Performance (in) ecology: A practice-based approach

Hopfinger, Sarah (2017) Performance (in) ecology: A practice-based approach. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Full text available as:
[thumbnail of 2017HopfingerPhD.pdf] PDF
Download (75MB)
[thumbnail of Age-Old Full Length] Multimedia file (Age-Old Full Length)
Download (1GB)
[thumbnail of Clip 1 Enactment and Representation, Animal Improvisation] Multimedia file (Clip 1 Enactment and Representation, Animal Improvisation)
Download (62MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 2 Immanent Authorship, Mountain Movements] Multimedia file (Clip 2 Immanent Authorship, Mountain Movements)
Download (58MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 3 Betweens Leading, Flying with Bags] Multimedia file (Clip 3 Betweens Leading, Flying with Bags)
Download (163MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 4 Nonhuman in Human, Bags and Carragh] Multimedia file (Clip 4 Nonhuman in Human, Bags and Carragh)
Download (51MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 5 Unpredictability, Bags, Carragh and Sarah] Multimedia file (Clip 5 Unpredictability, Bags, Carragh and Sarah)
Download (56MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 1 Practice-as-Research, Issues of Translating Theory into Practice] Multimedia file (Clip 1 Practice-as-Research, Issues of Translating Theory into Practice)
Download (32MB)
[thumbnail of Wild Life Full Length] Multimedia file (Wild Life Full Length)
Download (1GB)
[thumbnail of Clip 2 Wilding Performance Containers, Feeling Faces] Multimedia file (Clip 2 Wilding Performance Containers, Feeling Faces)
Download (3MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 3 Wilding Performance Containers, Playing with Boundaries] Multimedia file (Clip 3 Wilding Performance Containers, Playing with Boundaries)
Download (40MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 4 Wilding Performance Containers, All Messy Hair] Multimedia file (Clip 4 Wilding Performance Containers, All Messy Hair)
Download (61MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 5 Vibrant Humans and Nonhumans, Water Fight] Multimedia file (Clip 5 Vibrant Humans and Nonhumans, Water Fight)
Download (106MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 6 Working With and As Vibrant Matter, Sliding Stones] Multimedia file (Clip 6 Working With and As Vibrant Matter, Sliding Stones)
Download (34MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 7 The Agency of Practice, Interpretation Practices] Multimedia file (Clip 7 The Agency of Practice, Interpretation Practices)
Download (57MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 8 The Agency of Practice, Leaping and Being Leapt] Multimedia file (Clip 8 The Agency of Practice, Leaping and Being Leapt)
Download (15MB)
[thumbnail of Clip 9 Over General Instruction, Bending] Multimedia file (Clip 9 Over General Instruction, Bending)
Download (11MB)
Printed Thesis Information: https://eleanor.lib.gla.ac.uk/record=b3370804

Abstract

This thesis develops an ecological performance practice using a practice-as-research methodology. It explores how performance can engage the ecological, where performance (in process and product) is understood as an ecology of diverse humans and nonhumans, which participates within the wider ecology of Earth. Whilst recent publications have given sustained attention to the ways performance can respond to ecological imperatives (Allen and Preece, 2015; Heddon and Mackey, 2012; Bottoms, Franks and Kramer, 2012; Arons and May, 2011; Kershaw, 2007; Bottoms and Goulish, 2007), there has been scarce attention paid to how performance practices and creative process can be and do ecology. In attending to that gap, this research develops a critically-engaged practice of performance (in) ecology, exploring how performance – in its very methods, modes and live moments of practice – can enact the ecological.

The project developed an ecological practice through intergenerational and professional-nonprofessional collaboration. It was led by two performance works – Age-Old (2013) and Wild Life (2014). Age-Old involved collaborating with a seven-year-old girl to co-devise a new performance and it formed a developmental period of the research inquiry from which key methods were taken into the more ambitious work, Wild Life. This performance explored ‘wildness’ and was a collaboration with eight professional and nonprofessional performers, aged between nine and 60 years old. It presents the main body of the research. The written component of the thesis frames and elucidates the practice-based research findings. The thesis proposes that involving collaborators of diverse ages and skills presents a dynamic performance ecology through which an inclusive ecological practice can be developed. Its claim is that collaborative practice offers a potentially radical enactment of ecological qualities and dynamics, where this enactment is the ‘wilding’ of performance.

Conducted through a Collaborative Doctoral Award from the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the project was supported by Catherine Wheels Theatre Company. It offers new approaches for practice and scholarship in the fields of performance and ecology, devised performance, movement and ecology, and intergenerational practice. It also contributes to wider meanings of ‘ecology’ as advanced by scientific views, including posthumanist and rewilding perspectives.

Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
Qualification Level: Doctoral
Additional Information: Fully-funded via an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award (CDA) between the University of Glasgow and Catherine Wheels Theatre Company.
Keywords: Performance, ecology, ecological performance, intergenerational, nonprofessional performers, devised theatre, devised performance, collaboration, dance, ecological movement, ecological dance, participatory performance, environmentalism, children's theatre, child performers, wilding performance, ecological art, live art, contemporary performance, new materialism, posthumanism, re-wilding.
Subjects: N Fine Arts > NX Arts in general
P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN2000 Dramatic representation. The Theater
Colleges/Schools: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Culture and Creative Arts > Theatre Film and TV Studies
Supervisor's Name: Heddon, Professor Deirdre
Date of Award: 2017
Depositing User: Miss Sarah Hopfinger
Unique ID: glathesis:2017-8040
Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
Date Deposited: 05 May 2017 13:07
Last Modified: 28 Feb 2020 12:22
Thesis DOI: 10.5525/gla.thesis.8040
URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/8040

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year