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FIRT/IFTR Performance as Research Working Group - Lisbon Conference, 2009



Silent Voices Forbidden Lives: A Participatory Lab		Call for Contributions



'In the nature of the case, an explorer can never know what he is exploring until it has been explored.' Gregory Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind (1972/2000)



For the 2009 conference in Lisbon the Working Group has decided to create a Participatory Lab to investigate one of the core problematics of performance as research: namely, how can performance as research be best pursued to identify its own most fundamental methods of enquiry? 



Key to this problematic is that creativity is itself most fundamentally unpredictable, because at best it is an exploratory process in the manner described by Gregory Bateson. This is frequently reflected in descriptions of the creative process by artists, scientists and scholars, ranging from Harold Pinter's 'I don't know what kinds of characters my plays will have... I follow what I see on the paper' through Isaac Newton's 'Hypotheses non fingo' (I frame no hypotheses) to Éntienne Souriau's 'pour inventer il faut penser à côté' (to invent one must think aside). Thus for our 2009 Participatory Lab we will focus on the 'Silent Voices' that inhabit invention and on the 'Forbidden Lives' that art is adept at creating. So our call for contributions to the Lab invites proposals that address what might be called the self-censorship of creativity, the ways in which the inexpressible generates new insights, understandings, or knowledge through the processes of performance as research. 



The Lab will involve the whole Working Group in a series of participatory workshops offered by members through proposals that address the inexpressible as a focus within performance as research. These will allow for observation and documentation of practices, as well as 'immersive action' in practices. There may also be opportunities for presentation of past projects through displays. The working group invites TWO kinds of proposals for participation workshops, from Facilitators and Participants, in the form of abstracts.



PARTICIPANTS

Participants should identify an aspect of their research practices in which the inexpressible was most clearly or forcefully in play, perhaps in the form of 'silences', lacuna, aporia or absences, and indicate the particular ways in which that proved to be productive, or not. They could also indicate the methods that were used to render it productive, or not.  The abstract should describe the materials that the participant can make available to the Lab through which methods of addressing such inexpressibility might be shared and explored. Materials might range from primary sources of inspiration (objects, texts, events, etc.) through workshop/rehearsal plans to documentation and analyses of past projects, including accounts of creative crises and 'breakthrough' moments from their own or cognate practices. (Participant-proposers are advised that material[s] that is especially time-consuming to absorb generally should be avoided.) The Lab will be organised through three types of member participation, defined as: observer or documenter or, for want of a better word, 'rapturor' (from 'rapt', i.e. prepared for total involvement in the manner of an actor/performer in rehearsal). Participant-proposers should indicate if they are willing to engage in one or two or all of these types of participation in the Lab. Please note that this will NOT constitute a criterion for selection, but is required for purposes of organising the workshops in advance of the conference. Length of participant proposals: maximum 300 words.





FACILITATORS

Facilitators will have the opportunity to plan and run parts of the Working Group sessions as workshops. They should submit a facilitator-proposer abstract that briefly details the type, purposes, structure, activities and (if relevant) outcomes of the workshop they wish to run. This should also indicate the relevance they envisage of their workshop to the purpose of the Working Group sessions as a whole, as stated at the start of this call. As for participant-proposers, the facilitation abstract should describe the materials that the facilitator can make available to the Lab through which their methods of addressing inexpressibility might be shared and explored in their workshop. Materials might range from primary sources of inspiration (objects, texts, events, etc.) through workshop/rehearsal plans to documentation and analyses of past projects, included accounts of creative crises and 'breakthrough' moments from their own or cognate practices. (Facilitator-proposers are advised that material(s) that is especially time-consuming to absorb generally should be avoided.) If possible, facilitator-proposers should also indicate how materials brought by Participants might be incorporated in their workshop, or at least indicate their willingness (or not) to consider such incorporation. The abstract should indicate the preferred length of their workshop, which given the length of conference sessions should be 30 or 60 minutes or, very exceptionally, 90 minutes long. It might also indicate what balance between types of participation by group-members as observers, documenters or 'rapturors' would be desirable. Joint or small-group facilitator-proposals are welcome, and the Co-ordinators might suggest that some proposals could be combined. All facilitators - when not facilitating - will be participants in the workshop, and so must also submit a participant-proposer abstract. The materials indicated in that abstract may be the same as for their facilitation proposal. Length of facilitator proposals: maximum 400 words.



PLEASE ALSO NOTE

1.	The Convenors envisage that the Lab may accommodate up to 30 members attending (depending on space constraints), all of whom will be Participants and 10-12 will be Facilitators (possibly more if pairs/small-groups make proposals). 

2.	The 2009 conference organisers have scheduled two slots for Showcase panels by Working Groups, and the Performance a Research Working Group may present the outcomes of the Lab as a round table in one of these slots.

3.	In order to plan the Lab collaboratively with the participants/facilitators, the Co-ordinators may place proposals selected (with permission from the proposers) on a secure website accessible in advance of the Conference to 2009 Working Group participants.

4.	At Lisbon 2009 the Working Group sessions will continue through to 1.00pm on Saturday, July 18th, to reflect on the work of the conference and plan for the future. Proposers should take this into account in their planning for the conference.



DEADLINE FOR PROPOSALS

1.	Deadline for proposals Feb 28th PM.

2.	Selection of proposals by March 6th PM.

Please send proposals by e-mail as Word attachments to the Co-convenors Anna Birch, Mark Fleishman and Baz Kershaw, at: 

 

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If you have any questions about the Participatory Lab please send to Baz Kershaw.

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