Title
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On (not) being useful : the art of drifting in Asian contemporary theatre
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Author
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Abstract
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In 2014, I founded Scene/Asia, a platform of critique and dialogue for Asian contemporary performances. The main objective of the project was to extract performance tropes and concepts cultivated on the Asian soil; we tried to build a pool of knowledge that uses ‘Asian theatre [and not Western theatre] as method’, to cite Rossella Ferrari, who, in turn, borrowed from Kuan Hsing-Chen. Taking this three-year project as an empirical basis, this paper argues, in a hybrid language consisting of fieldwork reports, discussion outcomes, curatorial procedures and scholarly analysis, that the three pillars of Western canonisation in theatre – institutionalisation, historicisation and the ensuing commodification – may be ‘useful’ to the West, but a priori contradict the raison d’être of traditional Asian performances. The paper demonstrates this by referring to traditional Asian pop-up theatres and a text by Japanese ethnologist Orikuchi Shinobu, who argues that Japanese entertainers were originally ukare-bito (drifting people). Finally, this paper demonstrates an analysis of Malaysian theatre director Mark Teh’s Version 2020: The Complete Future of Malaysia (2017) as a contemporary Asian theatre piece that brings into relief ‘Asian theatre as method’ by adopting what Teh calls the ‘dispersive dramaturgy’. |
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Language
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English
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Source (journal)
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Studies in theatre and performance. - Place of publication unknown
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Publication
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Place of publication unknown
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2021
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ISSN
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1468-2761
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DOI
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10.1080/14682761.2021.1881732
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Volume/pages
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41
:1
(2021)
, p. 95-110
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ISI
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000625819300008
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Full text (Publisher's DOI)
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Full text (open access)
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Full text (publisher's version - intranet only)
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