Nomadic performativity as an aesthetic alternative to communal acts of resistance : dreis verhoeven's 'no man's land', brett bailey's 'sanctuary' and Akira Takayama's 'piraeus heterotopia' as case studies

Abstract EN

The present paper is mainly concerned with the question of “how can a performative situation be established and negotiated outside the walls of a theatre?” To this cause, this study argues for the potential of the ever-expanding notion of Nomadic Performativity, its new artistic disciplines and sporadic insights through a selected milieu of recent non-representational performative ambulatory performances: Dries Verhoeven’s No Man's Land (2014), Brett Bailey’s Sanctuary (2017), and Akira Takayama’s Piraeus / Heterotopia (2017).

Framing the way each nomadic performance establishes its performative strategy, the study draws on Gilles Deleuze's and Felix Guattari's 'Spatial Nomadic' theory as a methodological tool to investigate whether the productions at hand can truly essay a new way of 'thinking through practice' , and can sincerely provide an alternative mode of political debate and communal resistance to exclusionary practices and nationalist prejudices of the nation – states against migrants, refugees and asylum seekers.

The study reaches the conclusion that the case studies under question disintegrate the notion of space as the physical framework for holding the theatrical experience; illustrate the interconnectedness between the sphere of 'practice' and the sphere of 'thinking'; act as dramaturgical enquiries, reflective practices, ongoing assessments, and genuine articulations of one's relationship to place; and provide a qualitative shift of consciousness that attunes to the mobile spirit of the age.