You do not have CD player, cassette player, MP3 player, boomblaster, etc.). The sound
to aim at any specific sound quality. You can repeat the recording of volume also depends on you, as well as on the location and the power
the act as many times as necessary to feel happy with the sound of of the broadcasting device. It is not necessary to warn the prospective
the final object. audience of this artistic action, but if anyone approaches you regarding
it, you can say it is a 2017 performance by Ana Borralho & João Galante
2. called O Amor Está no Ar [Love is in the air], in which you are the unpaid
AUTOR
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EDITING performers doing it just for pleasure. The performers should also send
You may edit, cut, paste the sound, if you so wish. There is no need the authors, Ana Borralho & João Galante, the performance’s sound
to use the whole duration of the recording of the sound of the act. file to email [email protected] (you can send your names,
320 321
The intended aesthetical effect will depend on the performers. remain as anonymous performers or choose a pseudonym). Authors
Ana Borralho & João Galante will publish your performances/recordings
(anonymously or not, depending only on you) on the site soundcloud.
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
com/anaborralhojoaogalante. The performers are also free to place
the produced sounds online, mentioning that it is a performance by Ana
Borralho & João Galante in which they are the performers.
EXILE –
DETERRITORIALIZATION
IN CONTEMPORARY
DANCE/PERFORMANCE:
TWO RECENT EPISODES FROM
AUTOR
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322
THE PORTUGUESE CONTEXT 323
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
Attending to the details of performance is the necessary practice
of a responsive empiricism that attends to the micro-events that
within each work, makes it work, creates its critical-political action,
generates a differential movement. (Lepecki 2016, 22)
Sílvia Pinto Coelho

I shall resort mostly to Félix Guattari’s concepts of deterrito-
rialization and reterritorialization to set in motion a word play
that establishes a relationship between “terrain”, “exile” (des-
terro), “exiled” (desterrado), “territory”, “deterritorialization”,
“reterritorialization”, with no other explanatory purpose but
the aim of sounding a small etymological ritornello, in dia-
logue with Guattari’s Chaosmosis5. I shall also resort to some
texts by André Lepecki that problematize the critical and po-
“Exile – Deterritorialization in contemporary dance/perfor- litical character of artistic proposals in the field of experimen-
SÍLVIA PINTO COELHO

mance” presents an exploratory challenge that focuses on “the tal choreography (2004a, 2004b, 2013, 2016).
will to power”1 as a common factor of some recent perfor-
mance art and “experimental choreography”2 in Portugal3. By questioning whether there currently exist operative modes,
I shall analyze two recent episodes, unleashed by proposals styles and relevant forms of integrating art and life in Portugal
from artists linked to the dance scene4, taking into account that may be considered “performance art”, as historiographed
324 their informal modes of emergence and their consequences by Goldberg (1979), I try to focus on the affections that might 325
in terms of public reception to think how they might reflect echo that legacy and appear in the milieu of dance via different
modes of deconditioning of crystalized behaviour patterns. paths. For instance, the affection of New Portuguese Dance for
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the New York art scene of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s; the af-
1
Paraphrasing Nietzsche on “the will to power”, Gilles Deleuze considers that “the will to fection of Portuguese literature and visual poetry (Borralho and
power does not consist of coveting nor of taking, but in creating and giving. The power
as will to power is not what the will wills, but what in the will wills (Dionysos in person)”.
Galante 2016); the affection of street theatre (idem); the affec-
(Deleuze 2006, 24, translated by the author). tion of some music and the influence of discourses such as John
2
Cf. Lepecki (2015, 5). Cage’s. From the same perspective, one should note how the
3
For this text, I interviewed Daniel Pizamiglio (episode#1) and Ana Borralho and João affection of the Acarte encounters (Calouste Gulbenkian Foun-
Galante (episode#2). Choreographer Miguel Pereira contributed informally with details on
Nova Dança Portuguesa. I am profoundly grateful to all of them for their availability.
dation) translated into Portuguese artistic life, alongside such
4
For RoseLee Goldberg, the inter-affection of different artistic fields has been present
places as Lemauto (of the group Olho), Ginjal, the re.al labs
in the history of performance art since what the author considers as the appearance of

performance. “Any stricter definition would immediately negate the possibility of perfor- 5
In Chaosmosis: an ethico-aesthetic paradigm (1995), Guattari starts by speaking of the

mance itself. For performance draws freely on any number of preferences – literature, production of subjectivity and then, in manifesto style, appeals to a new aesthetic para-
theatre, drama, music, architecture, poetry, film and fantasy – deploying them in any com- digm. In the course of this proposal, he recurrently speaks of territorialization, deterri-
bination. No other artistic form of expression can be said to have such a boundless mani- torialization and reterritorialization and complex existential ritornellos: the modes of the
festo. Each performer makes his or her own definition in the very process and manner of constitution of subjectivation complexes to break out of repetitive impasses, opening up
execution”. (1979, 6). space for new singularities.
(with their role in bringing people together); or of other spaces, from other arts driven by experimentation (visual arts, impro-
such as zdb gallery, Capital – Artistas Unidos, Karnart, later vised music, literature and performance, etc.) constituted one of
Bomba Suicida (and their Sunday shows) and the approxima- the possibilities of producing differentiation in the dance milieu.
tions to queer with the events of mente collective at club Lux,
the successor to the disco bar Frágil. There are pieces that directly convoke the history of art, as well
as the public and critical reception of that art. There are also
If they do exist, the direct influences of many events linked to genealogies of affections and common themes, which contain,
performance art and the visual arts of the 1970s and 1980s in in different contexts, a more or less disruptive character. The
Portugal on the protagonists of New Portuguese Dance are rawness of Édouard Manet’s Olympia (1863) points to female

subtle. On the one hand, there is a generational gap; on the nudity in the history of painting, but the defying gaze had a
other, the influx of European Economic Community (eec) disruptive effect in the context in which it appeared. Because
money might have accentuated the more commercial side of of that impact, Olympia is cited in the performance by Robert
the visual arts, unlike the case with performance, which lost its Morris’ Site (1964) with Carolee Schneeman, and in Vera Man-
protagonism in the 1990s. Curiously, the affection of dance/ tero’s Olympia (1993). In performance art, disruptive urges are
326 performance directly linked to Portuguese visual arts seems to recurrent and involve scatology and provocations such as on 327
have unfolded later, namely in the deliberate search in Vânia stage urination and masturbation, slashing the skin or even the
Rovisco’s Reacting to Time (2014-2017), among other projects flesh, and the public consequences of those performances, such
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that dialogue with the notion of reenactment. as being booed, insulted, persecuted, fined, taken into custody
and being arrested6. More recent characteristics, like watching
As Miguel Pereira mentioned in an informal conversation,although a performance being commented on ad nauseam online and
he left for New York with a dance scholarship in the early 1990s, on social networks, coexist with other more recognizable fea-
his affinities led him to seek out visual arts and performance tures of performance art, such as improvisation, randomness,
related cultural offerings available in the city. During the same
conversation, Pereira also mentioned the strong influence of per- 6
Perhaps it is worth highlighting here the paradox of thinking performance and Dadaism
as art, with their underlying posture and thought originating from an anti-art perspective,
formance in the process of the piece Shirtology, in which he collab- or a perspective of art deterritorialization, moving towards the unknown without symbolic
orated with Jêrome Bel (1997). I speculated on how 1990s New references. Filippo Marinetti’s manifesto The Pleasure of Being Booed (1911-1915), Piero
Manzoni’s Artist’s Shit (1961), Otto Muehl’s Piss Aktion (1969), Lee Ming-Sheng’s The Artist’s
Dance was determined to distinguish itself from the classical Piss (1988) and R. Mutt’s (Marcel Duchamp) La Fontaine (1917) are crucial references to
and modern dance tradition of techniques and aesthetics as an the reflection proposed here. Some reactivations and reenactments of historical per-
formances seem to carry a will for reterritorialization that conserves the subjectivity of
identitary strategy.Style influence and appropriations – both avant- performance, rather than the will to re-singularize an activity that appears with a desire to
garde performances featured in Acarte and elements gleaned deterritorialize. In the “arrangement of history” the place of performance is paradoxical.
public provocation, manifestos and context variation. Certain Aesthetical Paradigm (1993), i.e., as a “deterritorializing poten-
characteristics of performance are shared by some experimen- cy”, which I propose here as a power of performance art itself.7
tal choreography, but that is not enough to predict whether
the deterritorialization possibility is contained in the proposals The name might be pure coincidence, but the “open wound”
themselves or if it is contingent upon the activation of a singular that Desterro revealed is not. For a long time, Intendente was
relation of relations to produce in situ deterritorializing effects. a place to avoid because it was associated with the selling and
using of drugs, with muggings and prostitution. Today, Dester-
ro is also the name of a cultural association in that district, co-
ordinated by Jari Marjamäki, a musician who has worked with

EPISODE # 1 various choreographers and performers, such as Meg Stuart
and Miguel Perreira. The association’s ground floor and base-
Muito atento a tudo o que está a passar ment host mostly concerts and music lessons. PA! Gabinete
[Keenly attentive to all that goes on] de Curiosidades Artísticas [pa! Cabinet of Artistic Curiosities],8
(Pizamiglio/Furtado, 2016) an informal public event that took place in January 2016, was
328 a proposal launched by former students of the Programa de 329
Desterro (literally: “exile”) is the name of a Lisbon district Estudo, Pesquisa e Criação Coreográfica do Forum Dança (pep-
around the Nossa Senhora do Desterro convent, the old Des- cc – Forum Dança Study, Research and Choreographic Pro-
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terro Hospital (closed and for sale since 2007), involved in the gramme) to the small community of artists potentially inter-
on-going process of gentrification of the Intendente/Almirante ested in presenting works in progress. During the discussion
Reis axis. The context is crucial to understanding the range of of proposals the potential as a showcasing device of a window
layers that must be dealt with when focusing on critical areas un- was recognized, and it was used to display Daniel Pizamiglio’s
dergoing a profound transformation. The word “desterro” car- and Henrique Furtado’s performance Muito atento a tudo o que
ries a somewhat poetic affective tone. O Desterrado [The exile], está a passar [Keenly attentive to all that goes on].
by António Soares dos Reis (1872) is a fascinating sculpture of 7
Deterritorializing subjectivities problematize reality through the force of the event and
a naked body inspired by Alexandre Herculano’s poems “Tris- not through an explanatory logic or the reification of a new logical territory. In this regard,
it is interesting to take into account the enumeration of the following singular powers by
tezas do desterro” [The woes of exile] (n/d). It is easy to associ- Lepecki (2016,14): ephemerality, corporeality, precariousness, scoring, performativity and
ate the exiles in classic epopees with the word “exile”; however, performance of the affective labour.
8
the resonance that might be pertinent to explore in this essay “PA! is the desire to bring people together, to pull artistic proposals together, to ex-
periment. PA! is an invitation to share wishes and questions, and to create out-
is “deterritorialization”, not linked to the loss of “terra” [land], side institutional spaces. […] performance art, dance, installation, video, music”
but as it is described by Félix Guattari in Chaosmosis: A New [January 2016: facebook.com/events/540765309431912/]
Post-its in Muito atento a tudo o que está a passar [Keenly attentive to all that goes on]
Pizamiglio/Furtado, 2016
We are very keen to talk to you / We are very ready to talk to you
We are very close to talk to you / We are very far to talk to you
We are very naked to talk to you / We are very unprotected to talk to you
We are very loving to talk to you / We are very grateful to talk to you
We are very vulnerable to talk to you / We are very dirty to talk to you
On the day of the event, the performance was scheduled to them, the policeman threw his jacket on the ground and asked
start at 9 pm, lasting around one hour and including other Pizamiglio to take off his glasses, all along deliriously describ-
simultaneous interventions. The action consisted of covering ing what he had seen: “You were rubbing yourselves against
the windowpane in post-its put up by the performers. On each the glass and the wall”, “you turned around to show your ass-
post-it the performers wrote a sentence about the desire to es”. Pizamiglio replied that he had no intention of shocking
communicate and the impossibility of doing so. A relationship anyone. Furtado also addressed the policeman, calling him
with passers-by was established through the gaze, through the “man”. “Don’t call me man!” “But you also called me man…”
sentences written for the onlookers and through the proximity “But I’m a policeman.” In the end, the policeman asked Fur-
offered by the window. A few lights softly changed the ambi- tado to come with him to the station, but everyone went along.

ance and served to draw attention, creating a voyeuristic rela-
tionship between the window and the street and exposing the At the police station, they started to feel uneasy. Pizamiglio,
fragility of the naked bodies. Furtado and Marjamäki did not know how to get out of the
situation. No other policeman talked to them. Everyone else
It was possible to establish a parallel with a red-light district waited outside, talking to the first policeman, who decided to
332 window. Then, a neighbour walks by with her 11-year-old son, collect a girl’s data and bring her into the station as well. Ac- 333
who remarks: “Look, two naked men.” Visibly disturbed by the cording to him, she had refused to talk with a policeman who
presence of the naked bodies, the neighbour returned later to was not wearing his uniform. Her side of the story was dif-
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have a word with the space’s manager, Marjamäki, who reas- ferent. However, he went into the station to put on his uni-
sured her that it was an artwork and that it would soon be form, thereby proving his identity as a police officer. “Ok, I’m
over. The fact that the manager was unable to stop the per- a policeman, do you respect me now?” Meanwhile, Marjamäki
formance and because the “artwork” argument did not reas- talked with another policeman in a different room, which did
sure the neighbour, she called a friend who was a policeman. not result in any solution. In the room with the performers were
On his day off, the friend left a dinner party to come and also the neighbours: the woman who had initially complained,
talk with Marjamäki. When he arrived, the policeman joined a friend and another girl. They could not have predicted that
the argument and shouted “This is shameful!” The argu- the situation would go this far, but were unable to control the
ment became increasingly heated and people began gathering policeman who was the neighbour’s friend. Pizamiglio talked
around, so the off-duty policeman decided to call the “police”. with the woman who had complained. She told him of her son
The performance was hence interrupted. Already dressed, and of the things she did not want him to see. For many years,
the performers also talked to the policeman, who said: “I’m the street had been very dirty and she could not bear the fact
not gonna talk with you, you’re a pseudo-man.” Threatening that it was getting dirty again. It was not the kind of upbring-
ing she wanted for her son. Pizamiglio was sympathetic, but he The ludicrous facts that set off deterritorializing strangeness
was also aware that the unexpected result was part of their per- cannot be disregarded. Without clothes, naked. Without uni-
formance proposal. He tried to get her to also understand his form, “non-policeman”. “Man” as a form of address uncon-
position. There are no answers, just the will to be able to work ceivable by the “authorities”, even off duty; a jacket thrown on
with nudity in Intendente, while accepting that it may bring the floor and a threat of direct physical contact (“take off your
back some memories of the recent past among residents. After glasses”). Could the imminence of physical battery have been
listening to her, Pizamiglio apologized, which really calmed fuelled by a bit of alcohol and territorial affront?
her down. Inside the station, the policeman now in uniform
said “If you’d like to press charges, these two will sleep here Another hypothesis is that the short moral sermon by the resi-

and go to court on Monday”. A plainclothes policeman who dents might have arisen from a feeling of deterritorialization
had just come in started a humiliating speech: “If you’d come caused by an invasion of territory as a “place of belonging”,
across a more aggressive cop…if it was me, walking by with my bringing the cartography of that “place” into close proximity
daughter…” “You can’t do this, it’s a crime against decency… with the ethology convoked by Guattari (1993). Some resi-
we’ll let you go, but I’ll take this personally and as far as I can”, dents welcome the gentrification that cleanses the neighbour-
334 he threatened Marjamäki and the association. But there was hood’s image (which they defend as their “land”), but they are 335
no formal complaint, nor any basis for an accusation. suspicious of the new population whom they do not know, that
proposes events, risking the confusion between cleanliness and
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Here, there is a confluence of different levels of “gaze”: the gaze a past they want to overcome. Desterro, a cultural association
of the policeman, who saw far more than what the performers within a multicultural area in the centre of Lisbon (the Martim
were actually doing; the neighbour’s gaze, who wanted an image Moniz/Almirante Reis axis), may go unnoticed in the territory,
for Intendente-Desterro other than the drugs and prostitution it may host events that are camouflaged in the landscape, it may
underworld connotation that the neighbourhood was trying to add on more layers of exiles (desterrados). On the other hand,
overcome; the gaze of those who watched the performance; the each proponent of this event, Romain Teule, Flora Detraz, and
gaze of projection in the experience of the performer “keenly others, are also not “from there”, either because their culture
attentive to all that goes on” within a site specific practice and of departure is different or because they do not inhabit certain
context. Anyone outside the “territory” may feel even more local routines. There is a “there” that varies between the con-
surprised: Pizamiglio is Brazilian, not European; Marjamäki is crete terrain and the experiencing of those passing through, a
European, but Finnish; Furtado is Portuguese, but he lives in place in the city between the ethnoscape (Appadurai 1996) and
France. Is no one from this land, the exile (desterro) of no one? the relationscape (Manning 2009)9 in which being “from there”
Could they have actually been detained during this episode? has different meanings for those living there, for those who
were born there, for those who settled there, for those who We could think of a “Portuguese body” – to recuperate a theme
plied their licit or illicit trade there, for those who prostituted belonging to national identitary constructions – as an exercise
themselves there, for those who bought drugs there, for those of reterritorialization against the grain, as if launching a chal-
who used drugs there, for those who run a grocery store and do lenge to build a paradoxical discourse containing its own an-
not speak the language yet, for those who did not legalize their tidote, an antidote to the conservative reterritorialization of
food establishments yet, for those who have recently opened subjectivity. Simultaneous absence and presence of a “body”?
tourist knickknack stores, for those who want to bring a differ- How so, “national bodies”?
ent life to that part of the city, for those who frequent the vari-
ous meeting and sharing places, the cultural street events, the

concerts, the organized debates and other activities – all of this
certainly brings affective, cultural, ethnic and racial tensions. PORTUGUESE BODY?
This list offers a few cosmopolitan examples which now char-
acterizes an axis of the city that, in the 1980s and 1990s, was In a 1993 chronicle, after watching the young dancers Vera
called a “drugs supermarket”. In the end, perhaps no one is Mantero and Francisco Camacho, Alexandre Melo asked him-
336 “from there”, or for that matter from any place else, until they self whether the “Portuguese have a body” (Melo 1995, 174). 337
become, for instance, a lisboeta? A Portuguese?10 We can think Considering “the innovative use of the body by these artists
of belonging as an aspect of subjectivity production, looking at as a positive point of departure for a critique of contemporary
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it from the ethologic perspective proposed by Guattari: “The Portuguese culture” (Lepecki 2004a), Melo resorts to a series
simplest examples of refrains delimiting existential Territories of episodes simultaneously ludicrous and serious (involving
can be found in the ethology of numerous bird species. (...) sexual discrimination, the contamination of haemophiliacs in
Each time this involves marking out a well-defined functional Portuguese hospitals and the aids campaigns that went most-
space”. (1995, 15) ly unnoticed) to talk about “a system of implicit tolerance by
omission” in place in Portugal (Melo 1995, 174). “The body
�9 Although I do not explain these concepts here, it seemed pertinent to use the neolo- has no place in the current and dominant discourse in Por-
gisms created by Manning and Appadurai to connect “terrain” to “landscape”.
10
Appadurai, for instance, points in that direction: “These complex, partly imagined lives
tuguese society and that is why everything happens as if the
must now form the bedrock of ethnography, at least of the sort of ethnography that wish- Portuguese indeed do not have a body (idem, 175). Mantero’s
es to retain a special voice in a transnational, deterritorialized world. For the new power of
the imagination in the fabrication of social lives is inescapably tied up with images, ideas,
Perhaps She Could Dance First and Think Afterwards (1991) is
and opportunities that come from elsewhere, often moved around by the vehicles of read by Melo as a programmatic declaration. Referring to this
mass media. Thus, standard cultural reproduction (like standard English) is now an endan-
gered activity that succeeds only by conscious design and political will, where it succeeds
choreography, he writes: “Moments like these do not crystalize
at all.” (idem, 54). as clichés, rather, they are constantly dissolving and reconfig-
uring according to a cadence of flows. As if dancing was like gence of Nova Dança Portuguesa. It starts by problematizing
going down the street with the body set at the highest level the action of the historical force field on a country’s national
of intensity” (idem, 177-8). While this description of a body identity – seen by Lepecki as undergoing historical negation –
which does not crystalize would suffice for an approximation and hypothesizing whether those forces manifest through per-
to Guattari’s (1993) idea of deterritorialization, O Rei no Exílio formance and choreography as memories of what had been
[The King in Exile], by Francisco Camacho (1991), is the il- lost (an empire, a “megalomaniac national body”?). In turn,
lustration of an exile both in terms of what is proposed and in Raquel Ribeiro’s (2010) article for the “Ípsilon” supplement (of
terms of execution. A Portuguese king, the exiled Manuel II, the daily newspaper Público) titled Os Portuguese Já Têm Corpo
is the figure of an exiled body staged by Camacho in 1991. e os Criadores Encontraram-no [The Portuguese already have a

body and creators have found it], relates to Melo’s chronicle
The last piece quoted and described by Melo, Our Lady of Flow- insofar as it calls together artists and researchers from various
ers, also by Camacho (1992) is – for the style of dance it ex- fields to reflect on the theme of sexual ambiguity, which seems
presses, and along with Perhaps She Could Dance First and Think to echo the issue “of the body and the Portuguese” raised by
Afterwards and The King in Exile – another case of an interval Melo. Because of its deterritorializing character, it is justifi-
338 between “paradoxical bodies” (cf. Gil 2001, 57-79) in constant able to once again evoke “this Portuguese body”, unabashedly 339
deterritorialization and reterritorialization: “A body that Fran- leaving behind the melancholy of the body’s absence in sebas-
cisco Camacho’s analysis, decomposition and re-composition tianismo and fado (cf. Lourenço 1992) and the consequences
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reveals, destructs and reconstructs in the different modelling of of a recent colonial and post-colonial body, to finally ask what
his postures vis-à-vis power and sexuality” (Melo 1995, 178). is happening today out there. What is the origin of this need to
The deterritorializing power of these bodies in performance is talk about a Portuguese body from time to time?
understood by Melo as a desirable potency to transform the
“ideology of loss of the body” into an “innovative use of the Although we do not know exactly who the “Portuguese” were
body as the positive point of departure towards a critique of that seemed not to have a body in the early 1990s, and who
contemporary Portuguese culture” (cf. Lepecki 2004a), and it such people might be now that, in contrast, can convene a cor-
points to the desire for a new decolonized identitary existence. poreality as “the point of departure towards a critique of con-
temporary Portuguese culture” (cf. Lepecki 2004a) – there are
In his doctoral thesis, Moving Without the Colonial Mirror: nevertheless bodies, performances and movements of thought
Modernity, Dance, and Nation in the works of Vera Mantero and with a public echo, linked to a latent Portugueseness, in which
Francisco Camacho (1985-97) (2004a), Lepecki establishes a the designation of a Portuguese language and body mirror each
relationship between Melo’s text and the then still recent emer- other in a localized and contextualized manner.
And although it is not enough to speak of a national body, our systems, etc. These are references that he has been integrating
imaginary is taken over by this body that has installed itself, in a most singular manner in his artistic work processes and in
which perhaps makes it impossible to ignore. research workshops. The concrete influence of the people with
whom he collaborated throughout the years is patent in his dis-
Indeed, some paradigms of performance art and the visual course. Equally important is the fact that re.al was for many
arts are reflected in the work of Vera Mantero and Francisco years a meeting point for artists with different backgrounds
Camacho – in what they summon as desiring, visceral, car- and interests. From the 1990s until their recent and complete
nal, or, as Lepecki says paraphrasing Melo: “blunty physical disappearance (to make way for other kinds of experiments),
body – desiring, sexualized, visceral, carnal. Rare examples of the Lab12 attained the status of “accidental school” for multi-

positive bodies” (Lepecki 2004a) – characteristics that also ap- talented performers and artists.
pear in some work by João Fiadeiro, Clara Andermatt, Paulo
Ribeiro, among many others. However, this posture of chal- Many of the works of Nova Dança Portuguesa artists, along
lenge and deterritorialization of patterns and conventions is with their legacy, could be included simultaneously within the
not exclusive to performance art, or to the “Portuguese body”, framework of the two fields: performance art or dance.13 How-
340 and it was generalized internationally, in the context of ex- ever, dance has been leading the reflection on them, and it is 341
perimental dance, along with more conceptual characteristics the proposals of dislocation of that referent which may, or not,
with affinities with the ready-mades and other provocations by produce a degree of deterritorialization.
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Marcel Duchamp, or with Allan Kaprow’s happenings, among
others.11 João Fiadeiro and other artists linked to re.al also 12
The designation Lab gradually transformed into variations of laboratory processes, in-
provided an important contribution to stabilize the connec- volving various artists and researchers until 2014.
13
tion between Portuguese dance and a certain performance As in the example of works by Ana Borralho and João Galante, but also by Cláudio da
Silva, Rui Catalão, Gustavo Sumpta, Cláudia Dias and many other artists from different gen-
art “flavour”. Fiadeiro often mentions the conceptual influ- erations, who feature in dance programmes, making incursions into styles of presentation
that many audiences do not accept as “dance” and which are sometimes placed “between
ence of Trisha Brown and Steve Paxton, but also of John Cage
areas” or in the area of performance art. It is relevant to mention the ephemeral launching
and Merce Cunningham, Duchamp, post-modern American of a series of events more recently proposed by such collectives as Demimonde, ADDK,
or baldio, which are open to the community and have made possible new approaches
dance, Zen Buddhism, Gilles Deleuze’s philosophy, complex between areas and the post-media, as demonstrated by the events Ora bolas há espaço
vamos usá-lo [Damn it, there is space let’s use it] (2012), Demimonde na Galeria da Boavis-
ta (2013), 5 minutos, 2 Ideias [5 minutes, 2 ideas] session 1 (2013) and session 2 (2014)
11 (cf. baldiohabitado.wordpress.com/primeiro-encontro-baldio). But also the collaboration
Some of Jérôme Bel’s works would be the most immediate translation of what a ready-
made can be on stage, generating a theme that brings into play ontological questions in proposals of O Rumo do Fumo with other groups, in Oferecem-se Sombras [Shadows on
Dance Studies, especially in the reception and programming of shows: “This is not dance, offer] (2013), Mais para menos que para mais [More towards less than more towards more]
I want my money back.” See, for instance, the piece Jérôme Bel (1995) (cf. Lepecki 2006, (2014), or even more recently the regular programming of performance events at Galeria
45-64). Zaratan and other informal spaces that have popped up outside theatre venues.
EPISODE # 2
Art Piss, On Money and Politics

Borralho/Galante and guests (2012)
Ana Borralho and João Galante worked together for the first
time in the context of the group Olho, coordinated by João
Garcia Miguel, within which the inter-affection of people from
theatre, dance and performance was intense and important.
After an education in the visual arts, Galante recognizes that

he approached activities which seemed more open to different
worlds, such as dance, performance art and theatre in the late
1990s (cf. Borralho and Galante 2016). At the time, the visual
arts had taken a commercial turn, and the subversive legacy
342 of performance art seemed more alive in dance (and theatre).
Galante recalls performances by street theatre groups such
as Canibalismo Cósmico, Netos do Metropolitano (linked to
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Olho), and many others. Felizes da Fé were often detained

by the police. At Olho, frequent visitors included Alberto Pi-
menta, Alface and Gustavo Sumpta. Together with Olho and
Festival x, re.al labs were the first stage, and also a meeting
place, for the exchange of ideas and experiences. Meanwhile,
the initial Olho project gradually disintegrated and was over by
2000, the year Ana Borralho and João Galante debuted their
first collaborative work. MissMasterMiss, with Miguel Morei-
ra and Jorge Bragada, was created at a time when their work
was artisanal but resorted to a new methodology, in which the
proper formulation of a question, or concept, was crucial be-
fore it was put into practice. In other words, the structuring of Antonia Buresi in Art Piss, On Money and Politics, Lisbon, 2012. Borralho/Galante
and guests / Photograph: Sofia Tri and Vítor D. Rosário
a performance became preponderant vis-à-vis improvisation,
AUTOR
344
CAPÍTULO
Ana Borralho in Art Piss, On Money and Politics, Lisbon, 2012. Borralho/Galante and guests / Photograph: Sofia Tri and Vítor D. Rosário
which generates a lot of performative material and, therefore,
calls for a great deal of selection, as it is difficult to fit in the
same piece in its entirety.
The process of Art Piss started with a series of photographs of

the artists in different situations, taken as travel photographs
that accumulated over time: whenever they wanted to pee,
they would stop and take photographs. They suggested in-
cluding those images, titled Art Piss, in the publication of text

“O Mundo Maravilhoso de Ana Borralho e João Galante” [The
wonderful world of Ana Borralho and João Galante] (Catalão
2010) proposed by Teatro Maria Matos. The project did not
come to fruition, but this led to the possibility of a performance
with the same title. This was at the peak of political discontent-
ment in Portugal in 2011: there was a demonstration on 12 347
March, and a large 25 April march in Avenida da Liberdade,
in Lisbon. In Spain, protests and acampadas [encampments]
LINES OF TENSION
started on 12 May and, soon after, included Lisbon’s Rossio
Square. Galante and Borralho invited some people to be filmed
urinating at the door of such emblematic buildings as the Par-
liament or the Bank of Portugal. After much group debate, the
project was put on hold. The idea for Art Piss, On Money and
Politics re-emerged after an invitation by – mente association
for the event Criativa – mente. Done with merely symbolic
funding, the idea was humorously presented at a meeting of
performer friends (Tiago Gandra, Cátia Leitão, André Uerba,
Francisca Santos and Antónia Buresi). As the performance was
confined to the space of the event Criativa-mente (Trindade
Elizabete Francisca in Art Piss, On Money and Politics, Lisbon, 2012. Convent, Lisbon, 8 December 2012), the idea of urinating on
Borralho/Galante and guests / Photograph: Sofia Tri and Vítor D. Rosário
public buildings was abandoned. Instead, they created a carpet
made with photocopies of banknotes and images of politicians one hand an unknown group in Brazil decided to launch an
targeted by criticism after the International Monetary Funding online survey to answer the question whether the event could
and troika were called to intervene in Portugal, leading to the be considered art (“yes” won), on the other hand there were
implementation of a harsh austerity plan. The performers ar- unpleasant threats and emails filled with nonsense (some of
rived at the space, a room inside a small palace in Rua da Trin- which merited replies from Ana Borralho and Rui Catalão).
dade, and meticulously arranged the photocopies on the floor. About a week later the controversy had died down, diluted
A subtle ambient music gave them time to choose a photocopy, within the unstoppable torrent of new cybernetic scandals.
approach it, pull down their pants, open their legs and pee, each
in their own way and at their own pace. Some people in the au- But what is this online scandal phenomenon? Is it related to

dience joined in, especially colleagues and friends who partici- issues having to do with performance? Perhaps the Internet
pated in the event, but also a few outsiders. Some people left, amplifies the discussion – between those who saw, those who
others were shocked, and many remained silent. No one could did not, and even those who never see anything anyway – and
have anticipated what happened. Some were amused, “others the reaction, in time, well beyond the event The questions that
never looked at us in the same way”, Ana Borralho commented. emerged included: public money, whether it was art or not,
348 the accusation of Leftist intellectualism, and the way it spread 349
The video was immediately made available online, but it took a across the Internet like a rampant virus. In Art Piss, the online
year for someone to criticize it. At first, with the discussion that video was the main cause of the deterritorializing disturbance.
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it generated and the sudden visibility it brought, the succes- If “They cannot do that”, what then can they do? A vast num-
sion of comments amused them. At a certain point the discus- ber of people that post comments would never watch the per-
sion no longer had anything to do with the event itself; instead formance live, indeed would never put themselves in that con-
people were attacking one another. The text generated by the text. In their personal computers, they are able to watch the
successive comments gradually built up despite the event that video repeatedly, out of its specific, site specific time and terrain.
had originated it. The “scandal” spread online. In fact, online The context is dislocated from the frame of performance art, a
comments questioned the subsidy that Associação Casa Bran- sort of private space opened to the public without prior notice.
ca had received from the State and even whether public money Dislocated from a meaningful discharge (to urinate) to unload
should be used against the very system that makes it available. severe frustrations on their political targets expressing revulsion
“The money for that event was only enough for a group din- at the path Portugal was taking with the situation generated by
ner”, Galante commented. One of the most intense polemics the intervention of the troika. The fact that public institutions
that emerged out of the online comments was the fact that the did not fund the event, and that it was organized with full free-
artists had been financed to urinate in public. While on the dom of action, is also part of the sensorial relief of passing water.
To become aware of the echoes of a performance that could In the future, it will be worth looking into the extemporaneous
have gone unnoticed, and whose online visibility derives only comments of online communication, which comes very close
from evoking a recurrent theme in performance art (political to total randomness, because it is no longer enough to estab-
protest via indecorous provocation) tells us much about the lish axes, or rather, nexuses for gifting and counter-gifting.
contextual and current pertinence of performance. Is perfor-
mance still worth it? Does it still produce deterritorializing ef- The question of deterritorialization and its dependency on the
fects? By the sheer fact of being online, the reception reached “terrain” in which it occurs – because it is the outcome of
unexpected proportions, seeming to contain its own singular a series of co-incidental relationships that allow for the discov-
power. There is an expansion of the potential public audience, ery of fractures in that terrain, which signify a larger number

beyond the specialized community; in online time and space; of possibilities – demonstrates how Muito atento a tudo o que
there is someone who watches, sheltered from the world, está a passar could have gone almost unnoticed if nobody had
in their private space, and wants to have a distanced voice. felt offended and voiced their anger against the nudity in the
Online and media discussion itself becomes performative. It is window. Just like Art Piss, it remained under the radar until it
a discussion fed by individual frustrations, anxieties, a meas- was viewed and commented on online. The two performances
350 ure of delirium and the claim to a public voice. To each the consist of the execution of apparently very simple tasks, which 351
right to their opinion, due to the simple fact that they can ex- open up the terrain to a dislocated and unexpected audience.
press it immediately, thus participating in a public sphere that Unexpected, or merely hidden in the obvious, these terrains
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is accessible to all. But to talk about what if they have no ac- could perhaps be fractured territories that enable a thinking of
cess to the proposal in itself? Can they talk without listening, other subjectivities, based on the deterritorialization and reter-
about that which they do not listen to? Yes they can, but per- ritorialization as performance proposal.
haps the answers are not answers, when a question was not
posed. Moreover, the project was not conceived as a video to
be watched online; the video was a mere recording. However,
that recording led to some delirious comments possessing
a certain Dada nonsense quality, an a-critical, quasi-perform-
ative cacophony. Improvisation, a certain randomness, the fist
fights that followed the Dadaist salons, seem to reverberate in
this chaos that is easily produced by, and remains inscribed
in, the Internet. Perhaps then, from a distance, there will be a
possible reading of the moment of its appearance on the “net”.
REFERENCES
APPADURAI, Arjun. 1996. «Global Ethnoscapes: notes and queries for a Transnational
Anthropology». In Modernity at Large – Cultural Dimensions of Globalization.
48-65. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
BORRALHO, Ana and GALANTE, João. 2016. Interview with Ana Borralho and João
Galante, by Sílvia Pinto Coelho, 27 July.
CATALÃO, Rui. 2010. «O Mundo Maravilhoso de Ana Borralho e João Galante».
Jornal MM 4: 40-46.
DELEUZE, Gilles. 2006 [1965]. Nietzsche par Gilles Deleuze. Paris: P.U.F.
GIL, José. 2001. Movimento Total, o Corpo e a Dança. Lisbon: Relógio D’Água Editores.

GOLDBERG, RoseLee. 1979. Performance Art, Live Art from 1909 to the Present.
New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc Publishers.
GUATTARI, Félix. 1995. Chaosmosis an ethico-aesthetic paradigm.
Bloomington & Indianapolis. Indiana University Press.
LEPECKI, André. 2004a. «Chapter 2 Missing Body, Missing Dance, Missing Country».
In Moving Without the Colonial Mirror: Modernity, Dance, and Nation in the Works
of Vera Mantero and Francisco Camacho (1985-97). sarma.be/docs/2850
—. 2004b. «Concept and Presence. The Contemporary European Dance Scene».
353
In Rethinking Dance History: A Reader, edited by Alexandra Carter. 170-81.
London: Routledge.
—. 2006. Exhausting Dance. New York: Routledge.
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—. 2013. «Choreopolice and Choreopolitics: or The Task of the Dancer».
The Drama Review 57 (4): 13-27.
—. 2016. Singularities: Dance in the Age of Performance. New York: Routledge.
LOURENÇO, Eduardo. 1992. O Labirinto da Saudade. Lisbon: Publicações Dom Quixote.
MANNING, Erin. 2009. Relationscapes: Movement, Art, Philosophy.
London: The MIT Press.
MELO, Alexandre. 1995. «Os Portugueses não Têm Corpo».
In Velocidades Contemporâneas. 174-8. Lisbon: Assírio & Alvim.
RIBEIRO, Raquel. 2010. «Os Portugueses já Têm Corpo e os Criadores Encontraram-no».
Público, 30 August. publico.pt/culturaipsilon/noticia/os-portugueses-ja-tem-
corpo-e-os-criadores-encontraram-no-252773.
THE AVANT-GARDE
FRONT TO BACK:
PORTUGUESE MUSICAL
RETRO-PERFORMANCE
AUTOR
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354
AND COMMUNICATION 355
FROM THE 1980s

CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
TO THE 1910s–1920s
João Macdonald
Almada Negreiros, who was bent on instructing the public
against the detractors of the “new”; 2) deconstruction 1960-
1970 – initiatives geared towards the dismantling of the tradi-
tional artistic space and language (Ernesto de Sousa, Egídio
Álvaro, E.M. de Melo e Castro were some of the most active
individuals), which was also the product of coeval social con-
vulsions; 3) dissolution 1980-1990 – a period that detonated
and, in most cases, turned what had been the history of Portu-
guese performance art into a blank slate.
JOÃO MACDONALD
JOÃO MACDONALD
However, the universe of performance art operates in tectonic
territories with varying degrees of impact, some of them cir-
cling around larger territories to reach others that are smaller,
more distant in time and not as easily identifiable. This is ap-
356 TIMES AND TECTONIC PL ATES parent in the threads of communication between the 1910- 357
1920 block and what could be considered as a sub-plane of
The on-going historiographical record of Portuguese perfor- 1980-1990: a certain field of Portuguese pop-rock music of
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mance art tends to divide the topic into blocks consisting of the 1980s. This proximity is rooted in the appropriation, by
pairs of decades of the twentieth century: 1910-1920, 1960- some of those musicians, of modernist movements, incorpo-
1970, 1980-1990 (with 1940-1950 consisting of the actions by rating their methods, updating and quoting them.
Mário Cesariny and the surrealists – a more distinctive block,
engaged with a specific school and thus also more homoge- Its identification and characterization as a branch of the ge-
nous). This division (emanating from academic, non-academ- nealogy of performance art was established in recent years by
ic and artistic fields) has been consensual although it does not the researchers Paula Guerra (2013) and Sandra Guerreiro
consider these blocks in isolation. Dias in the context of their doctoral theses. In the case of the
former, in the chapter “1984-1990: entre os refinamentos e as
In this same sense of referential utility, I suggest an ad hoc derivações da música moderna portuguesa e da afirmação do
classification of those blocks by resorting to three notions, pós-punk” [1984-1990: between the refinements and deriva-
namely instruction, deconstruction and dissolution. In brief: tions of modern Portuguese music and on the affirmation of
1) instruction 1910-1920 – with a focus on the actions of post-punk]”(Guerra 2013); and in the case of the latter in the
chapters “Revolução pop em Portugal: sinergias experimentais PLUNDERING THE PAST
de uma estética performativa” [Pop revolution in Portugal: ex-
perimental synergies of a performative aesthetics]” and “Neo- In 1967, in Traité de Savoir-vivre à L’Usage des Jeunes Générations,
dadaísmo e cabaretismo urbano para uma homeostasia feliz” the situationist Raoul Vaneigem popularized the “perfect” no-
[Neodadaism and urban cabaret-ism for a happy homeosta- tion of nihilism conceived by Russian thinker Vasily Rozanov:
sis]” (Dias 2016). “The show is over. The audience get up to leave their seats.
Time to collect their coats and go home. They turn round...
I shall take that filtering of the 1980s as the point of depar- No more coats and no more home.”1 Rock critic and historian
ture and deepen it conceptually, but not without first placing Greil Marcus recovered the image in Lipstick Traces (in which
JOÃO MACDONALD
JOÃO MACDONALD
into context the post-punk universe – a term that agglutinates he laid out the thread linking Dadaism, situationism and punk;
positions, rather than a musical trend – to which belong the Marcus 2007,65-67) to synthetize punk, demonstrating it with
performer-musicians under scrutiny. a 1977 song by British band The Adverts, “One Chord Won-
ders”, from the album Crossing the Red Sea: “I wonder what
we’ll do when things go wrong./When we’re halfway through
358 our favourite song./We look up and the audience has gone/[…] 359
we don’t give a damn.”
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To paraphrase another rock historiographer (Simon Reynolds
in Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978-1984), the immedi-
ate reaction to punk, and to those nihilistic outbursts, by a cer-
tain class within the contemporary music community was the
anti-intellectual intellectualizing of music. It was carried out by
musicians who were more concerned with keeping a startled
audience in the room than with startling them out of the room.
1
Although he does not mention it, Vaneigem most probably used, in his book (1967, 181),
the translation of Rozanov’s (1865-1919) work by Vladimir Pozner and Boris Schloezer,
L’Apocalypse de Notre Temps: Précédé de Esseulement (1930, Paris: Librarie Plon), in which
that definition of nihilism appears in a passage titled “La Divina Commedia”, alluding to the
fall of the Russian Empire in 1917. The translation of Rosanov’s quote we use here is the one
by John Fullerton and Paul Sieveking in their English version of Vaneigem’s The Revolution
of Everyday Life, according to the online source (library.nothingness.org/articles/SI/en/
display/61).
Reynolds book is a celebration of those who devoted them- Reynolds analysis opens with a quote by Pere Ubu’s Allen Ra-
selves to filling in “punk’s uncompleted musical revolution, venstine in a 1978 interview: “The Sex Pistols sang ‘No Fu-
and explored new sonic possibilities” – i.e., the “post-punks”, ture’, but there is a future and we are trying to build one.”
most of whom had attended fine arts schools, an aspect that is This non-punk, but advanced, kaleidoscopic march went on
relevant to this case. Reynolds specifically highlights how they to contaminate spaces outside the Anglo-Saxon spectrum.
“plundered” early twentieth century avant-gardes: In Portugal, from the late 1970s onwards, it resulted in a vol-
ume of records, concerts, video clips, happenings, performanc-
Those seven post-punk years from the beginning of 1978 to es and manifestos generated by entities and subjects who had
the end of 1984 saw the systematic ransacking of twenti- (and still have) their main platform in music. The affiliation in
JOÃO MACDONALD
JOÃO MACDONALD
eth century modernist art and literature. The entire period early twentieth century and modernist engagement was simi-
looks like an attempt to replay virtually every major mod- lar, and while some adopted onomastic traits in line with it
ernist theme and technique via the medium of pop mu- (bands such as K4 Quadrado Azul – which carried the same
sic. Cabaret Voltaire borrowed their name from Dada; Pere name as Almada Negreiro’s famous 1917 modernist text title –,
Ubu took theirs from Alfred Jarry. Talking Heads turned Ezra Pound e a Loucura, Mler Ife Dada), all were exploratory.
360 a Hugo Ball sound-poem into a tribal-disco dance track. Terminology places them under the category Música Moderna 361
[The] techniques of collage and cut-up were transplanted Portuguesa (mpm – Modern Portuguese Music –, which does
into the music. Marcel Duchamp, mediated by 1960s Fluxus, away with such terms as post-punk, new wave or no wave to clas-
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was the patron saint of No Wave. The record-cover artwork sify the phenomenon). And they emerged in a social-political
of the period matched the neo-modernist aspirations of context comparable to “those of Orpheu”2.
the words and music, with such graphic designers as Mal-
colm Garrett and Peter Saville, and labels like Factory and
Fast product, drawing from Constructivism, De Stijl, Bau-
haus, John Heartfield and Die Neue Typographie. This fren-
zied looting of the archives of modernism culminated with
the renegade pop label ZTT – short for Zang Tuum Tumb, a
snatch of Italian Futurist prose-poetry – and their concep-
tual group the Art of Noise, named in homage to Luigi Rus-
solo’s manifesto for a Futurist music.
(Reynolds 2006, xvii-xviii)
2
Reference to the Portuguese modernist magazine published only twice in 1915.
THE BET TER REVOLUTION The progressive regime of 1910 was not in a situation to – nor
was it their intention to, in line with their purpose – not mete
The modernist instruction phase in Portugal consisted of out aesthetical discipline. Nor was the modernist front in such
shock-effects led by Santa Rita Pintor, Almada Negreiros, a situation.
Raul Leal and Amadeo de Souza Cardoso, and took place in
the highly turbulent society that followed the 1908 regicide. “As usual in periods of pre or post-revolutionary political tur-
In 1915, five years after the establishment of the Portuguese moil the more orthodox political apparatuses strive to simply
Republic, the modernists truly came on stage openly in con- life; many artists and cultural practices were co-opted by the
flict with the republican intellectuals, who zealously guarded most primary, anachronistic and absurd ideological manipula-
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an aesthetical programme that was broadly speaking based on tions.” This comment was made by art critic Alexander Melo,
a more or less romanticizing and more or less historicizing type in 1998, when writing about the post-25 April 1974 Revolu-
of naturalism – the artistic expression of social consciousness tion. “From Maoism to Guevarism – via Stalin and Trotsky –
both in the visual arts (painters Luciano Freire, Carlos Reis, all the ideological corpses showed up for the festive historical
Columbano Bordalo Pinheiro and Veloso Salgado were among parade of models and period costumes” (Melo, quoted by Dias
362 the most prominent) and in literature.3 2015, 82). When the mpm in the late 1970s and throughout 363
the 1980s emulated the stamina of 1915-1918, preferring acts
From the attack on conservative writer Júlio Dantas to the po- of provocation to acts of catechism, it was made up of a gen-
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litical hostility of the text “O Bando Sinistro” [The Sinister eration of recent musicians reacting to the abrasive effect of
Gang], distributed by Leal in an operation devised by Santa “protest song” and its corresponding artistic space, in the face
Rita (a “call on Portuguese intellectuals” against prime-min- of a new revolutionary purity (preceded by the dictatorial New
ister Afonso Costa and the “Jacobins”), republican artistic pu- State “policy of the spirit” and by that of the First Republic).
rity was targeted by modernist public operations (and suffered
a counterattack: of the 107 articles that appeared in the press In the intellectual arena, our original socialist path becomes
in 1915 on the two issues of Orpheu, only nine were favour- narrower and narrower, suffocated by the so-called na-
able and most were printed in republican newspapers).4 tional reaction or by the very skilfully advertised culture of
the international bourgeoisie. The disagreeing critic must
3
In 1919, shortly after his election as president, António José de Almeida eulogized natu- be a “pure reader”, i.e., he must transcribe every work that
ralist writer Teixeira de Queirós, in whose books “always emerges a moral foundation […]
the purpose of which is to fight against the crisis of characters [sic] that plagues the Na-
somehow is a binary capable of altering the inertia of un-
tion today and that we all are committed to quell” (1919,6). desirable traditions. […] As we know, the current musical
4
Calculated from data in Hilário (2008), Dix (2015) and Sá-Carneiro (1915). panorama in Portugal is less than brilliant. […] [There is]
a warped notion of democratization of culture that seems “COURAGE, OH PORTUGUESE”:
to interpret it so as to make it impossible for everyone, in- POP-OUTBURSTS, AN OVERVIEW
stead of widening it to the very limits of possibility.
In the opposite camp to the post-protest song (elsewhere it
This was written by music critic Adriano Luz in 1978, as he would be interesting to discuss the exception of José Afonso
introduced Anar Band, the album by the eponymous project and his connection to surrealism) was manifesto music. Lima
of Jorge Lima Barreto, which also included Rui Reininho. Barreto’s text for the Anar Band vinyl, while not a manual to
“The record Anar Band is absolutely at the avant-garde of Por- instruct the new generation, displays some of its outlines.
tuguese music and maybe it is a thorn for those living in the re-
The record Anar Band is an aesthetical statement within the
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actionary mediocrity of its current panorama” (Luz 1978, 26).
panorama of avant-garde music. […] [The] work [belongs]
simultaneously to jazz aesthetics […], contemporary pop
[…], erudite electro-acoustics […]. The work reveals the
aesthetical nature of the Third World, in which the avant-
364 garde forms a dialectic alliance with the more unconscious 365
forms of mass music. […] The aesthetics of Anar Band is
turned to revolution […] The pleasure of creating music is
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the communication of universal senses, which express the
sensuality of rebellion and cosmic desire.5
The 1977 statements of a quasi-situationist Lima Barreto were

not terribly different from the “urges”, the “Universe, The Infi-
nite”, the “Spirit” exalted by Raul Leal in “ The Sinister Gang”
of 1915, which aimed at realigning Portugal.
5
Cover text on the vinyl Anar Band. The cover art, an oil painting titled Science Fiction,
is by Abel Mendes, one of the members of the group VideOPorto, a seminal structure in
Portuguese video-art.
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366 367
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José de Almada Negreiros at Mosteiro da Batalha, in the 20s Heróis do Mar
Photograph: unknown / courtesy of The Estate of Almada Negreiros Photograph: Francisco Graça / courtesy of Universal Music Portugal
In fact, the high benchmark set by Lima Barreto (who par- The neo-modernist performance of mmp was abundant. Lima
ticipated in the project Telectu, together with Vitor Rua, in Barreto’s original desacralizing followed various paths. mmp
the programme of Performance Portugaise, organized by Egí- multiplied and trans-multiplied, came together and came
dio Alves at the George Pompidou Centre, in 1984) launched apart. Much of it recovered the “manifesto”, so dear to early
a desacralizing path on the margins of the somewhat belated twentieth century avant-gardes. An example is the manifes-
punk phenomenon in the country. In 1979, even the prole- to of Bastardos do Cardeal, a band from Viseu, published in
tarian pioneers of Portuguese punk rock, the band Aqui d’El the newspaper Blitz in 1985. This band was anti mass culture,
Rock, realized what was happening: “We were told that [punks] anti-intellectual, anti-hippie, anti-themselves: “Bastardos do
are bands that want to give back to rock what it had in the be- Cardeal should not be allowed to play, because Bastardos do
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ginning, strength, spontaneity, which has now been perverted Cardeal do not play music: the band of this name does noth-
by intellectuals” (Ferreira 1979:33). It was doubtlessly a wide- ing but accumulate various amplified and electrified noises ac-
spread desacralizing, from the popular authority of composer, cording to various sequences and they do not wish to be stuck”
singer and born performer António Variações (himself another (Bastardos do Cardeal 1985, 12) (a small set of videos avail-
form of “Third World aesthetics”, to expand Lima Barreto’s able on YouTube shows the performances of Bastardos in the
368 expression) to the performatic impact of the band Heróis do 1980s, especially the persona of its lead singer Luís Morgadi- 369
Mar, with their neo-Pessoan quality. In the words of one of nho). Other names worth mentioning and examining include
the founders, Carlos Maria Trindade: “Heróis were in fact 20 Boris Ex Machina, Bye Bye Lolita Girl, Croix Sainte, Entes
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years ahead in terms of their concept of recovering the human- Queridos, Lucretia Divina, Mão Morta, Melleril de Nem-
ist values of Portuguese past. The country would only truly butal, New Wave Atitude, Moeda Noise, psp, Repórter Es-
redeem itself with Expo 1998, successfully and unabashedly trábico, Santa Maria, Gasolina em Teu Ventre!, Uru Eu Wau
displaying its historical soul to the world” (Cardoso 2010). Wau – a complex and incomplete list (YouTube documents
An incontrovertible eclipse points back to Almada Negreiros’ rather well these scenic-musical machines).
1917 Ultimatum Futurista às Gerações Portuguesas do Século XX
[A Futurist Ultimatum to the Portuguese Generations of the Capable of launching disorder among the audience, at least
Twentieth Century]: “The complete people is those who have a disorder of awe, three other names deserved a solid recep-
bound together all their qualities and all their faults to the tion during the 1980s in their enactment of “cabaretism”:
maximum. Courage, oh Portuguese, you only lack the quali- Ocaso Épico, with their protagonist Farinha (the artistic name
ties.” And at a certain moment in their career, Heróis do Mar’s of Carlos Cordeiro); Mler Ife Dada, brimming with the inge-
stage wardrobe seemed in fact to replicate one of Almada Ne- nuity of Nuno Rebelo and Pedro d’Orey (and Anabela Duarte,
greiros uniforms. a sort of projection of Valentine de Saint-Point); and João Pes-
te’s Pop Dell’Arte. Founder of label Ama Romanta, a magnet ENA PÁ 2000 “DO NOT EXIST”
for unique cases of the topic at hand, Peste used the first com-
pilation released by the label, Divergências (1986) to launch his The critique and history of the Movimento Homeoestético ([Ho-
manifesto. The record includes a vote “of confidence in the fu- meoaesthetic Movement] Fernando Brito, Manuel João Vieira,
ture” (instead of “no future”) by sociologist Paquete de Olivei- Pedro Portugal, Pedro Proença, Xana, between 1982-1989)
ra, based on Pier Paolo Pasolini’s concept of “new fascisms”: have been done and documented in great detail (6=0Homeoes-
“The illusion of the 1980s is that of a fight to enable every- tética 2004; Almeida 2008). Attached to the movement, the
one’s personal freedom. The equality of all is a myth, but the band Ena Pá 2000 (founded in 1984) was a concept by Vieira,
guaranty of the difference of every one is another”.6 Through with the occasional collaboration of Brito, that went beyond
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this and more Peste in Pop Dell’Arte updated the radicalism of the movement: the translation onto the stage of homeoaesthetic
the twentieth century: “An identity of libertarian values, a mu- tenets brought their neo-Dadaism (a term that they adopted)
sically vast identity, with influences from the pop-rock scene, to audiences beyond the milieu of the visual arts. The disguise
but also from jazz, contemporary music and even from other reached almost extemporaneous proportions.
type of movements such as futurism, surrealism, Dadaism or
370 names that never belonged to any movement, but were always But the disguise is an action in permanence. In 2015, Vieira 371
a reference to us, such as Marcel Duchamp” (Lopes, quoted said the following in an interview:
by Guerra 2013, 262-3).
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Not even I know who I am […] When I created Ena Pá 2000,
I created a fiction in the sense of confronting myself with
something between Monty Python and Frank Zappa, it was
a hodgepodge of culture and post-PREC [the so called On-
going Revolutionary Process] disillusionment, but it was also
a critique of pop-rock language. So I preferred to ridicule,
to create characters, and that opened the door over other
horizons. Although these were surrealist, they were simply
other, never the same. […] Basically, we created fictitious

bands that were a seed of the ones that exist now, which in
fact are fictitious. Ena Pá 2000, Irmãos Catita, do not exist.

(Branco 2015)
6
Recording included in the album Divergências.
This very national modernist way of being-other-than-oneself THE KING IS DEAD, LONG LIVE REININHO*
creates an ellipsis that points to one of the disconcerting acts
of Santa Rita, the continuous-performer, at café A Brasileira Probably the most consensual maître de cérémonie of mmp as
(according to journalist Reinaldo Ferreira). Some characters performer, Rui Reininho has kept that attitude until today, even
who wanted to physically assault him, looked for the artist out- considering the album Valsa dos Detectives (1989) as the last
side the café; Santa Rita told them “You gentlemen are misin- chapter in the golden period of his gnr – Grupo Novo Rock
formed… Someone must have played a practical joke on you… (it should be noted that the album’s art cover was by painter
Santa Rita Pintor does not exist…[…] This that you see here Carlos Carreiro, of Grupo Puzzle, ››› a structure responsible
it nothing but clothes… Santa Rita’s overcoat, jacket, shirt and for some events between 1976-1981).
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pullovers exist… But Santa Rita himself, does not” (Ferreira
1929, 37). In their deconstruction to zero, in the edification In 2016, Reininho shed new light on his paramusical trajectory
of performance art as occupation of the public thing (both before having been invited to join the band in 1981. Below are
the public space and the concert hall) the modernist and the the transcriptions of two episodes that reveal the artist’s act-
homeoaesthetical musicians coincide in the need to transform ing matrix. The recent public sharing of these two testimonies
372 self-derision into an artistic intervention. shows how Reininho acknowledges the importance of historio- 373
graphing them to better understand the performatic substance
When in 1989 a branch group of homeoaesthetics, Ases da of his (and gnr’s) career:
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Paleta, organized an “anti-art exhibition/performance with a
dada-formal matrix” at Galeria Quadrum, in Lisbon, that self- We shall never forget Kronstadt! Artur the Leftie attacked us
derision, in an outlandish dialogue with the modernists, was and we returned the threat: – We shall never forget Kronstadt!
once again set in motion: the members signed with the pseu- [the 1921 rebellion of soviet sailors, disillusioned with the revo-
donyms Amadeo de Sousa Veloso (Pedro Portugal), Palmada lutionary trajectory, against central communist power]. We,
(Fernando Brito), Maluca (Paulo Feliciano) and Sanita Pintor the anarchists of [café] Majestic; them, the commies who used
(Manuel João Vieira).7 to hang out at [café] Piolho. We challenged them on their own
turf and put on the skin of the Trotskyite sailors killed in Sta-
lin’s first great purge. Maybe the time for revenge had come.
Little Artur was an icon of Porto. We challenged him. We were
against everything. Before and after the revolution [of 25 April
7
The pseudonyms, except for Maluca, which refers to painter Maluda (1934-1999), mock * TN – The original Portuguese reads “O rei morreu, viva o Reininho”, a play on the word
the modernists Amadeo de Souza Cardoso, Almada Negreiros and Santa Rita Pintor. “rei” (king), which is contained in the musician’s surname: “Reininho”.
1974]. Like the Dadaists, who rushed to the streets when Paris PERFORMATIC AND MUTANT
was liberated, to salute the Nazis in a fit of total eccentricity.
Porto saw some very cultural, very avant-garde stuff, in which The phenomenon brought about by those agents of mmp be-
we participated [the “anarchist group” Reininho belonged to] tween the late 1970s and 1980 caused shifts in the tectonics of
as agents provocateurs. When the great Iannis Xenakis played Portuguese performance art and was practically diluted before
at Cinema Trindade one Sunday afternoon, all the bearded the 1990 dissolution, which relocated performance into more
architects came to listen to him. We also went, bringing with filtered spaces, and directed it to a narrower audience. React-
us portable radios. As he spoke about avant-garde music… ing above all against the cultural apnoea (as they had stated at
– Braga [stadium] here! Goal! Goal by Leixões! – Shhh!... – The the time, but also retrospectively) issuing from the politiciza-
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live [football] commentary. Luigi Nono was regaled with the tion of the arts in the immediate post-25 Abril, they referred
same reception. […] The ideologue, the mentor, was Jorge to the avant-gardist mechanisms of the 1910s and 1920s to
Lima Barreto. launch actions based on a post-punk attitude. These actions
(Torres 2016, 221-2). always targeted a wide audience, were not exclusive to the art
world and unabashedly resorted to all means available – from
374 This attitude was transferred to gnr (the same self-conscious- music concerts to television appearances (including shows for 375
ness appears in a commentary about the 1982 Vilar de Mouros the masses). In other words: like the early modernists (who
Festival: “I’ve got a few photos: me coming out of a dumpster had explored using the media and popular theatres), they real-
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wearing a diving mask; it was me who did the keyboards for [the ized that subversion would only have the desired effect if and
song] “Avarias”. It was a performance.” [69]; it appeared in lit- when applied without hesitation to universal media.
erature as Sifilis versus Bilitis published by &etc in 1983 and in
the lyrics for the songs in Come On e Ana – Líricas – 1982-2006 Actualizing instruments from the past that had not yet been
(Ermida 2009).8 Any hesitation in linking Reininho to the avant- fully used, they did not have, and did not need, a programme.
gardes of the early twentieth century is eliminated by looking into They preferred to de-programme. For that reason they were
a short, but essential, study by Fernando Guerreiro published kaleidoscopic, their only pattern being the constant disturbing
in the magazine Vértice: “Do ‘Bar da Morgue’ à ‘Turbina e Moça’: of the pattern of their constructions. These were performatic
o cabaret-circo dada-futurista de Rui Reininho e dos gnr” [From and mutant artists, who worked as a network, not as a school,
‘Bar da Morgue’ to ‘Turbina e Moça’: the Dada-futurist cabaret- and they are a segment of the last batch of creators to intro-
circus of Rui Reininho and gnr] (Guerreiro 2012). duce disturbance in Portuguese culture.
8
For a detailed analysis of this work cf. Ermida (2009).
REFERENCES
6=0 Homeostética. 2004. Edited by Maria Ramos. Porto: Museu de Serralves. Exhibition —. 1915. «Orfeu 2».
catalogue. mariosacarneiro.bnportugal.pt/index.php/categorias/12-outros-documentos/116-
orpheu2-recortes-de-imprensa-organizacao-de-mario-de-sa-carneiro-2
ALMEIDA, António José. 1919. Diário da Câmara dos Deputados. 22 July, (26): 6.
—. 1915. «Orpheu 1 [recortes de imprensa]». purl.pt/28015
ALMEIDA, Bruno de. 2008. 6=0 Homeostética. Lisbon: Arco Films.
—. 1915. «Orpheu 2 [recortes de imprensa]». purl.pt/28016
BASTARDOS do Cardeal. 1985. «De Viseu, com ódio». Blitz, 22 January: 12.
TORRES, Nuno. 2016. GNR: Onde nem a beladona cresce. Porto: Porto Editora.
BRANCO, Miguel. 2015. «Os portugueses, como variante etnológica, estão em vias de
desaparecer». Interview with Manuel João Vieira. I, 8 August. VANEIGEM, Raoul. 1967. Traité de Savoir-vivre à l’Usage des Jeunes Générations.
ionline.sapo.pt/406118 Paris: Gallimard.
CARDOSO, António Luís. 2010. «Heróis do Mar – Carlos Maria Trindade em entrevista».
museudoboom.comyr.com/dia_23.php
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JOÃO MACDONALD
DIAS, Sandra Guerreiro. 2016. O Corpo como Texto: Poesia, performance e
experimentalisno nos anos 80 em Portugal.
po-ex.net/taxonomia/transtextualidades/metatextualidades-alografas/sandra-
guerreiro-dias-o-corpo-como-texto-poesia-performance-e-experimentalismo-
nos-anos-80-em-portugal/
DIX, Steffen, ed. 2015. 1915: O Ano do Orpheu. Lisbon: Edições Tinta-da-china.
ERMIDA, Isabel, 2009. «O nonsense faz sentido(s): Sobre os jogos de linguagem nas
376 377
líricas de Rui Reininho». Diacrítica – Série ciências da literatura 23 (3): 227-58.
FERREIRA, Pedro. 1979. «Entrevista em geito [sic] de bate-papo com o Aqui d’el Rock».
Música & Som, April: 32-33.
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FERREIRA, Reinaldo. 1929. «Recordações da geração “futurista”… – As histórias do
Santa Rita Pintor». Ilustração, 1 August: 35-38.
GUERRA, Paula. 2013. A Instável Leveza do Rock: Génese, dinâmica e consolidação do
rock alternativo em Portugal (1980-2010). Porto: Edições Afrontamento.
GUERREIRO, Fernando. 2012. «Do “Bar da Morgue” a “Turbina e Moça”: o cabaret-circo
dada-futurista de Rui Reininho e dos GNR». Vértice, January/March: 84-93.
HILÁRIO, Fernando. 2008. Orpheu: Percursos e ecos de um escândalo.
Porto: Universidade Fernando Pessoa.
LUZ, Adriano. 1978. «O disco Anar Band – Na vanguarda da música portuguesa».
In Mundo da Canção 48: 25-26.
MARCUS, Greil. 2007. Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
REYNOLDS, Simon. 2006. Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978-1984.
London: Faber and Faber.
SÁ-CARNEIRO, Mário de. 1915. «Orfeu 1».
mariosacarneiro.bnportugal.pt/index.php/categorias/12-outrosdocumentos/118-
orpheu1-recortes-de-imprensa-organizacao-de-mario-de-sa-carneiro-2
THE POLITICAL
REENACTMENT OF
PERFORMANCE AND
ITS MICRO-ACTIVISM
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378
OF AFFECTIONS 379
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Christine Greiner
inner and outer environments, announcing the recognition of
an increasingly intense flow of spatialities that are singular but
never absolutely distinct. Flows and environments, as much as
places (house, street, city), are considered sign systems rather
than mere geographical territories.
As for the second movement, which has intensified more ex-

plicitly in the last decade, it relates to urban events that are
resistance networks, such as the Arab Spring, the Battles for
CHRISTINE GREINER
CHRISTINE GREINER
Seattle and the 2013 passeatas in Brazil, among many other
examples around the world. In these cases, the most serious
problem concerns the ambiguous relationship of these net-
works and collectives with alterity, which either feeds off them,
Since the late 1990s, two movements have brought about signifi- or promotes immunizing actions that set in motion isolationist
380 cant epistemological reverberations in performance art (hence- and identity policies, which are increasingly segregationist. 381
forth called performance). The first concerns the strengthening
of digital technologies and the expansion of zones of indistinc- This essay does not aim to analyse the sociological, economic
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tion between online and offline life proposed by the new gen- and political issues that ensue from these movements, but rath-

erations of users known, among other labels, as digital natives, er at questioning how performance has been reinventing itself
generation Z, post-internet generation, otaku and floating gen- with a view to identifying a sort of ontological reenactment.
eration. In conceptual terms, these navigations between cyber- The aim is to revitalize its political ability towards sharing
space and life beyond the screens have gradually destabilized through a microactivism of affections.1 The most relevant public
the distinctions between materiality and immateriality, public aspect of these microactions is geared towards the construc-
and private, real and fictional, among other dichotomies des- tion of the munus, as it appears in the etymology of communitas
tined for extinction. This constitutes a logical change that has (community) and common. Roberto Espósito (2011) explained

reshaped the meaning of many terms and concepts. Immateri- the complexity of this Latin term, remarking that it should not

ality, for instance, is now understood as a plunge into concrete- be mistaken for the res publica (the public thing) or for the public
ness (regardless of whether analogical or digital), as proposed space. Moreover, it is not similar to the sociological definition
by Antonio Negri (2012). As for the zones of intersection be- 1
This term was coined for a lecture I gave in June 2015 in Germany, in the context of the
tween public and private, they signal the indistinction between event The Body in Crisis, organized by curator Bettina Masuch.
of public sphere. Munus is close to the loss of boundaries and to Therefore, the type of political-philosophical reenactment this
a sort of spasm and void of the subject and its modes of collective essay refers to does not concern the re-staging of historical
undoing, thus reminding us of performative acts that pointed performances, but the reenactment of a certain cognitive trait.
to and sought to destabilize the devices of power. As Fischer- As Rebecca Schneider (2011) explains, the term reenactment
Lichte (2008, 27) observed, performative acts are always non- began to be abundantly used at the turn of the twenty-first
referential because they do not refer to pre-existing conditions century, when it had to do with the practice of re-making or re-
as inner essences, substances, stable identities or anything that staging a previous event. However, it did not always relate to
could be “expressed”. In fact, expressivity would be the very the reconstitution of works or events, because such re-staging
opposite of performativity, because it would imply something has always and unavoidably implied a new experience, a new
CHRISTINE GREINER
CHRISTINE GREINER
that already exists and, therefore, could be expressed, while the body and a new environment. The ontological reenactment
performative act would be that which constitutes itself as a pos- of performance asks about the munus of performer subjects
sible, immanent reality. If the munus is constituted in the col- who are not immunized and are non-subservient to the mar-
lective, in the dilution of boundaries that challenges the notion ket; who demonstrate an aptitude to a radical exposure to that
of a pre-existing and ready subject, it is also the materiality of which is not the same, i.e., who reactivate, in a certain way, the
382 the performative action that emanates from the body and turns function-performance of operators of destabilization. As pro- 383
identity into a processual singularity instead of a ready and in- posed by André Lepecki (2006; 2010), reenactment actualizes
dividual reality. the virtual and concrete that is present in the work and can still
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act, not as a reproduction of past experience, but as something
When performance started to be recognized as a specific lan- that can come to being.
guage, some models and procedures became recognizable and
recurrent, as is usually the case in the evolutional process of But what would this come-to-being look like in political terms?
every language. This was also when a market for acting, closely Should we surmise that the contexts emerging between the
linked to museums and galleries, appeared within which the great 1990s and the 2000s set in motion statements to engender
names are celebrated.2 In these institutional contexts, there is performative actions that were non-subservient to the imme-
a stability that is incompatible with the notion of performative diatist logics typical of neoliberal art circuits? Would it be pos-
action. This is not a value judgement, but an acknowledgement sible to break away from the managerial logics that administer
of how neoliberal devices of power impact ways of thought, ac- deadlines and money; and from the neoliberal governmentality
tion, creation and circulation. that prioritizes the preservation of the rules of the game rather
2
The most often quoted example is Marina Abramović, a major reference in the history of
than the players?
performance, who has circulated in major museums, such as MoMa in New York.
PRODUCING, MAKING AND ACTING distinguish between poiésis and práxis, production and action.
Man’s making had definitely become an activity that produced
In a tacit way, some of the main issues in this debate emerged a real effect, in other words, an action in the world.
in Ancient Greece. Aristotle used to differentiate poiésis (to
produce in the sense of acting) from praxis (to make in the Despite the sovereignty of this modern notion of production
sense of acting). At the core of práxis (accentuated here as it is and action, the singularity of the different forms of work con-
translated into Latin languages) there was a will that expressed tinued to be considered as a fundamental question with bla-
itself immediately in the action. And at the core of poiésis, there tant implications on everyday life. It was in that sense that
was a production in presence, i.e., the production of some- Karl Marx (2011) proposed, in his manuscript Grundrisse, the
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thing that did not exist and began to exist only at the moment distinction between material work and immaterial work. Ma-
it appeared in full light, without concealment. Therefore, práxis terial work always produces something other (a car in an as-
had a practical aspect, of production and action in the world. sembly line and artefacts, for instance), while immaterial work
As for poiésis, although it was implied in production, instead of produces its own process, like a pianist creating music while
producing something palpable, it was a mode of truth, a non- playing the piano or an intellectual articulating ideas and con-
384 concealment. Based on these presuppositions, Aristotle concepts while thinking, writing or speaking. That which unfolds 385
cluded that poiésis was a characteristic of the human. It would in processual production is an altogether different result and
reside within human making, while poiésis would lay out the not exactly the production of that work (the publishing of a
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human condition as a living being, as an animal, and would book, the recording of a composition, for instance).
constitute a sort of principle of movement or will (appetite,
desire and volition). Another word that was extensively studied, and already con-
tained the idea of “going through action in action” (with noth-
Throughout the centuries, these distinctions were obscured, as ing outside action), is “experience”. Aristotle even suggested
Giorgio Agamben explained in his first book The Man Without an affinity between experience and práxis, but established a
Content, written in 1974 (2012). Poiésis was translated into Lat- difference between the objects, stating that the object of theory
in as agere, i.e., something like “put-to-work” or operari and no is truth and the object of action is praxis. In turn, experience
longer as being in the presence. For the Romans, this became would be closer to a practical intellect capable of such and
actus and actualitas, also translated into the plane of agere, as such particular action. It should be noted that for Aristotle
the voluntary production of an effect. With political conditions only human beings determined their action and took it to the
and the new work forces and social needs of the modern pe- final consequences. Therefore, experience and práxis were part
riod, there did not seem to be the possibility of continuing to of the same process, while the determinant principle of both
práxis and the practical intellect (experience) is will. A crucial PERFORMANCE AS AN OPERATOR
author in this debate that seeks definitions for art, as well as for OF DESTABILIZATION
its function or power in everyday life, is Friedrich Nietzsche
(1844-1900). Before him, the place of art seemed always closer The experiences of performance were historically marked by
to poiésis, understood as the production of truth and non-con- a capacity for action and, above all, for shared action (rituals,
cealment, not as the production of an action. With Nietzsche, collective movements and so forth). Even in autobiographical
especially after the first edition of The Genealogy of Morals in works there has always been, in one way or another, the action
1887, art was recognized as a will to power or as something of a memory in the act of re-presenting it for the other, promoting
capable of establishing new worlds and new actions. Nietzsche the destabilization of the body, and of memory itself, through
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was more interested in creation than in the reception of art, sharing. For this reason, the recognition of political action or
problematizing the Kantian hypothesis according to which art performative action (Austin 1979; Butler 1997), which defies
production would be an aesthetical state shored up exclusive- the tendency of performance to irretrievably disappear (Phelan
ly by the notion of beauty, innately disinterested and exempt 1993), was always fundamental.
from any social or political implication. Be that as it may, from
386 the eighteenth to the nineteenth century art was reduced to All these questions have been exhaustively discussed, but the 387
the production of feelings, excluding cognition from the whole aspect that is more pertinent to this essay lies in the fact that,
creative process. Poiésis or poetics continued tethered to the before being considered a language in its own right or becoming
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notion of disinterested beauty and a flow of feelings, thereby a field of studies, performance was an operator of destabilization,4
promoting a conceptual dislocation that ended up overlooking the most significant political action of which would be to implode
the initial meaning of the term poiésis, i.e., action.3 paradigms, models, habits and patterns. In that sense, once the
experiences of dance, visual arts or theatre are corroded by per-
formance they do not represent a hybridization of languages,
but rather modes of thinking and acting imbued with a radical
availability to emphasize the meta-stability of each of these artis-
tic systems rendered irremediably fragile by the exposure to that
which is not given a priori, but constituted in action instead.
3 4
It should be remembered that Plato banished art and artists from the pólis, precisely This definition of performance as an operator of destabilization was proposed by myself,
because he acknowledged the power of action of art. If art had been considered inof- for the first time at a lecture at the Encontro do Instituto Hemisférico (Sesc Vila Mariana,
fensive from the beginning (as mere aesthetical fruition) it would not have posed any risk São Paulo, 2010). The idea was then developed in a few essays, which appeared in the
to the Greeks. anthology Corpo em Cena (2013) and Rivista Danza e Ricerca (2014).
This mode of acting of performance is only corporeally estab- In Brazil, there has been a proliferation of research, publica-
lished from the moment when it opens itself fully to alterity. tions and debates on this subject. At the same time, it seems
From this perspective, the public aspect would not be limited unavoidable to live side by side with the consequences of what
to the spectators, nor to public spaces, which they occupy, nor some authors have identified as a new economic system, which
to the ideological networks of discursive practices, but rather could be called “artistic capitalism” (Lipovetsky and Serroy
to its aptitude to turn alterity into a state of creation, simulat- 2015) and a generalized fundamentalism of creativity – the
ing an organic operation that ignites the process of cognition most toxic effect of which is to transform a substantial part of
and affectation itself.5 creation into entertainment and show (Gielen 2013).
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Against this trend, some recent projects have proved quite pow-
erful as they try to restore the performative aptitude of the radical
BETWEEN ACTION AND PRODUCTION: openness to the other and revitalize the munus of performance.
EXAMPLES OF PERFORMANCES IN BRAZIL These examples are not literally mobilized by street demonstra-
tions or digital networks mentioned earlier in this essay. How-
388 Despite the lengthy trail of debates stating the non-static char- ever, they reflect issues that are covered by these phenomena, 389
acter of the individual, there is a series of political issues that referring mostly to modes of rethinking communities, to the re-
translate into identities and segmentations of all kinds (ra- lationship between performance and the public, to the strategies
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cial, social, geographic, etc.). In this very sense, the debates involving exhibiting autobiographies and constituting narratives
between what constitutes itself as action or production were based on the radical openness to the other, among other themes.
radically exacerbated in recent years. As far as art is specifical-
ly concerned, there is no longer the clash between aesthetical A good example was the project 1000 Casas [1000 Homes]
fruition and knowledge: what now matters is whether there is proposed by the choreographer Marcelo Evelin and the collec-
commercial value or not. Thus, the tensions between artwork tive Núcleo do Dirceu in the city of Teresina (capital of Piauí
and merchandise seem to emerge in all debates, and perfor- State). The project organized a performative installation re-
mance is no exception. sulting from life-experiences that occurred during the years
of 2011 and 2012 as Dirceu participants visited five hundred

5
In “Alteridad como estado de creación” [Alterity as a state of creation], a recent essay
(of the one thousand targeted) homes in their districts.6
that I wrote for the book Componer el Plural (2016), I explain that, in organic terms, what
the brain detects as different from itself generates diversity in the sense of establishing
6
new modes of perception and corporeal states, which would constitute points of depar- Núcleo do Dirceu participants in this project were Allexandre Santos, Caio César, César
ture for processes of cognition and affectation. Costa, Cleyde Silva, Elielson Pacheco, Humilde Alves, Izabelle Frota, Jell Carone, Jacob �
1000 Casas, Núcleo do Dirceu
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The proposal emerged from a concern within the Núcleo as in his or her particular universe. With predefined themes for
they thought about the place of the spectator in a space other the performances in the homes – such as domestic violence
than a theatre seat. The procedure was quite simple: the art- –, the artists generate an interest in art in the residents while
ists started to go into the homes of the Grande Dirceu dis- proposing a joint participation and performing a public act in
trict (where the collective are based) to generate interest and a private space, which results in a deliberate blurring of the
what they have termed a “co-responsibility of residents in art”. function of the actor and the spectator.
The interventions consisted of “visits” or “break-ins”; arriving
without having been invited preserved the surprise effect. Each Aside from the installations that presented fragments of narra-
participant chose a profile of homes to visit and a performance tives and movements created during the visits, the project was
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to do according to a list of criteria linked to the features of the turned into an eponymous book (2012), which gathered differ-
chosen house (such as having tiles), or to the characteristics of ent documents on these experiences. In this case, the political
the people living there (elderly residents), or also to an event reenactment of the actions came to the fore because the “final
(homes where domestic violence had occurred). Regardless of result” was practically inexistent, forming instead a process in
the choice, the artists’ focus was always on the performativity of the course of the shared action.
392 the encounter and the dialogue with the other, as well as on the 393
creation of environments that were real (meeting face to face) Another example of an attempt to revitalize the sense of commu-
and fictitious (the narrative built from the dialogue with the res- nity was A Cozinha Performática [The Performative Kitchen],
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ident). One of the intentions was to approach the private place a proposal by the Núcleo Marco Moraes launched in June
with a public act. As the group explained on their website7: 2013. The methodology of this project consisted of artistic
partnerships through which research and dynamic collabora-
In the actions that we developed, private became public and tive procedures were developed seeing the artist as an articula-
vice-versa, in an inversion that also blurs the notion of artist tor of permanent creative processes.8
and spectator and the meaning of what art and everyday life
might be. The public sphere is established politically by shar-
ing what is common. And the private sphere [is defined] be-
cause the event takes place in the singularity of the individual,
8
The project was supported by two editions of the São Paulo Municipal Programme for
� Alves, Janaína Lobo, Layane Holanda, Marcelo Evelin, Regina Veloso e Soraya Portela. For
Dance Promotion (2014 and 2015) and by the Funarte Klauss Viana Dance Prize, which
two years the project was supported by Petrobras and the Ministry of Culture, with the
enable the circulation of some works across various Brazilian cities. In 2014, Cozinha Per-
sponsorship of Rouanet Law and the Federal Government.
formática was awarded the Denilto Gomes Dance Prize in the special category “collabora-
7
demolitionincorporada.com/1000casas tive platform”.
Marcos Moraes in Solo dance O Porco e o Cozinheiro [The Pig and the Cook] / Photograph: Yuri Pinheiro
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Solo dance O Porco e o Cozinheiro [The Pig and the Cook] / Photograph: Marcella Haddad
Already in its first year of work, called Ano do Cavalo [Year Tupinambá Indians, the poet Oswald de Andrade laid out the
of the Horse] and with the Marco Moraes’s solo (Anatomia Brazilian eclectic appetite for devouring everything, creating
do Cavalo [Anatomy of the Horse]) a series of photographic outcomes which are not subordinated to any origins, matrixes
essays, videos, shows, installations, performative dinners and or roots. By dealing with multiple languages and people with
various combinations were produced which artists usually call absolutely disparate histories, Moraes somehow created a dia-
“combos”. At this stage, more than forty participants took on logue with that early 1920s movement, provoking a reenact-
the challenge of living and creating together. In 2015, the Ano ment of old issues and metaphors from his performative din-
Digestivo [Digestive Year], a collaborative research and crea- ners that challenged the notion of ready-made and narcissistic
tion platform was created to organize Performative Dinners identities while valuing what is done with and from the other.
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inspired by Gordon Matta-Clark’s work and his early 1970s
Soho restaurant Food. According to Moraes, the challenge is A last significant example in terms of radical sharing of the work
to understand what the possible dramaturgies emerging from (and its creation processes) is the autobiographic performance
these encounters are. In these contexts, all artistic work is con- of the Pernambucan artist Oriana Duarte, undertaken since
sidered political. The challenge is to set in motion new ways 2002. It began when the artist experienced a strong bout of ver-
398 of sharing with the public, which does not actually exist in the tigo while mountain climbing in Faxinal do Céu, near Pinhão 399
conventional sense, because the audience also actively partici- city, in the State of Paraná. Hypoxia, or the lack of oxygen expe-
pates in the experience. Perhaps the most powerful performa- rienced by alpinists, also known as mountain sickness, inspired
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tive action in this project is precisely this one: to absorb the the performer to challenge the limits of her body. Moreover,
spectators in order to break away from the dichotomy between a series of concurring personal events made her decide to im-
artists and audiences, as well as the distance between private pose the extreme strains, typical of radical sports, on her own
and public. body. The objective was to prove to herself that she could go on.
Aside from the solo, the project generated the book Cozinha In 2003, the project eva (Experimento em Voos Artísticos
Performática (2014), coordinated by Ana Teixeira, which gath- [Experiments in Artistic Flights]) put three activities to the
ered essays by professors, researchers and artists; the video Sa- test: bungee jumping, rappel and rock-climbing. The trans-
broso, directed by Osmar Zampieri; and the dinners themselves, formation of the practice of these sports into performances is
held in several cities in Brazil. Although explicitly referring only apparent in the minimal gestures of territorial demarcation,
to Gordon Matta-Clark, it would be hard to overlook a reso- such as: orchid seeds thrown during the jump, chalk inscrip-
nance with the notion of anthropophagy, so dear to Brazilian tions on rock surfaces during ascent and descent, and so forth.
culture. When proposing cultural cannibalism, inspired by the Her reading of Clarice Lispector’s oeuvre also helped the per-
former name the exhibition of the first stage of her research: This time, the project developed as paddling sessions on sev-
“Querer Viver” [Wanting to Live]. eral Brazilian rivers. The idea was to create imbrications of dif-
ferent landscapes as the paddling constantly flowed from river
In 2004, during a jump, Oriana got stuck hanging by her feet to river, so as to imagetically connect physically distant ter-
and her eyes popped out of their sockets. Twenty-eight days ritories, gliding across mutating boundaries and landscapes.
later, reasonably recovered, the performer carried on with the The river was never the same, nor was the boat, nor was the
rappel and rock climbing installations of the project. This gen- woman. The body increasingly transformed into a body-boat-
erated the video Os Riscos de eva [The Risks of Eva], which dealt river. What is most interesting is that during the process the
with physical strength, fatigue, frailty, courage, fear and the for- body became not just the body but the autobiographical sto-
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mation of the states and sensations of the body from the alterity ry of overcoming hardship through challenging limitations.
vis-à-vis natural environments, stones, rocks, woods and, in the Strengthening resulted from the sharing with the different
end, a major piece of engineering – an iron bridge suspended communities through which Oriana passed and with which she
between cliffs over a river. The project also resulted in an in- grew. Gender issues emerged, because the paddling commu-
stallation composed of a large-scale fan blowing wind into the nity is mostly masculine; there were the social hardships of the
400 environment and a small sofa for the public to enjoy a series of small settlements; and, finally, the communication challenge, 401
artist books, the “Cadernos de eva” [eva Notebooks]. It was which led to the questioning of how to tell these stories in the
made up of suspended folders containing drawings, chrono- process, these narratives of the body, not always verbalized,
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grams, medical exams, physical evaluation tables and part of but necessarily collective and geared towards ensuring survival
the bibliography researched on sports, cosmetic alterations, during and after these adventures.9
plastic surgeries, nutritional medicine, brain functioning, etc.
Next to the sofa, an old pharmacy cabinet display contained
the clothes used in the performances, protection gloves, chalk,
contusion medicine, food supplements, vitamins, etc. On the
walls, two photographs, the image of the artist’s biceps tattooed
with the inscriptions of the performances and the image of
a swollen face with a red-coloured haemorrhaging eye.
The year 2005 saw the production of several works and, in 9

Plus Ultra turned into a doctoral thesis, defended in 2012, within the scope of the Com-
munication and Semiotics Programme of the Catholic University of São Paulo. The objec-
July 2006, the Plus Ultra stage was created, the point of depar- tive was to reflect on the aesthetics of existence and the writing about oneself proposed
ture of which was the lightness and fluctuation of the body. by Michel Foucault.
MICROACTIVISM OF AFFECTIONS
For all these experiences to be recognized as modes of think-

ing, researching and knowing, it is not enough to question pro-
cesses of creation, but rather to reinforce sharing procedures.
As we have seen with Aristotle, experience meant going through
action in action. We could then suggest that this going through
action in action would necessarily imply a movement that dislo-
cates itself from what is of the self, proposing an open, meta-
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stable, performative and decentred political action. In other
words: for aesthetical experience to be constituted it is impor-
tant to create networks of creation. Otherwise we would have
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to admit that creation is just an action confined to a creative

subject or genius, which would compromise its most relevant
402 feature, i.e., aesthetics as an action for life. 403
We are all undoubtedly immersed in capitalism, including art-

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ists. There is no instance constituting itself as an “outside”.
Relationships of power manifest in the culture space in which
we act (university, academy, galleries, museums, cultural cen-
tres and institutes) and in the symbolic systems that tacitly af-
fect us, even when we escape the institutions and public power.
Giorgio Agamben often mentions that the problem of the fate

of art in our time began being outlined as soon as we consid-
ered it as a productive activity, belonging to the “making” of
human being s in their context. Every making of a human – an
artist, politician or worker – would from this perspective be a
práxis. And, as we have explained earlier, práxis is the manifes-
Plus Ultra frame, Oriana Duarte, Rio de Janeiro
tation of a will that produces a concrete effect. Acknowledging
that man needs a productive status changed everything, and cess is often a macro-political failure, which necessarily calls for
brought about a great impasse: how to strengthen the critical a reinvention of collectives. While immunitary processes hinder
power of performance when creation and production share so alliances there is, on the other hand, an aesthetical dimension
many market interests and competition makes up their com- of life that persists, producing a network of possibilities.
mon ground.
Perhaps we could even think the same of performance, when
Brian Massumi (2015a) suggests that a possible way out would it relies on a “macro” artistic production coherent with market
be to recognize a plane of immanence in a capitalist economy expectations and everything that is already familiar and prone
linked to modes of perception and actions that are not always to good receptivity. However, at the same time there is micro-
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conscious and emerge from trans-individuality. Instead of high- production, sensitive to destabilizations and to everything that
lighting the nefarious side of capitalism, Massumi’s wager is is seen as failure – neither one nor the other, but a negation of
on the power of affections while demystifying exacerbated nar- this dichotomy itself. The processes of microproduction feed
cissism and pointing towards a collective instance that could off alterity in the sense of strengthening the ability to destabi-
open up new pathways. At stake is not any type of transcend- lize this dichotomy and set in motion the systemic crisis that
404 ence, but rather a collective action, which does not differenti- constitutes them. Neither one nor the other, but rather a trans- 405
ate between poiésis and práxis, product and process, action and individuality operating through microactivisms. The outcome
production, but establishes an undeniable instance of conti- of such cases is a set of processes, subjective networks and the
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nuity between individual and group. For Massumi (2015b), setting in motion of affects. That is what the ontological reen-
a certain mode of life that will carry on nurturing possible actment of performance as a political action consists of: a coun-
worlds emerges precisely from the collective and the common. ter-device of power that turns creation into the key to survival.
The role of performance in these networks is fundamental. Es-

pecially when it becomes “workless” or “worklessness”, a tenta-
tive translation of “désouvrement”, which occurs when a certain
inoperativity is internalized preventing any a priori functional-
ity, but never robbing the areas of risk of their power. From
this perspective, performance has nothing to do with the inof-
fensive zone of entertainment. Massumi himself explains that
it belongs to neoliberalism, a certain type of movement, which
dies because of its own success. Therefore, micro-political suc-
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Corpoboca, drawings by Oriana Duarte, Plus Ultra
REFERENCES
AUSTIN, John. 1979. How to Do Things With Words. Oxford: Oxford University Press. NEGRI, Antonio. 2012. «Metamorfose, Arte e Trabalho Imaterial». In Copyfight: Pirataria
AGAMBEN, Giorgio. 2012. O Homem sem Conteúdo. Translated by Cláudio Oliveira. e cultura livre, edited by Adriano Belisário and Bruno Tarin. 115-26.
Lisbon: Autêntica. Rio de Janeiro: Azougue editorial.
BUTLER, Judith. 1997. Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative. NIETZSCHE, Friedrich. 1996. On the Genealogy of Morals. Translated by Douglas Smith.
New York: Psychology Press. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
CVEJIĆ, Bojana and Ana Vujanović. 2012. Public Sphere by Performance. PHELAN, Peggy. 1993. Unmarked: The Politics of Performance. New York: Routledge.
Berlin: b_books. SCHNEIDER, Rebecca. 2011. Performing Remains: Art and War in Times of Theatrical
DUARTE, Oriana. 2012. Plus Ultra: O corpo no limite da comunicação. Phd Dissertation, Reenactment. New York: Routledge.
Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo. TEIXEIRA, Ana, ed. 2015. Cozinha Performática. São Paulo: Árvore da Terra.
ESPÓSITO, Roberto. 2011. Immunitas: The Protection and Negation of Life.
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Cambridge: Polity Press.
EVELIN, Marcelo, ed. 2012. Mil Casas. São Paulo: Itaú Cultural.
FISCHER-LICHTE, Erika. 2008. The Transformative Power of Performance: A New
Aesthetics. New York: Routledge.
GIELEN, Pascal. 2015. Criatividade e Outros Fundamentalismos. Translated by Sharine
Mello. São Paulo: Annablume.
408 GREINER, Christine. 2013. «A percepção como princípio cognitivo da comunicação: 409
uma hipótese para redefinir a prática da performance». In Coleção Corpo em
Cena, edited by Lenira Rengel and Karin Thrall. Vol. 6, 11-35. São Paulo: Anadarco
Editora & Comunicação.
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—. 2014. «Un esercizio per ridefinire la pratica della performance». Danza e Ricerca:
Laboratorio di Studi, Scritture, Visioni 5: 75-95.
—. 2016. «Alteridad como estado de creación». In Componer el plural, escena, cuerpo,
politica, edited by Victoria Pérez Royo and Diego Aguilló. 319-39.
Barcelona: Ediciones Polígrafa.
LEPECKI, André. 2006. Exhausting Dance: Performance and the Politics of Movement.
New York: Routledge.
—. 2010. «Planos de composição». In Criações e Contextos, edited by Christine Greiner,
Sónia Sobral and Cristina Espírito Santo. 13-22. São Paulo: Itaú Cultural.
LIPOVETSKY, Gilles and Jean Serroy. 2015. A Estetização do Mundo: Viver na era do
capitalismo artista. Translated by Eduardo Brandão.
São Paulo: Companhia das Letras.
MARX, Karl. 2011. Grundrisse, Manuscritos econômicos de 1857-1858: Esboços da
economia política. Translated by Mário Duayer. São Paulo: Boitempo.
MASSUMI, Brian. 2015a. Ontopower: War Powers and the State of Perception.
Durham: Duke University Press.
—. 2015b. The Power at the End of Economy. Durham: Duke University Press.
The ground
of the cities –
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A perfomance
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catalysis
Andrea Maciel
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Andrea Maciel in the performance O Chão das Cidades [The Ground of the Cities]
V Encontro Instituto Hemisférico de Performance – Centro, Belo Horizonte/MG, Brazil / Photograph: Lia Gladstone
The first time I fell down to the ground of a big city I wanted to becomes the catalyst for imaginary formations by the various urban
investigate first-hand the disconcerting vulnerability of the bodies cultures on the issue of social exclusion and vulnerability.
that surrender to gravity against the daily and urgent march that
characterises the productive life of a city. I fell down on Avenida I started by falling on the ground alone, but gradually sought other
Copacabana and someone leaned over me: peers. How many times have other bodies fallen with me in fear
or fearlessly? Performance companions, students, partners in that
“You alright?” disconcerting vulnerability of surrendering to the pavements and
“Yes, just trying the city from another angle.” to the movement of passers-by that pierces through us in every
possible way. The unexpected does happen: “I should be at work
To my pleasant surprise the undecipherable condition of my fallen by now. But I am not because you won’t get up. Get up woman.
body was also able to shift both the gravitational centre of the gaze That’s ungodly. We don’t have the right to question the destiny of
of passers-by and set in motion narratives and meaning creation man.” “Do we?!”
about the vulnerability of the fallen person. The countless times
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I fell on the grounds of different Brazilian cities I would enter in my Sharing the fall is a circle of intensities, which multiplies the angles
research journals how a falling body is a catalyst of aspects intrinsic for looking at city scenes while generating complicity around a
to local culture. state of corporeal listening. I have always understood that state
414 of listening as the essential condition to set off the catalysing 415
There are also countless stories to tell: plenty of sexual harassment; processes around us.
religious reactions, which linked the fallen body to drug use, deep
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depression, anxiety, a suicide attempt; plenty of associations with O Chão das Cidades taught me that to be on the streets is like
some sort of trick to make money and there were also aggressors, leaping into the void. For Yves Klein, “fires burn in the heart of
leering at the body that challenges the law of verticality, with the void as well as in the heart of man” (cited in Safatle 2015, 43).
accusations of laziness, procrastination, prostitution or ill- It is not a matter of calculating the fall, but letting oneself be taken
intentioned loitering. by the combustion in the process and learning its transforming
powers. The fall taught me the size, height and intensity of an
In our daily route across the city, we see beggars, mad people, action capable of transforming the spark of surrender into space-
men, women and children thrown on the ground under the stunned, catalysing combustions. Performance is a catalyst when it does not
or indifferent gaze of other city dwellers. It was precisely the focus on the act itself, but instead on that which the action sets in
indifference to these excluded bodies that spurred me to create motion, because: “catalysts act by setting off a new relational path,
this performance. The act is simple: surrender body weight to or accelerating reactions with minimal input energy” (Levenspiel,
the ground and remain open to the events that follow. Under the 1974, 33).
contingencies of the fall itself, the body opens up ways for new
meanings to touch the routine of going by unaffected, and it also
In the wake of many experiments, qualities of the senses that amplifies historical wounds and repressed conflicts. The performer’s
stimulate the catalysing effect came to the fore. We always mixed catalysing body screams, expiates, moulds, reveals and absorbs the
with people in areas of great circulation. We fell one by one, at powers of marginal dwellers. Public space catalysing performance
different times and away from each other to avoid a scene similar has always confronted me with the question: “What moves me?”
to a flash mob or street theatre. We never explained the reason I move because I want to stand in between – the unavoidable
for falling; we avoided any type of plastic or choreographic space of performance –, but above all to generate perceptions
representation, and let ourselves remain empty and flexible for the and affections in a world that is too fast to integrate our active
manifestation of the other. Remaining empty for the other to come perception and participation.
in is to cultivate the immanence and the courage of vagabonds who
learn the path at every new step.
We are pierced through by what does not belong to us and creates

a heteronomy between the corporeal impulses and the surface of
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the public space. Urban crises are revealed, as when we mixed with
the homeless of Piedade-Barris square, a place of urban violence in
Salvador da Bahia, and were attacked by the same private security
416 staff that daily beat up and mistreat those street-dwellers. 417
On that day, by mere chance, the homeless were with us behind the
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cameras, observing with detachment their own activity, which we
now had embodied. My body had fallen at the foot of some stairs
leading up to a street. Had it been the body of a street-dweller, it
would have certainly become invisible to passers-by, but because
it was the body of a white middle-class woman, daily invisibility
became visible at many levels. The security staff – who behaved as if
they owned the area – felt targeted by our critical action and made
it clear that if it had not been for the clothes and vocabulary they
would have expelled us like they do street-dwellers. Meanwhile, at
the top of the stairs, the street-dwellers witnessed their daily crisis
unfold amplified by the performance.
REFERENCES
Revealing crises install themselves between a body in an extreme LEVENSPIEL, Octave. 1974. Engenharia das Reações Químicas. São Paulo: Edgard Blücher.
situation and public space. The polyphony of surrounding voices SAFATLE, Vladimir. 2015. O Circuito dos Afetos. São Paulo: Cosac Naify.
PERFORMANCE,
ACTIVISM AND
PUBLIC SPHERE:
ARCHIVE, REPERTOIRE
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418
AND REPERFORMANCE 419
IN THE NEW NEW

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SOCIAL MOVEMENTS
Paulo Raposo
system. Just minutes before, she soaked her scarf in vinegar

to avoid the effects of tear gas fired by the police. These facts

were avoided in Kurt Andersen’s article that accompanied the
photograph. Nevertheless, in that same issue Time published
several photographs (by photo-reporter Peter Hapak) of dif-
ferent activists from across the world. Even despite the aes-
thetical stylizing of the protest/protester it is possible to find
particular elements: a strong presence of women and blacks,
which, although intergenerational, included mostly young peo-
ple, artists, the presence of digital technologies alongside loud-
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speakers, beaten up bodies and the remains of bullets/tear gas
SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND MEDIA IN A TIME canisters and faces covered in improvised masks.
OF UNCERTAINT Y AND INDETERMINACY
The media protagonism of the protester, even if sanitized or styl-
420 In 2001, Time Magazine chose the figure of the Protester for ized and absorbed by mainstream media logics in their search 421
person of the year, which was the cover story and the usual for anonymous protagonists or romantic heroes, does not hin-
global media circulation.1 Ted Soqui’s photograph, creatively der the dynamics of multiplication of “new spaces” of democra-
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recreated by renowned street artist Shapard Fairey (the same tization and indignation that spread across the globe from 2009
author of Barack Obama’s slogan-cartoon “Hope”), was of a onwards. This accompanied the cycle of global capitalism’s fi-
woman, Sarah Mason, 25, who belonged to the Occupy la, but nancial earthquakes and accentuated the so-called crisis of de-
some details were reworked and the anonymously presented mocracy or, to be more precise, of democratic representation.

face aimed at attaining a collective dimension. In fact, Sarah
was wearing a scarf around her face printed with the number To take the street became a performative movement with a new
“99%”, a symbol that emerged during the Occupy movement intensity, on a plane that was refined and intersected, and me-
in the us. The photograph was taken on the same day Sarah diated at the global, national and local scales. Which is to say,
was detained while participating in a human cordon opposite to take the street became a performative movement because, to a

Bank of America, Los Angeles, in protest against the financial large extent, political forms of protest and resistance grew from
performative gestures and actions that took on a very clear per-
1
Cf. Time Magazine, “2011 Person of the Year: The Protester”, content.time.com/time/
formatic tendency, i.e., occupation of public space or build-
person-of-the-year/2011/ ings, camps, creation of autonomous zones, using the bodies
as protagonists both of violence and peaceful resistance, or for unquestionable element of the current social and political
the presentation of political subjects, etc. On the other hand, to experience (2015, 14).
take the street consolidated as an intensely mediated movement,
resorting to the agitprop media and technologies of commu- For Innerarity (2010), uncertainty is an indicator of the qual-
nication in the digital era. John Downing (2001) had already ity of democratic spaces, which curiously has been emptied
explained the characteristics of radical media in processes of out of political debate dynamics, confined to parliaments,
social transformation and change that expanded the potential “closed rooms” or media debates (always peopled with spe-
for social movements to share and exchange information be- cialists and commentators). And, thus, the new social move-
yond the space allotted to them in conventional media: ments sought, among other dynamics of mobilization, hori-
zontal public meetings that become political performances in
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(...) there are also radical formats that are not technologi- themselves and where the distinct narratives under discussion
cally driven and expensive, such as graffiti, buttons, t-shirts, become themselves actions, instead of mere speeches, and are
song, street theater, performance art (...). subject to unpredictability and improvisation. The street has,
(Downing 2001, 51) therefore, acquired new meanings, and its landscape and its
422 territory take on another significance. It is now inhabited by 423
Clearly, Downing referred to a whole set of tactics and strategies those who, apparently, wish to become emancipated specta-
that emerged in late twentieth century political protest, especially tors – to use Jacques Ranciére’s metaphor (2010) – of the po-
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driven by the so-called anti- or alt- globalization movements. In litical theatre. This performative declaration, under the guise
that sense, the Seattle (1990) and Genoa (2002) protests were of an assembly or even an encampment, claims the right to re-
the apex of that process of combination of “analogic” forms inhabit public space as space for the construction of the public
(described above by Downing), so to speak, with digital modali- sphere and of the political debate, as well as the production of
ties (creation of independent platforms such as Indymedia, dif- democracy. And it is more than a symbolic act – it aims at pro-
fusion via fax, telephone, etc.). Julia Ruiz Di Giovanni (2015) ducing reality! Like John Austin’s or John Searle’s performa-
underlines this trend of continuity outlined above: tive utterances and speech acts, which are more than enuncia-
tions and actually are and do something, this new landscape of
In the years of transition from the twentieth to the twenty- the square also is and does something.
first century, in the context of the wave of demonstrations
of the so-called anti-globalization movement – which were Citizenship protests, which are considered inorganic, are also
always surrounded by a debate on their efficiency and le- clearly marked by indeterminacy, exploring a performative di-
gitimacy – a new vitality in street protests emerged as an mension that allows us to speak of a sort of performance activ-
ism, as Richard Schechner2 recently suggested, classifying it as ments. If we choose visual images and representations of that
a new third world of people that relate at a fundamentally per- correspondence mediated by digital technologies, it is likely
formative, rather than ideological, level. Which is to say, while that we may also need to redefine the agency of that digital
nineteenth and twentieth century activisms had a fundamental- activism, in the sense of including a new framework in which
ly ideological basis, focusing mostly on political rights and eco- causality and indeterminacy, intention and event are not the
nomic inequalities, contemporary activism seems to add this two sides of the same coin, but rather an in-between interface
radically relational dimension – i.e., a collaborative social pro- (cf. Abreu 2013). One of the relevant dimensions was its con-
cess of discovery and creation of new ideas, new roles, new rela- stitution through Internet resources and applications, namely
tionships and new activities. A field, therefore, for the emerging the use of digital agitprop through postings and images spread
of a milieu de mémoire (Pierre Nora) or a repertoire of incorporat- through social networks, live streaming of assemblies, meet-
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ed performative practices, as proposed by Diana Taylor (2003), ings, occupations or other forms of protest. Precarious and
and built by the indeterminacy of a performative here and now, as blurred archives of images were produced very rapidly and for
outlined by Performance Studies theoreticians. consumption at the global scale. Image-making processes with
alternative media were constantly uploaded onto commercial
424 But precisely for Schechner, this performance activism would platforms and social networks, but also onto independent plat- 425
be guided by some principles, those, in fact, which are at the forms. This enabled the assemblies in the squares of Madrid,
basis of his definition of performance. In a 1995 text, outlin- Lisbon or Athens (Syntagma) to be seen, in real time or not,
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ing the performative dimension of street protests, Schechner in São Paulo and Wall Street, and for them to become the rhi-
considered that “(…) to allow people to assemble in the streets zomes of global protest. However, we should not reduce this
is always to flirt with the possibility of improvisation – that the process to a struggle for meaning and sense, but should also
unexpected might happen” (1995, 47). try to perceive that new temporality – made of uncertainty and
indeterminacy – in terms of technological and media appro-
Moreover, in the era of digital capitalism we witness the emer- priations. To my mind, that new temporality unfolded with the
gence of a digital activism (cf. Joyce 2010) marking the corre- “September 11” effect, when the narratives of threat and ter-
spondence between the notion of uncertainty (generated around ror justified the plate armouring of the future in terms of peo-
the economic crisis narrative) and the notion of (technologi- ple’s mobility and citizenship rights (along with the austerity
cal) indeterminacy in the protests of the new new social move- measures to overcome the “crisis”). In fact, based on a projec-
tion of a threatening future marked by terror, the uncertainty
2
Proposed at a seminar during the 2012 Performing the World Conference
and indeterminacy of protests in squares, which were repeat-
(cf. performingtheworld.org/past-conferences/(2012-2). edly described as having been created in social networks, also
seemed to materialize a performatic matrix of the revolution; on the democratization of technological usage. Communica-
a matrix of the here and now that does not shed any light on the tion processes in social movements obviously articulate with
roads that led to those squares. Therefore, indeterminacy and a technological framework. Since the early 1980s, thanks to
uncertainty seem to have contributed to the much-vaunted the telefax, the global explosion of electronic mail and the in-
end of History.3 ternautic forums of the 1990s, the blogosphere and the crea-
tion of Indymedia in the late 1990s, the advent of Facebook
(2004), YouTube (2005) and Twitter (2006), all these techni-
cal upgrades, together with the expansion of the diy spirit, had
DIGITAL ACTIVISM: a fundamental impact on our way of relating and communi-
THE HERE AND NOW OF A NEW TEMPORALIT Y cating contemporaneously and, therefore, on the way in which
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social movements communicate with, mobilize and nurture
One of the most recurring ideas in media studies of social political resistance communities.
movements is linked to a boom in the use of information and
communication technologies, which supposedly modified the Dan Schiller (2005) states that the Internet, and the large
426 dialogue and relationships between people on a global scale.4 telecommunications systems on which it is based, is a con- 427
In fact, there has been a revolution in media formats and the sequence of an increasing transnational change in economic
technologies that lead them, and that has changed our lives. activity. Capitalism has always been an international system,
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In recent years, global movements have produced new public but, since its globalization in the 1990s, its trends have created
spheres in which the distinction between “real” and “virtual” a new model for economic and financial flows. Cyberspace has
seem to vanish. And this is a common utterance to define the unmistakably been included in those flows, in that new supra-
relationship between media and social movements in contem- national market, which in fact has been colonized by digital
poraneity. But in fact, this truism on media revolutions is some- capitalism. Also for that reason, I am quite sceptical as to the
how exhausted because we could go back at least forty years to cybernetic potential of the Internet as an open and democratic
recognize this trend and reflect (in a critical or optimistic way) hi-tech paradise for the sharing of information.5
3
A concept developed by American philosopher and economist Francis Fukuyama. It first
appeared in a 1989 article that was followed by a 1992 book titled The End of History and
Although there has been a growing debate on web activism
the Last Man. Looking into mostly Hegelian readings of history, Fukuyama claimed that (or even on hacktivism), as well as on the efficiency of new me-
capitalism and representative democracy were the crowning of humankind’s history in the
face of crumbling fascisms and socialisms.
4 5
Together with John Dawsey, I have organized a dossier on digital activism (cf. Raposo and On this and other matters, cf. the critical review of the arguments under discussion in
Dawsey, 2015). McChesney (2013).
dia usage by contemporary social movements, a core idea re- Another vector of analysis concerns the computational basis
mains: radical media (Downing 2001), such as Indymedia and nature of communication between these new social move-
other activist hubs seem to play an important role in the emer- ments. The messages and images of so-called cyberprotest are
gence of a certain type of counterculture. However, another hyperdynamic, appearing and disappearing without warning,
question prevails: will so-called social networks provide spaces distributed across multiple related or unrelated sites, social
for critical perspectives and for radical or countercultural nar- network groups, virtual forums or communities. The way that
ratives? What is the role of mainstream media in social move- contemporary activism resorts to digital technologies, practic-
ments and how fluid is the interrelation between alternative es hacktivism, creates networks or physically manifests emerg-
and mainstream media? (cf. Askanius and Gustafsson 2010). ing political ideas could be considered a blurred genre, to use
the term in the sense of anthropologist Clifford Geertz.6
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One of the most famous examples used in this debate is the origi-
nal adoption of the Internet in the 1990s by indigenous Zapatista Moreover, contemporary social movements, coexisting in this
movement ezln in Chiapas, which Castells (1999) or Cleaver temporality of uncertainty and indeterminacy, can change
(1995; 1999) saw as a “prototype” for other movements. How- shape, name, strategy or appearance, or even vanish without
428 ever, although the Internet allowed the new social movements trace. Therefore, cyberprotest is a fuzzy category, a phenome- 429
to appropriate the means to produce new expressions of protest, non that is fluid to the observer and often without clear bound-
they also remained faithful to traditional tactics that had proved aries (cf. Van De Donk et al. 2004). Juris (2005) examines how
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efficient in the past and could be adapted to this new virtual envi- these activists use a range of communication resources (email
ronment (Meikle 2002). Strikes, demonstrations, occupation of lists, webpages, open editing software) to organize and coordi-
the public space or of institutions, mob-protest, pamphlets, post- nate actions and share information, reflecting a general growth
ers, radical radio and tv channels, assemblies or rallies are tactical of a paradigm or model for digital collaboration and sharing:
means that prove vital in the political performances of contem-
porary insurgency. This is true of the recent Brazilian case, with Indymedia has provided an online forum for posting audio,
school occupations by high-school students, or the occupation video, and text files, while activists have also created tem-
of Ministry of Culture delegations by artists and arts and cul- porary media hubs to generate alternative information, ex-
ture collectives. These bring together mechanisms that were once periment with new technologies, and exchange ideas and
described as highly dangerous (nineteenth century proletarian resources. Influenced by anarchism and peer-to-peer net-
and anarchist occupation of factories) and the digital tactics that
spread the news of these occupations in real time preventing, 6
Geertz proposed an anthropology in which the divide between the literary and non-
hindering or delaying the violent suppression of protests. literary, fictional and realist, artistic and scientific genres would increasingly blur.
working logics, anti–corporate globalization activists have balization and of a new worldwide political-economic scenar-
not only incorporated digital technologies as concrete io, or rather, of a collective awakening to its socially fracturing,
tools, they have also used them to express alternative po- fragmenting and disrupting effects.
litical imaginaries based on an emerging network ideal.
(Juris 2005, 189) Somehow, the recent revolts across the world, linked to the
effects of the financial crisis, particularly after 2009, could be
Thus, open publishing, free software sharing and live streaming seen as replica of those primordial, turn of the millennium
have become three relevant dimensions of media performance scenes, countering the reading that mainstream media tried
in contemporary social movements. This means that the pos- to impart of a spontaneous gathering of protesting crowds.
sibility for shared writing and collaborative commentary on This time, however, the technological elements in a digital
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activist digital platforms, the development of software outside world have repositioned this reading. Curiously, these revolts
the large corporations or the sharing and uploading of infor- have not only been televised in alternative channels and in
mation without a password or login are now strong trumps for mainstream channels, but they were also published across the
so-called independent movements. And, last but not least, the Internet, especially on Facebook and Twitter. The question
430 spamming of live streaming-produced images in independent that seems to take hold of our minds is ironic and paradoxical, 431
or mainstream platforms has become a crucial arena in the and it appeared on one of the posters of Wall Street protest-
struggle for information and “truth”, a true political hashtag ers during the occupation of Zuccotti Square: “The revolution
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or a detonator for constant political reenactments, as we shall will not be televised, but will it be downloaded?”
see below.
As I have mentioned previously, the new new social move-
ments stand out for their recurring use of digital information
and communication technologies. The Indymedia digital plat-
POLITICAL HASHTAG AND REPERFORMANCE form emerged with the 1999 Seattle protests; but the use of
IN CONTEMPORARY POLITICAL PROTEST Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, not to mention live stream
broadcasting and free communication platforms, turned the
Edgar Morin (1999) would say that if the twentieth century protests and messages of contemporary activism into a com-
ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the twenty-first bination of street protests, civil disobedience actions and in-
century had started in Seattle. Seattle 1999, along with the tense digital activism. Thus, documentation and archive are
Prague protests in 2000 and Genoa in 2001, could somehow not separate levels of the performative repertoires of contem-
be seen as the stages and primordial scenes of alternative glo- porary activism, to borrow Taylor’s (2003) concepts; in fact,
they never were, but now they are and with an unprecedented umentation methods (film or photography), which, accord-
scale and intensity. For Joyce (2010) the power of the digital ing to her, can never recreate what it is to watch/participate
code manifests when someone posts a piece of content and in a performance and, therefore, prefers the experiential di-
uploads it, and a copy (with variations) becomes immediately mension, the liveness (on which Phelan vehemently insisted).
available and transmissible to the world. Live streaming is one But to reperform is not to repeat, reproduce or simulate; reen-
of the branches of this empowerment of the digital code. actment is an invitation to transformation through memory
and history, and it generates unique results and resonances.
And this directs us towards the final question: are we talking For instance, Yoko Ono’s performance Cut Piece was reper-
about live performance or its mediatization? Or both? What formed by the artist countless times, each time taking on new
temporality opens up in this digital here and now? meanings and resonances for the artist and its participants.
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In Seven Easy Pieces (2005), Abramović sought to reperform
At the turn of the millennium, a concept/practice has emerged five key artist pieces that she had never watched but which
in the field of performance art: the notion of reperformance had influenced her own work. She recreated one of her per-
or reenactment. Reperformance is the reenactment of a performances and introduced an original performance, claiming
432 formance that nevertheless requires new enactment condi- that in doing so she was opening possibilities for reinterpreta- 433
tions (audience, context) for the reinvention of the “original tion in the present.
performance”. Reperformance finds itself contaminated by an
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interpretative or re-interpretative intention. Many performers Auslander (2006) clarifies that performative documenting,
now resort to it as a significant part of their creative processes. especially in the field of performance art, has always existed.
For years, Alan Kaprow, the creator of late 1950s happenings, He suggested two models: documental and theatrical. In the
thought that to re-enact his seminal performances would defi- former, performers use means of recording that basically ar-
nitely contaminate their indeterminacy. However, weeks be- chive the event; in the latter, the recording itself becomes per-
fore his death, he authorized Munich’s Haus der Kunst to re- formance. Auslander resorts to two examples, Chris Burden’s
make his happenings, namely, 18 Happenings in 6 Parts (1959), performance Shoot (1971), for which he invited a friend to shoot
directed by André Lepecki. him in a Californian art gallery before a small audience, film-
ing and recording the moment (the documentation being all
Marina Abramović, Yoko Ono and other artists who emerged that was left of the performance); and Yves Klein’s Leap into the
already in the 1970s have invested in reperformance as a way Void (1960), in which the artist leapt from a roof over a Parisian
of leaving a trace of performance events for a wider audience. street and was photographed; the photograph itself (although it
Abramović claims she is not satisfied with traditional doc- was a photomontage) becoming the performative object.
It is also in this sense that the notions of documentation (or appropriation and caring, re-learning and resisting, which all
archive) and performance enactment (or repertoire) of con- fall under the expression “to reclaim”. Not to say it is “ours”,
temporary political protests interlink. They are categorized not to think of ourselves as victims of lost conquests or of a
according to a conceptualization developed by Diana Taylor Machiavellian system, but to enable us to once again inhabit
(2003). She considers the archive as the collection of material the wastelands of human experience generated by contempo-
traces of objectified culture, such as texts and monuments, rary capitalism. This is what intellectuals such as Slavoj Žižek,
while repertoire consists of the performative enactments of Antonio Negri, Zygmunt Bauman, Manuel Castells, Eduar-
embodied memories. do Galiano, Saskia Sassen and Boaventura de Sousa Santos
have in mind when describing the Arab Spring, the Indignados
The concept of live streaming is based on the generic real- Movements of citizens in the Iberian Peninsula or the outbreak
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time broadcasting of any event, but its consumption and view- of the so-called Occupy movement, as places for experimenta-
ing may or may not be simultaneous with their enactment. tion and emancipation.
However, the most interesting aspect is that, broadly speaking,
with the massive live streaming circulation of pieces or im- To end this text, I would like to mention just a few examples of
434 ages of political actions, these become viral and replicate in the reperformativity effect manifest in the contemporary dy- 435
different contexts. They are reinterpreted and, in that sense, namics of protest, which results in a redefinition of the per-
reperformed. Live streamer has become a profession within the formative here and now. In Portugal, the “Grandoladas” (an
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activist community, in the same way that as alternative plat- allusion to the song associated with the 1974 Carnation Revo-
forms, peer-to-peer digital environments or fee-software mul- lution) chanted across the country in protest against members
tiply and are shared; laptops and mobile phones are a constant of the government or controversial figures, in the period of se-
visual presence in protests. This urges us to think of cyberac- verest government imposed austerity (2011-2014), exemplify
tivism and hacktivism as a crucial dimension of contemporary this phenomenon; generated after the protest in the galleries of
political struggle. the Parliament by members of the collective Que se lixe a Troika
[Fuck the Troika] during a speech by the then Prime-minister
For these new new social movements, digital revolution is Pedro Passos Coelho, it was replicated in several events across
about global sharing and calls for reenactment as a key con- the country whenever members of the government or other
cept of a new form of agitprop. Like the occupation or taking controversial public figures spoke or officiated in ribbon-cut-
over of streets and squares, the hacktivist notion of open access ting ceremonies. This model is a derivation of the Argentinian
is not so much of the order of “re-conquest” – a term used by escrache during the military regime, or of the more recent ac-
Guattari –, but is instead irreducibly linked to notions of re- tions by the activists of 15m in Spain. The encampments of
Indignados in Madrid and Barcelona were replicated in other ism whose main dimension is relational, we should also in-
Spanish cities and inspired events in other cities across Europe clude in that process the dimension that represents the digital
and the Americas, while Occupy Wall Street generated a wave flow. And, within this flow, performative imponderability and
in hundreds of us cities. Another example is the solidary pro- its reperformative fluctuation are made of contaminations and
tests against police violence and repression that echo in other reinterpretations. For contemporary activism, archive, reper-
cities and countries. The arrest of the Russian activists of punk toire, performance and reperformance are key words to un-
band Pussy Riot caused a multiplication of actions around the derstand it, as much as indeterminacy and uncertainty seem
world whose key element was their coloured balaclava. to be the outlines of its temporality.
Somehow, this effect is similar to an earthquake, except that Somehow, those key words clarify what Martin (2015) refers
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the aftershock may in some cases be stronger than the initial to as the possibility of existence of a contemporary political
tremor. It is an effect that touches on the strategies and tactics theatre qua public sphere of social experiments, despite the
of contemporary activism, especially in the case of these new fact that this author is particularly concerned with documental
new social movements, and which I have been defining as the theatre and verbatim.
436 hashtag effect. 437
This was the itinerary of compromise between art and politics
Hashtag is the mathematical symbol (cardinal) used in Twitter that we have laid out here, somehow seeking not to compro-
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in combination with a key word to designate a given subject mise art, or politics, and acknowledging what both can gener-
and the postings that refer to it. The same hashtag connects ate in common and what are the flows of concatenation that
several authors and allows for the reading, anywhere in the constitute them.
world, of the list of postings linked to it. For instance: #ows or
#queselixeatroika, #15m or #yosoy132 are facilitators of com-
munication. Political digital activism has increased the use of
narrative performative strategies to facilitate conversation in
what could be deemed a political hashtag operating according
to the logics of reperformance/reenactment. But to reperform
is not to repeat, reproduce or simulate; reperformance is an
invitation to transformation through memory and history, and
it generates unique results and resonances. Therefore, if we
are dealing, as Schechner claimed, with a performance activ-
REFERENCES
ABREU, Maria José de. 2013. «Technological Indeterminacy». Anthropological Theory 13 RAPOSO, Paulo and John Dawsey. 2015. «dossiê Artivismo: poéticas e performances
(3): 267-84. políticas na rua e na rede | Artivism: poetics and political performances on streets
ASKRANIUS, Tina and Nils Gustafsson. 2010. «Mainstreaming the Alternative: and on web». In Cadernos de Arte e Antropologia 4 (2).
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AUTOR
AUTHORS
AUTOR
440 441
CAPÍTULO
CAPÍTULO
ANA PAIS is a FCT postdoctoral fellow at CET – Centro de Es-
tudos de Teatro at the University of Lisbon/FLUL and McGill
University, dramaturge and curator. She is the author of Dis-
course of Complicité. Contemporary Dramaturgies (Colibri,
2004) and Affective Rhythms in the Performing Arts (Colibri,
2018). From 2005 to 2010, she was assistant professor at Es-
cola Superior de Teatro e Cinema, Lisbon. She has worked as
theatre critic in the most distinguished Portuguese newspa-
pers, as a dramaturge in both theatre and dance projects in
Portugal, and as curator of several discursive practice events.
ANDREA MACIEL is a choreographer, performer and dancer.

ANA BIGOTTE VIEIRA is a historian, cultural critic, dramaturge Her work investigates the physical resonance of space in ur-
and curator. Her Ph.D research, recently awarded with an Hon- ban landscapes through dance, performance and installations.
ourable Mention in Contemporary History by the Mário Soares Ph.D in Performing Arts by PPGAC-UNIRIO with a research
Foundation, focuses on the cultural transformation in Portu- period in the Performance Studies Department (NYU) as a
gal after the country joined the European Union in the 1980s, visiting scholar. She has conducted several research groups
442 443
particularly on the performative role played by the opening of in the field of Performance and Public Space to undergradu-
the Modern Art Museum. She is a researcher at IHC– Instituto ate and postgraduate students at the Universities of Bristol,
de História Contemporânea/UNL and CET – Centro de Estu- New York, Rio de Janeiro and Bahia. She was a lecturer at
dos de Teatro/FLUL. Together with choreographer João dos the Department of Theatre at PUC-Rio and University of the
Santos Martins, she is currently working on project of collec- City for over ten years.
tive historicization of Portuguese New Dance.
CARLA CRUZ is a London-based artist whose ongoing pro-
ANA BORRALHO & JOÃO GALANTE met while studying vis- ject All My Independent Women experiments with forms of
ual arts at AR.CO and worked together regularly in the 1990s collectivity, the erasure of authorship and practices that take
as actors/co-creators with renowned Portuguese physical place outside, and in defiance of, the mainstream art system.
theatre group Olho. Since 2001, they have been working to- Carla’s research has resulted in the genesis of a communi-
gether on performance art, dance, installation, photography, ty cultural centre in Guimarães, in rural northern Portugal
sound and video art projects. Since 2004, their work has (RASTILHO). Carla holds a practiced based Ph.D from Gold-
been featured worldwide at international festivals. They are smiths University of London; she has recently completed the
also artistic directors/curators of the live art festival Verão residency Finding Money at Open School East, London; she is
Azul (Lagos/Portugal), and former co-curators of the elec- an AHRC funded Research Associate for Goldsmiths, based
tronic music festival Electrolegos (Lagos/Portugal). at the community centre The Mill.
casabranca-ac.com/en carlacruz.net/category/project
CHRISTINE GREINER is professor in the Graduate Program ELEONORA FABIÃO is a performance artist and theorist.
of Communication and Semiotics and in the Undergraduate She has been performing in the streets, lecturing, conduct-
Course of Communication and Performing Arts at PUC – the ing workshops and publishing internationally. In 2011, she re-
Catholic University of São Paulo, Brazil. She is head of the ceived the Arts in the Streets’ Award from the Brazilian Na-
Asian Studies Center. She is the author of Leituras do Corpo tional Foundation of the Arts, and in 2014 the Rumos Itaú
no Japão (2015), Corpo em Crise (2010) and O Corpo. Pistas Cultural Grant that resulted in the publication of the book
para Estudos Indisciplinares (2005) and of several articles on AÇÕES/ACTIONS (Rio de Janeiro: Tamanduá Arte, 2015). Fa-
performing arts, Japanese culture and body studies. bião is a professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
– Theatre Directing Undergraduate Program and Arts of the
Scene Graduate Program where she chairs the artistic ex-
CHRISTOF MIGONE is an artist, teacher, curator, and writer. perimentation wing – and holds a Ph.D in Performance Stud-
He often works with language, voice, bodies, performance, ies (New York University).
intimacy, complicity, repetition and endurance. A book com-
piling his writings on sound art, Sonic Somatic: Performances IDALINA CONDE is Professor and researcher at ISCTE-IUL
of the Unsound Body was published in 2012 by Errant Bodies University Institute of Lisbon. Ph.D in sociology with speciali-
Press. He currently lives in Toronto and is an assistant profes- zation on art and culture (including biography, memoir and
sor in the Department of Visual Arts at Western University in visual studies). Author of numerous papers and a regular at-
444 445
London, Ontario. tendant at national and international conferences. She has
christofmigone.com participated in European projects, namely those of ERICarts
– The European Institute for Comparative Cultural Research.
DAVID HELBICH has been living and working in Brussels since She is preparing several publications, among which a book on
2002. His works take place on stages, on paper, online and contemporary Europe from a cultural perspective.
in the public space. A recurrent interest is the understand-
ing of an audience as active individuals and the search for ISABEL NOGUEIRA completed a Ph.D in Fine Arts/Sciences
an opening up of experiences in socially and artistically re- of Art (University of Lisbon) and concluded a Posdoctoral
stricted spaces. Many of his concepts around physical and programme in History and Theory of Contemporary Art (Uni-
social experiences are presented in score-books as well as versity of Coimbra and Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne/
in live performances and installations. They have been re- Arts Plastiques et Sciences de l’Art). She is a contemporary
cently presented at Martin-Gropius-Bau (Berlin), Palais de art historian, art critic, professor and writer. Recent books
Tokyo (Paris), Café Oto (London) and UnionDocs (New York), (essay): Teoria da Arte no Século XX (Imprensa da UC, 2012;
among others. 2nd ed. 2014); Théorie de l’Art au XXe Siècle (L’Harmattan,
davidhelbich.blogspot.com 2013); Artes Plásticas e Crítica em Portugal nos anos 70 e 80
(Imprensa da UC, 2013; 2nd ed. 2015), Modernidade Avulso
(A Ronda da Noite, 2014); A Imagem no Enquadramento do
Desejo (Book Builders, 2016).
JEN HARVIE is professor of Contemporary Theatre and Per- PAULO RAPOSO is an anthropologist, professor in the De-
formance at Queen Mary University of London. Her research partment of Anthropology of the Lisbon University Institute
focuses on cultural politics, with emphases on neoliberalism (ISCTE-IUL) and researcher at CRIA – Research Centre in An-
and feminism. Her monographs include Fair Play – Art, Per- thropology. Former Coordinator and teacher at the Labora-
formance and Neoliberalism (2013), Theatre & the City (2009), tory of Visual Cultures (CRIA). His research on cultural perfor-
Staging the UK (2005), and The Routledge Companion to mances and artivism has appeared in several publications in
Theatre and Performance (co-author, second ed. 2014). She books and journals. He is the author of Behind the Mask. Es-
co-edited Making Contemporary Theatre: International Re- say on Anthropology of Performance (2011) and co-authored
hearsal Processes (2010) and The Only Way Home Is Through No Performance’s Land? Dialogues between Performance
the Show: Performance Work of Lois Weaver (2015). For Con- and Anthropology (2014).
temporary Theatre Review, she has co-edited special issues performanceandme.wordpress.com
on globalization (2006) and the London (2012) Olympics and
Paralympics (2013). PEGGY PHELAN is a performance theorist and the Ann O’Day
soundcloud.com/user-148494537 Maples Professor of Theater & Performance Studies and Eng-
sed.qmul.ac.uk/staff/harviej.html lish at Stanford University. Publishing widely in both book and
essay form, Phelan is the author of Unmarked: the Politics
JOÃO MACDONALD has been a culture journalist since 1994. of Performance (Routledge, 1993); Mourning Sex: Performing
446 447
He was press officer at the European Parliament, Brussels, Public memories (Routledge, 1997); and editor and contribu-
from 2009 to 2014. He has worked for several Portuguese tor to Live Art in Los Angeles (Routledge, 2012). Phelan is also
newspapers and as a reporter for TV art shows. He was ex- co-editor of Acting Out: Feminist Performances (University
ecutive editor for the Lisbon Cultural Agenda and TV culture of Michigan Press, 1993) and The Ends of Performance (New
programme Câmara Clara (RTP 2), a position he currently York University Press, 1997).
holds at Up, TAP Air Portugal inflight magazine. He is working
on a biography of Portuguese artist Santa Rita Pintor. REBECCA SCHNEIDER is professor of Theatre Arts and Per-
formance Studies at Brown University. She is also currently a
LILIANA COUTINHO is a researcher and curator, head of co-principal investigator for the Mellon project, “Dance Stud-
discursive practices programme at Culturgest (Lisbon). She ies In/And the Humanities.” She is the author of The Explicit
holds a Ph.D in Aesthetics and Sciences of Art, from Univer- Body in Performance (l997); Performing Remains: Art and
sity Paris 1, and is a researcher at Institut A.C.T.E – Université War in Times of Theatrical Reenactment (2011), and Theatre
Paris 1 /CNRS and IHC – Instituto de História Contemporânea/ and History (2014) as well as editor and author of antholo-
UNL. She has published nationally and internationally. Guest gies, essays, and journal special issues. She lectures widely
Professor at the Curatorial Studies post-graduation, Univer- on time-based art, matters touching inter(in)animation, the
sidade Nova de Lisboa, and at the Masters of Global Affaires affective turn, historical materialism and the new materialism
/ Universidad Rey Juan Carlos I. in performance, and feminist and race-critical theory.
RUI MOURÃO is an artist and researcher. He studied Arts in SILVIA PINTO COELHO is a choreographer, dancer and re-
UAB and CECC (Barcelona), Maumaus (Lisbon) and Malmö Art searcher. She holds a Ph.D in Communication Sciences and
Academy (Sweden). He holds a Postgraduate in Digital Visual Arts. She has been developing her professional activity as
Cultures and Masters in Anthropology, both at ISCTE (Lisbon). a choreographer, dancer and performer since 1996. She
He is doing a Ph.D in Artistic Studies at Universidade Nova produced, choreographed and participated in several cho-
de Lisboa. He presented a film at Portuguese Cinematheque reographic research processes, in live performances and in
(nominee for Best Documentary in QueerLisboa Cinema Fes- films with artists from different fields. She presented her
tival – 2013). He did several performances, conference com- own choreographic work in Portugal, Germany, and Spain.
munications and art residencies and has presented dozens of Sílvia has been teaching dance classes since 1996. Cur-
video installations in more than 50 exhibitions in 16 countries. rently, she teaches the seminar “Dance in Context” at the
Performing Arts MA in FCSH – Faculdade Ciências Sociais e
SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS holds a Ph.D in Language and So- Humanas/UNL).
cial Practices (School of Arts and Humanities/Centre for So-
cial Studies, University of Coimbra). She is a researcher at
CLP – Centre of Portuguese Literature – University of Co-
imbra and Assistant Professor (Polytechnic Institute of Beja).
She specializes in experimental literature, performance art,
448 449
and the Portuguese 1980s. Her current research areas are:
performativity, intermediality, performance and the archive,
experimental literature and contemporary Portuguese liter-
ature and history. She is also a poet and performer.
SEVI BAYRAKTAR is a Ph.D candidate in Culture and Perfor-

mance in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance
at UCLA. Her research links social dance and politics in Tur-
key. Her recent studies about dance in the context of social
movements have been presented in national and internation-
al conferences. She completed her B.A. in Political Science
and M.A. in Sociology at Boğazici University, Istanbul. She is
also a dancer, facilitating international workshops on Turkish
and Balkan dances with a critical emphasis on the relation-
ship between dance and identity politics.
terraroman.com

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Performance

SPONSORS INTRODUCTION AND EDITION

DESIGN AND WEBSITE

ARTICLE ARTIST PAGE ARTICLE

ARTICLE ARTIST PAGE ARTICLE

DETERRITORIALIZATION 1910s–1920s ARTICLE

10 “After Trump, we must begin”, said Alain Badiou speaking 11

Ana Pais subjectivity” insofar as the “destiny of human beings is more

This ebook is a version of the printed paperback Performance

AND PUBLIC SPACE

in and among architectures that script comportment, relation,

enactment (whether ancient or as contemporary as a traffic

about a public(ity) potentially less bounded by sovereign na-

tional borders or logics of capital that flow across those bor-

I’d like to start my talk by lifting out a score of one of David

necessarily haunted by the fundamentally conjoined operation

Instead, when the “new social movements” fighting against

››› Guerreiro Dias p.104

››› Bayraktar p.180

››› Pinto Coelho p.325

››› Greiner p.381

Such is the contrast between expectant and problematic re-

Beyond the literal warmongering, the apology for war using

as aesthetics, as depiction – as occupying a place in the sensible –

BRAIDOTTI, Rosi. 1994. Nomadic Subjects: Embodiment and Sexual Difference in

Sandra Guerreiro Dias

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

››› Greiner p.388

››› Conde p.70

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

Aside from Teoria da Indiferença [Theory of Indifference]

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

SANDRA GUERREIRO DIAS

Finish with this one:

Go to another heater, on another floor and repeat the phrase.

Consider the changes of the sound reflections as micro-changes.

COLLECTIVE EVENTS 131

AND PUBLIC SPACE

As for Grupo Puzzle, it was born in Porto, in December 1975,

I think that underneath the whole activity of the Group there

››› Coutinho p.270

››› Raposo p.421

››› Bayraktar p.180

››› Harvie p.211

enable combat in ways that matter, to fight subverting the logic of

I am searching and I will continue to search. By means of each

urban space required both mobility and immobility because

››› Greiner p.388

Standing in stillness as a modern performance technique was