Ervaringstheater.
Experience or experiential theatre would be the literal translation of ervaringstheater, but it is an illusive term, since theatre without experience seems quite impossible (to me). The specific focus of ervaringstheater is the unique experience. Or as theatre company Ontroerend Goed puts it (concerning to there performance The Smile Off Your Face): "Actually, it's not about viewing. You are blindfolded; you are in a wheelchair, tied up. It's about experiencing. There is no stage. There is no public, no fixed spot in the lights where actors perform. In fact, you don't know where you are.” In the Netherlands this kind of theatre seems to pop up everywhere since the 2001 Holland Festival invited the Colombian Teatro de los Sentidos (theatre of the senses) according to theatre critic Annette Embrechts. Elaborating on this term Embrechts continues with the following: “welcome to the world of ervaringstheater. Theatre performances which first and foremost want to seduce the audience to look and experience the performance and save judgement and interpretation for later. It’s theatre that preferably manifests itself on unexpected locations such as shopping malls, train stations, prisons, city busses and dunes. The audience is slowly being detached from their daily routine through physical contact and is put in a state of confusion.” This year’s theatre season in Frascati opened with a festival named I, THE SPECTATOR aiming to: “discuss on the position of the audience in the theatre through the showing of new, surprising forms of theatre” in which the audience is in the spotlight in one way or another.
Some examples: Boukje Schweigman, Ontroerend Goed, WunderBaum and Dries Verhoeven. Dries verhoeven U bevindt zich hier (You are here):
[the link in case it doesn't work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lu-DNUNCwms]
We (Jo, Dana, Martin) read the description, watched the piece, and wanted to jot down our reactions and thoughts...
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the description of the word, we had some notions about what the piece would look like. Martin thought it might be a kind of street theatre, but the setting, the location, was super designed and set up specifically for the piece, and was almost the most important component. We thought about the differences between a controlled performance environment (as seen here) and an uncontrolled space (as in street performance). This set took an every day situation (a room with a bed is a familiar convention) and made it unfamiliar (isolation, mirrors...) and make us rethink the location.
We thought visibility was a key word in this piece. In here the people could see themselves, and sometimes others, but the focus was always controlled. This perspective allowed people to see themselves and to reconsider themselves in relation to others. Seeing others had to be a huge surprise to the audience, and we were forced to reconsider who is the audience and who is watching who. There is the possibility to change roles unexpectedly.
This also raised the question of 'what is theatre?' To fit this into the definition of theatre, we had to look at the components of this piece. If theatre is an audience watching an actor, than this isn't theatre. But we can manipulate the definition of theatre to include this piece. Maybe the definition is more broad.
We wondered if it was important to understand what the woman was saying. We guessed she was an audience member talking about her experiences, reflecting after the fact. But what if she was talking about politics? What if she was part of the performance and this was played live to the audience members? How would this change the performance, if at all?
WAR Group C