alt.theatre magazine: 5.2 Sample by alt.theatre

Vol. 5, No. 2 MAY 2007

Photo (clockwise) : Hope McIntyre | Ken Tabata | Edward Little

Habitual Thought in a Theatre of Education

6 Editorial by Edward Little

The Future in the Past: Reinterpreting Cross-Gender Traditions for Today

The Borders of Rights—Reflections on PSi #12: Performing Rights

“I am not going to be brown and act white”: A Conversation with Jani Lauzon about Playing Shylock

The Line Between Theatre and Politics: The Seventh Triennial Women Playwrights International Conference

Arts, Social Action, and Cultural Diversity in the Downtown Eastside Heart of the City Festival

Book Review

Guillaume Bernardi considers how two new works by Canadian artists play with tradition to subvert notions of gender in the 2006 festival, Transformations: Expressions of Gender Roles in Asian Dance held at Toronto’s Harbourfront Theatre.

After attending the twelfth Performance Studies international conference, Megan Macdonald reflects on the issue of human rights through the concept of “borders”—both external and internal. Robert Ormsby speaks with Jani Lauzon about the repercussions of cross-casting culture and gender in her performance of Shylock in SITR’s The Merchant of Venice.

Hope McIntyre’s experiences in Indonesia prompt her to reconsider text-based Western definitions of theatre.

Savannah Walling describes Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside self-mobilization in community-led renewal through its annual Heart of the City Festival.

Janet Amos reviews the inspiring stories of theatre making a difference in Theatre and Empowerment: Community Drama on the World Stage edited by Richard Boon and Jane Plastow.

alt.theatre: cultural diversity and the stage is published by

“Change the World, One Play at a Time”

UPCOMING in alt.theatre! R H Thomson’s The Dance for Diversity. A pictorial essay on Teesri Duniya’s A Leaf in the Whirlwind. Marcel Fuentes on Guillermo Gómez-Peña’s ethno-techno: Writings on Performance, Activism and Pedagogy. Katherine Foster’s Recognizing the Boundaries of Cultural Exchange: The 2007 Festival of Original Theatre “Dissolving Borders.” Isabelle Zufferey-Boulton on Q Arts production of Ernestine Shuswap Gets Her Trout. Chris Creighton-Kelly on The Performer in a Multicultural Society. Alvina Ruprecht’s interview with Marie Clements about Copper Thunderbird. M. NourbeSe Philip on Kwame Anthony Appias’s Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers.

EDITOR IN CHIEF Edward Little A S S O C I AT E E D I T O R Denis Salter EDITORIAL BOARD Rahul Varma, Edward Little, Denis Salter, Lina de Guevara, Shelley Scott CONTRIBUTORS Edward Little, Guillaume Bernardi, Megan Macdonald, Robert Ormsby, Hope McIntyre, Savannah Walling, Janet Amos MARKETING & SALES Linda Levesque GRAPHIC DESIGN ATELIER 6/ DFI GRAPHIK COVER PHOTO David Leung COPY EDITOR Colette Stoeber

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a l t . t h e a t r e : c u l t u r a l d i v e r s i t y a n d t h e s t a g e i s C a n a d a ’s o n l y m a g a z i n e d e d i c a t e d t o n e w s a n d v i e w s a b o u t i n t e r s e c t i o n s b e t w e e n p o l i t i c s, c u l t u r a l p l u r a l i t y, s o c i a l a c t i v i s m , a n d t h e s t a g e. O u r r e a d e r s h i p i n c l u d e s t h e a t r e p r a c t i t i o n e r s, a c a d e m i c s, p l u s o t h e r s i n t e r e s t e d i n i s s u e s p e r t a i n i n g t o a r t s a n d c u l t u r a l d i v e r s i t y. a l t . t h e a t r e we l c o m e s s u g g e s t i o n s o r p r o p o s a l s fo r i n t e r v i ew s, n ew s, p i e c e s o f s e l f - r e f l e c t i o n , a n a l y t i c a l a r t i c l e s, a n d r e v i e w s o f b o o k s, p l a y s, a n d p e r f o r m a n c e s. Founded in 1998, alt.theatre is published quarterly by Teesri Duniya Theatre —an intercultural theatre company with a mandate to produce socially engaged theatre that reflects C a n a d a ’s s o c i a l a n d c u l t u r a l d i v e r s i t y. Fo r m o re i n fo r m a t i o n , co n t a c t Te e s r i D u n i y a T h e a t r e 4324 St. Laurent Blvd., Montreal, QC Canada H2W 1Z3 Te l : 5 1 4 . 8 4 8 . 0 2 3 8 Fa x : 5 1 4 . 8 4 8 . 0 2 6 7 email: info@teesriduniya.com w e b s i t e : w w w. t e e s r i d u n i y a . c o m We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts which last year invested $20.1 million in writing and publishing throughout Canada.

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E D I TO R I A L / b y E d w a rd L i t t le

Growing up in the small coal-mining town of Cumberland on Vancouver Island, BC in the 1950s and 60s, I recall my history lessons as primarily about events from either British or American perspectives. Once we had paddled with the coureurs des bois and dispensed with the various English–French battles that culminated on the Plains of Abraham, there seemed to be no Canadian stories left. Later, with the lessons of elementary and secondary school but dim memories, I discovered plays such as 1837, The Farmers’ Revolt—the collective creation about William Lyon Mackenzie and the Upper Canada rebellion against the corrupt colonial power of the British Family Compact; John Coulter’s Riel—the account of the life, trial, and 1886 execution of the Metis leader; James Reaney’s The Donnellys—a dramatization of the religious, ethnic, and economic factors behind the feud that lead to the barbaric1880 murders of an entire family in Southern Ontario; and Sharon Pollock’s account of the Komagatu Maru Incident—where, in Vancouver Harbour in 1914, over 350 immigrants arriving from the Punjab via Hong Kong and Japan were denied entry to Canada under the discriminatory “continuous journey clause” and held aboard the ship for two months before they were forced to retrace their route.1

The Rights Here! project. Photo: Isabelle Fleurelien

HABITUAL THOUGHT IN A THEATRE OF INTERVENTION by Edward Little

Later still, plays like these that told Canadian stories from working class perspectives became touchstones where I could test, within my own experience, the validity and operation of theories about theatre and social change. Historiographic principles relating to “truth” and point-of-view, for example. Or Brecht’s synoptic encapsulations of politics, power, and social justice as represented through Gestus. Or Benedict Anderson’s notions of “imagined communities” in which “remembering” an apparently suppressed or “forgotten” moment of history becomes a powerful and subliminal force in nation or community building. Or educationalist John Dewey’s belief that true learning depends on apprehending and exploiting “teachable moments”—those randomly occurring events where habitual thought is temporarily disrupted and new ideas can take root. Anderson, Brecht, and Dewey are very much on my mind as I contemplate the nature of social intervention in theatre in general, and in our own recent experience with Phase II of the Rights Here! Theatre and Law for Human Rights project in particular. Perhaps aesthetic success in all theatre depends on moments where habitual thought is somehow arrested. Dewey advocated the recognition of teachable moments as they occur. I would argue that an effective theatre of

social action must first create instances where habitual thought might be apprehended, and then provide the kind of liminal space where perceptual shifts, new ideas, and interventions in habitual thought might be explored—“tried on” and “rehearsed” by creators, participants, and audiences alike. This idea of a participatory “rehearsal for change” is at the heart of Augusto Boal’s challenge to Aristotelian catharsis. Where Aristotle characterized the moment of recognition or “discovery” as a place where “a change from ignorance to knowledge” could trigger the cathartic purging of pity and fear in the spectator, Boal regarded this as coercive—a means of containing any impulse towards revolutionary action on the part of audiences (Rainbow 71). In constructing a more culturally democratic theatre, Boal sought to create spec-actors—participants who would undertake the roles of both actor and audience in order to “rehearse” changes that could then be implemented beyond the theatrical event. For Boal, the spec-actor who experiences recognition experiences a powerful, but less personal level of human engagement. They recognize the character portrayed: “I am not like that at all, but I know exactly [this] sort of person!” Boal sought more profound levels of engagement through identification: “I am exactly like that” (Rainbow 68-69). The power and authenticity of any community-engaged theatre depends on the construction of this deep sense of identification. Even recognition or resonance, within the context of a community experiencing identification, can lead us towards Anderson’s imagined communities. 2 How then, in concrete terms, might community-engaged artists—both for themselves and for others—enter into and stage the kinds of creative encounters between identification, recognition, and habitual thought wherein biases, competing ideologies, and apparently irreconcilable differences are momentarily suspended and subject to examination from multiple perspectives? And so to Phase II of Rights Here! Theatre and Law for Human Rights. The long-term goal of this three-part project is to stimulate art and advocacy pertaining to human rights, and to inspire young people to take responsibility, leadership, and action within their communities. Phase II (January to June, 2007) culminated in a series of Street Theatre excerpts performed in various public spaces around Montreal. These were followed by full performances staged in an abandoned section of the sprawling William Hingston Community Centre in Park Extension—

E D I TO R I A L / b y E d w a rd L i t t le

one of Montreal’s most culturally diverse neighbourhoods. Creative director Rachael Van Fossen set out to foreground the experience of encounters between young people from different social and cultural backgrounds as they explored the concerns, preoccupations, and ideological conceptions of human rights held by themselves and their communities. With this often contentious material in mind, we set out to gather individuals and communities around a fun and lively celebration of youth, optimism, hope, and joy. We hoped that the visceral appeal of the performing arts would engage young and old alike, draw attention to the issues and concerns represented by the project, and generate momentum for Phase III of the project—a School for Human Rights Advocacy.3 In common with all community-engaged theatre, and precisely because of its overarching concern with cultural democracy, Rights Here! seeks, both in the process of creating art and in the art itself, “to be the change that you want to see in the world” (Ghandi). In this regard, I found myself deeply moved by each and every performance. I was struck by the effectiveness of the aesthetic of found and recycled objects—an aesthetic that spoke of the potential of the creative imagination to envision inclusion and transformation, to work with what is at hand, and to resist the seduction and expense of technology. The design team created a percussion cart made of two wheelchairs bolted together to hold pots and bins, dish racks, bicycle wheels, and all manner of noise makers. Other carts were made with in-line skates, another from a giant inner tube, and yet another from two discarded bicycles coupled to a wooden platform. Boards with slogans doubled as percussion “clappers,” and participants created an evocative range of masks and faces from materials including papier-mâché and a plastic tub lid painted white on one side and brown on the other. Silhouette images of participants were painted on giant tarps; costumes with evocative hoods/head-wear were made of “recycled” clothes; and the neighbourhood’s ubiquitous laundry lines were reproduced with cast-off pants and shirts bearing slogans in multiple languages that spoke of human rights. I was seduced by the insistent beat and rhythms of the music and songs; I was impressed by the accomplished and creative use of movement, acrobatics, and puppets large and small. As an audience member, I shared laughter at our common foibles, and shame at our complicity in ongoing injustice. Above all, I was deeply affected by the sheer energy, openness, optimism, and joy of the performers as they offered their very best to audiences and to each other. I experienced this generosity as love, and I was struck by its

essential role in human rights, its fertility and fragility in youth, and my responsibility as a teacher to contribute to its survival. Where might we have done better? As my father used to say, “When you’re up to your ass in alligators, it can be hard to remember that your original intention was to drain the swamp.” Generally, audience feedback on the performances was positive and the concept of encounters provided fertile ground for challenging habitual thought in our youth participants. In retrospect, however, I think we might have done far more to imagine a creative process in which there would be room and desire to break the kinds of habitual thought that kept our cross-sectorial partnership from fully realizing its collaborative potential. Phases I and II of the project were guided by a steering team of representatives from student and community participants, the creative team, and the partner organizations—the Department of Theatre at Concordia University, the Park Extension Youth Organization (PEYO), Teesri Duniya Theatre, and a legal advisory consisting of members of the Equality Committee of the Quebec Bar Association. While this brought together a considerable range of experience and expertise, it also brought together differing intentions, values, and perspectives on what kinds of concrete actions could and should be taken at the community level and at what pace. Inevitably, the exigencies and innumerable number of details associated with performing before a public begin to exert precedence over our working process. As pressures of time and resources mounted, our steering team tended to lose sight of the creative potential for learning from our own encounters with difference within the partnership cultures of law, theatre, community work, education, family, and community. It now seems obvious that had we structured and committed to a working process that could prompt, recognize and act upon the kinds of “teachable moments” that would challenge our own individual patterns of habitual thought within the steering team, we would have uncovered a rich vein of fresh material with which to inform the project. Modeling our own risk, identification, creative interventions, and ideological shifts, we might have inspired even greater identification, creative risk, and ideological shifts in the youth participants, in our performances, and in our audiences.

The Rights Here! project. Photo: Isabelle Fleurelien

NOTES

1 Commonly referred to as the “Continuous Journey Clause,” Privy Council Order No. 920 essentially discriminated against immigration from India and other Asian countries by making it illegal for anyone to land in Canada who was not traveling on a through ticket without any break in journey from their land of birth. As no such service existed between Indian and Canadian ports, emigration from India was rendered impossible. 2 Boal’s most diffuse level of engagement is “resonance”—“She is like that, but she could be different; I am not like that, but I would like to be”, etc. (Rainbow 69). 3 The first phase focused on training in Indian Street Theatre and social advocacy (see alt.theatre 5.1, pp 3-5).

WORKS CITED Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. New York: Verso, 1991. Boal, Augusto. Theater of the Oppressed. New York: Urizen Books, 1979. ---. The Rainbow of Desire: the Boal Method of Theatre and Therapy. New York: Routledge, 1995. Dewey, John. How We Think: A Restatement of the Relation of Reflective Thinking to the Educative Process. Chicago: Regnery, 1971.

C R O SS - G E N D E R T R A D I T I O N S / b y G u i l l a u m e B e r n a rd i

In the first half of the program, we admired the refined skills of traditional artists Master Song Chang Rong and Elly. The former is an artist in his seventies and a renowned star in China. He is one of the last performers of nan dan (men playing female roles) in Peking Opera whose art survived the Chinese Cultural revolution. Elly, a delicate young woman, is already well-known in Indonesia for her arresting transformation when she portrays warrior male characters in topeng, a traditional mask dance. She is an heir to the acknowledged master, Rasinah. In the second part of the program, we enjoyed three new works: Engagement, by Yukio Waguri, a butoh artist from Japan who performs a striking female role, and two works by Canadian artists—Hari Krishnan’s Uma and Peter Chin’s Berdandan.

Photo : David Leung

THE FUTURE IN THE PAST: REINTERPRETING CROSS-GENDER TRADITIONS FOR TODAY by Guillaume Bernardi I n J u n e 2 0 0 6 , C a n A s i a n D a n c e p re s e n t e d t h e f e s t i v a l Tr a n s f o r m a t i o n s : E x p re s s i o n s o f G e n d e r R o l e s i n A s i a n D a n c e a t t h e H a r b o u r f ro n t T h e a t re i n To ro n t o . T h i s f e s t i v a l c o n s i s t e d o f a f u l l e v e n i n g o f c ro ss - g e n d e r p e r fo r m a n ce s o f A s i a n o r i g i n s . C a n A s i a n A r t i s t i c D i re c t o r D e n i s e F u j i w a r a a s k e d multidisciplinary artist Peter Chin to curate this e v e n t . C h i n re a c h e d a d e l i c a t e b a l a n c e w i t h t h e f i v e p i e c e s h e p re s e n t e d : t w o w e re re p re s e n t a t i v e o f t r a d i t i o n a l A s i a n c ro s s - g e n d e r p e r f o r m a n c e a n d t h re e w e re n e w w o r k s .

masked a complex cultural operation that subverts simultaneously these traditions and the dominant notions of gender—straight or gay—in Canada today.

Uma is a dance solo choreographed for Sudarshan Belsare, a bharatanatyam dancer, and is inspired by the eroticism and sensuality of the courtesan dancer in pre-modern South India. It belongs to the rich tradition of stri-vesham, the art of female impersonation in South India, but is in fact quite subversive in other ways. At the beginning of the piece, Belsare enters and is followed by a procession of seven other performers. These are the musicians who will accompany his dance. Among them is Krishnan himself, discreetly conducting the performance, and interdisciplinary artist Katherine Duncanson. Duncanson Now that women can per- reads a text in English as Although the form their own roles on stage, the performance progresses, the narrative overall title of the festiwhat could be the motivations decoding elements of the dance. val felt deliberately neufor preserving these traditions? Bridget Cauthery evocatively tral and somewhat acadescribes the performer demic, one sensed comwhen she writes, plex and powerful moti“Belsare is a consummate dancer, quick-footed vations behind this important cultural event. and exact, with clean lines and rhythmic alacrity.” Clearly, the perception that these traditions are And earlier, “Dressed in a fan-pleated dhoti and threatened would have been a strong argument fitted choli blouse over pert falsies with a fake for presenting them, but, especially for the new bun, long plait, jewelled headdress and nose stud, pieces, other motivations had to be present. In Belsare is by far the most convincing woman in this article, I will focus on these new works, the show.” specifically on the two Canadian pieces, and reflect on their possible raison d’être. Berdandan1 also is a dance piece focused on one performer. Peter Chin collaborated with As a nonspecialist, I presume that well-known, multi-faceted Indonesian artist/ cross-gender traditions must originally have had dancer Didik Nini Thowok.2 In the first half of the some strong repressive purposes. Cross-gender piece, which starts as the audience comes in, we casting allowed the straight male audience to watch Thowok going through the meticulous resolve contradictory desires: on the one hand, it process of transforming himself into a female restricted women’s activities by banning them dancer, applying his make-up, jewellery, etc. He is from the stage, and on the other, it provided the assisted by his dresser, performed by Yves men with the pleasure of imaginary gratification Candau, who also functions as a translator. As the through the representation of women. If traditiontransformation takes place, Thowok answers al cross-gender performances are threatened questions asked by a voice off-stage: he tells how today in Asia, it is most likely the result of the over the years he embraced the tradition of changing place of women in society, as occurred cross-gender performance. While this quite in Europe in earlier centuries. Now that women magical transformation is taking place, video can perform their own roles on stage, what could artist Cylla von Tiedemann enters the stage and be the motivations for preserving these traditions? begins filming Thowok as he dresses. Her video close-ups are projected onto a draped fabric on This question seems even more pressing screens positioned upstage of Thowok. Once when one considers these new works created in Thowok is ready, the screens are removed and a Canada today. It was clear that the goal of the percussion orchestra, a gamelan, is revealed. choreographers of Uma and Berdandan was not Thus we move to the second half of Berdandan, in simply to preserve performance traditions. which Thowok performs with exquisite delicacy Rather, one sensed that for Chin and Krishnan the Golek Lambang Sari dance, a traditional these works were a significant act of claiming cross-gender work from the classical Javanese their personal artistic identities in Canada. I will repertoire, which depicts a young girl discovering argue that the cautious title of the festival in fact her femininity.

C R O SS - G E N D E R T R A D I T I O N S / b y G u i l l a u m e B e r n a rd i

an understated tone: the translator doesn’t draw Both Krishnan’s Uma and Chin’s attention to himself. These nuances are in fact Berdandan are beautiful and complex dance quite representative of the main difference pieces, each of them with a very rich and distinct between the two pieces, Krishnan’s being more vocabulary; but beyond the very obvious provocative, more camp, and Chin’s more dreamlike, differences between these two works, both more meditative. artists are confronting similar sets of complex issues, centered on relating to traditions, The understated position of spoken text communicating with audiences unfamiliar with in Chin’s work is counter-balanced by his more such traditions, and defining identity in this prominent use of technology. Whereas Uma process. The most obvious challenge is clearly to convey to a mainstream Canadian audience the employs only human components, Berdandan cultural specificity of these works. Yet, this simple uses some effective technological tools. It could act of elucidation be argued that the very brings other essential of video artist Traditions are alive only presence issues to the forefront: Cylla von Tiedemann on insofar as performances take stage embodies another the choreographers must position themselves place. At the same time, this level of mediation, but not only within their audience is more implies that the repository of the Canadian context but struck by the huge the traditions, simply by living images of the face and also in the context of their culture of origin. in a specific present, has the jewellery of Didik Nini option to shape those traditions Thowok that she generAs noted earlier, ates on the partition according to his/her context. in both Uma and screens right behind the dancer. The conBerdandan a mediator frontation between the is present on stage to physical presence of facilitate the relationThowok and his image challenges a simplistic ship between the cross-gender performer and the notion of identity. For the spectator, it sets up a audience. It is worth underlining that technically rich dynamic between self and image, between the function of translation could have been fulfilled the frail body of the middle-age male dancer and by program notes or surtitles, but both choreographers the glamorous details of the make-up or of the chose to have that role embodied by a performer. jewellery in huge close-up shots. This complex This reveals in my view the great importance presence is mirrored by the peculiar status of the placed on the act of bridging cultures. The amplified voice that keeps questioning Thowok. At choreographers must have felt that Duncanson first we simply hear it, another case of disembodied and Candau were mediators to whom a mainstream presence. Later, as the fabric on the screens is Canadian audience member could easily relate. removed, we gather that that voice must come Both are visibly of European descent: the authority from one of the players in the gamelan. In fact the that their origins bestow on them in Canada is speaker is Peter Chin himself, a discreet silhouette reinforced by maturity for Duncanson and maleness among the musicians. Yet it is this echoing disembodied for Candau. Yet both of them also convey a great voice that drives the piece forward. Hari Krishnan gentleness. It is also worth reflecting on their as well chose to sit upstage during Uma and conduct gender. In the case of Uma, the mediator is a woman. Her voice naturalizes the imaginary gender the performance from there. These ambiguous of the performer: we see a woman dance, we hear presences might well function as a powerful a woman speak. But of course this also contributes metaphor for the complex role that Chin and to the strangeness of the piece, as there is an Krishnan play in their pieces. On reflection, that unusual split between body and speech. In complexity rests mainly on various aspects of their identities, both in term of origins and sexual Berdandan, a man plays the mediator. As he is identity. clearly a translator, there is no schizophrenic feeling here; yet Yves Candau’s foreign accent is a For any migrant, identity is greatly discreet reminder of his role as a go-between: he determined by the kind of relationship one chooses truly functions as a link between the Canadian to maintain with one’s culture of origins. By opting audience and the foreign performer, between us to work on traditional forms, clearly Krishnan and and the Other. The texts spoken by these two Chin are reasserting their own Asian identity. It is mediators are quite different. Whereas worth noting though that for a dance artist, the Duncanson’s speech has a distinct, clearly notion of tradition has a specific deep and personal provocative, vernacular quality (“You bitch, get meaning. Dance is an art form transmitted mainly away from my man.”), Candau’s is very discreet, a through direct interaction, verbally or by imitation, literal translation of Thowok’s words delivered in

from teachers to students. Tradition is indeed embodied in a personal relationship between teacher and student. In other words, a dancer can become a dancer only by embracing a tradition, and a willingness to do so is indeed essential in defining a dancer’s identity. In the program of the Transformations festival, these genealogies of knowledge were systematically emphasised, a fact that underlines the vulnerability of the crossgender traditions. Traditions are alive only insofar as performances take place. At the same time, this implies that the repository of the traditions, simply by living in a specific present, has the option to shape those traditions according to his/her context.

Photo : Cylla von Tiedemann

For Chin and Krishnan this essential attachment to the forms and traditions had to be balanced not only with the necessities of selfexpression, but, even more so, with a specific place between two worlds. As we have seen, Chin and Krishnan claim the cross-gender performance traditions, but they shape them so that they become intelligible for a Canadian audience.

Clearly though, their goal is not simply to allow the Canadian audience into those traditions; more is at stake here. Sexual identities issues are at the core of both pieces. The spectator senses veiled polemical purpose in both works, although these biting intents seem to be aimed at different segments of the Canadian audience. It has already been noted that Uma appears to be more respectful of the general character of traditional forms and yet at the same time more openly polemical. This might indicate that the imagined target is the traditional South East Asian audience rather than the Canadian mainstream. Traditionally, young women—and only young women—receive training in Bharatanatyam. By reclaiming, in the name of another tradition, that territory for a male dancer, Krishnan certainly subverts gender preconceptions, but he also reclaims for himself part of his identity. Traditions are thus not the exclusive territory of the traditionalists.

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is never in doubt. The performance relies mainly The case of Berdandan is more complex, on shock value. The performer transgresses with wider implications for mainstream Canadian commonly held views on gender roles and irony is audiences. Although Peter Chin has traveled and an essential ingredient of the genre. But this studied at great length in Indonesia, he does not aggressive irony can originally belong to be read as a sign of that culture, a fact In Berdandan, by staging, also deep discomfort towards that most likely without irony, the very progressive gender ambiguity. affects his relationship with the material. The passage from masculine to feminine In Berdandan, carnal, direct delight and by setting at the heart of the by staging, of Uma stems in part without irony, piece a male performer accessing the very progressive from the Krishnan’s uninhibited relationthe contained femininity of the passage from masculine ship has with his Goleg Lambag Sari dance, Chin to feminine and by setting at the heart of the piece culture; the delicate, clearly advocates a new way of a male performer respectful rapport looking at gender. accessing the contained that Chin establishes femininity of the Goleg with the traditional Lambag Sari dance, Javanese dance on Chin clearly advocates a new way of looking at the other hand seems to express the awe of a gender. In this, the passage from masculine to passionate researcher. Also, and more relevantly, feminine happens through barely perceptible for Chin there isn’t a significant Indonesian incremental changes. population in Canada to which the piece would be addressed and with whom to engage in debate. One guesses then that the target audience of the The Transformations festival presented piece is indeed the mainstream. The polemical Toronto audiences with a wide range of performances, intent, then, is aimed at both straight and gay all related to ancient traditions. The new Canadian Canadian mainstream, as it strongly challenges pieces prove, though, that traditions can inspire the binary gender representation of our culture meaningful works, dealing with relevant issues of today. The challenge to the straight conception of gender and race identity. These new works, deeply gender is obvious; but, in fact, Berdandan might inspired by the past, challenge Canadian audiences and artists to discover who they want be aimed more at mainstream gay culture. In gay to be today. culture, of course, the equivalent of cross-gender performance would be drag, a genre in which the performer adopts an aggressive hyper-feminized persona. Paradoxically, the genre refuses to deal with ambiguity; the actual gender of the performer NOTES

1 I should mention that Berdandan was created in March 2005, as part of an earlier CanAsian Dance Festival. I functioned as dramaturge on this earlier version. In the Transformations Festival, Peter Chin generously insisted on crediting me as director. I feel that in this production my aim truly was to facilitate as much as possible the expression of Peter Chin’s and Didik Nini Thowok’s intentions. 2 His website reveals the variety of activities of Didik Nini Thowok: www.didikninithowok.info. It should be noted that Thowok has been actively advocating the preservation of cross-gender traditions and organized a cross-gender tradition festival in Indonesia in 2004.

THE BORDERS OF RIGHTS— REFLECTIONS ON PSi #12: PERFORMING RIGHTS by Megan Macdonald PSi

(Performance

Photo : Joel Anderson

Studies

international) #12: Performing Rights was held at Queen Mary, University of L o n d o n i n J u n e , 2 0 0 6 . Fo r f o u r d a y s , o v e r f i v e h u n d re d d e l e g a t e s c o n s i s t i n g of artists and academics from thirty-seven countries met to listen to papers, witness

WORK CITED Cauthery, Bridget. “Cross-gender Performance: Dispelling the Binary. CanAsian Dance Festival 2006.” The Dance Current. On-line edition. www.thedancecurrent.com/reviews.cfm

performances, mingle, and talk about human rights. A sampling of panels shows the diversity of current scholarship:

(In this last paper, Guevara told the story of hundreds of women murdered since 1993 in one town in Mexico—in Spanish these are called the feminicidios or “femicides.”) A round table— “Memory Rites”—focused on the performances enacted (by all who visit) in locations where memories and experiences of place are intimately connected to rites and rights. These papers considered a range of topics: the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, the Gulla people of South Carolina, Hiroshima and concentration camps in WWII, the African ports where slaves were put on boats, Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, and the Asian Tsunami of December 2004.1

“ P u b l i c A p p e a r a n c e ” b ro u g h t t o g e t h e r papers examining “Censorship and the S a c re d ” ( H e le n Fre s h w a te r ) , “ S p a ce

BIO

Guillaume Bernardi

IS A TORONTO-BASED STAGE DIRECTOR WHOSE WORK COVERS A WIDE RANGE OF GENRES—FROM THEATRE AND OPERA TO MOVEMENT PIECES. RECENT DIRECTORIAL PROJECTS INCLUDE MOZART’S LE NOZZE DI FIGARO FOR FRANKFURT OPER AND MOLIÈRE’S GEORGE DANDIN FOR THÉÂTRE FRANÇAIS DE TORONTO; RECENTLY HE DIRECTED MOZART’S LE NOZZE DI FIGARO FOR THE CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY. HE IS THE COORDINATOR OF THE DRAMA STUDIES PROGRAMME AT GLENDON COLLEGE, THE BILINGUAL FACULTY OF YORK UNIVERSITY. HE OBTAINED HIS DOCTORATE IN FRENCH AND ITALIAN LITERATURE AT THE PARIS-SORBONNE UNIVERSITY AND LATER STUDIED DRAMA AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO.

and

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Nield),

Border and

Citizen”

(Sophie

“Performing

Ciudad

J u á re z ” ( V i c t o r M a n u e l d e G u e v a r a ) .

Alongside panels, the conference hosted performances by, among others, people with learning disabilities (Power House and People First), one of the UK's leading performance artists, Bobby Baker, (whose piece on mental health issues included the audience being pelted by buns), and a project about (be)longing created by Curious (Leslie Hill and Helen Paris), who worked with and interviewed various groups of sex workers in London. Lebanese artist Rabih Mroué used his extensive collection of

PERFORMING RIGHTS / by Megan Macdonald

newspaper clippings in a performance about the happens around the world. From the first plenary disappeared people in Lebanon: his story is of a session, I found myself questioning tensions civil servant who was murdered to cover up between politics and human rights in relation to government mismanagement of money. Three the difficulties that geographic borders present, artists delivered papers about how they are not only in the case of aid workers trying to get addressing Israeli/Palestinian issues in their into various countries around the world, but also current work: Horit Peled, a lecturer and artist in in their attempts to cross internally from one area Israel, presented work on a group of women to another. (Machsom Watch) who stage non-violent resistance at the Palestinian and Israeli checkpoints; The Panel on “Public Appearance” artist and curator Rayelle Nieman (based in questioned cultural (inter)relations and how the Switzerland and Cairo) looked at how the personal is political: any time I cross a border, I arrangement and perform my own operation of checknationality, the freeIt also examined how border points affect the doms I enjoy and Palestinians and how those denied to areas (both geographic and psyartistic strategies can others. It also chological) can not only segregate, be used as resistance; examined how border but they can also provide space and Barbara Rose areas (both geoHaum (a lecturer at graphic and psychofrom which to view the “other.” New York University) logical) can not only Sometimes only from the border described a piece she segregate, but they is it possible to perceive what was involved with that can also provide was co-created and space from which to differentiates one place from performed simultaneously view the “other.” another—that the social and cultural by performers in New Sometimes only positions occupied by any person York and Tel Aviv. from the border is it are arbitrary and constructed, possible to perceive Pe r fo r m a n ce what differentiates and that these positions need to conferences, I’m told, one place from be made more visible. are different from, for another—that the example, English or social and cultural Political Science conferences. My friends were positions occupied by any person are arbitrary either fascinated or disgusted when I described and constructed, and that these positions need performances that included being pelted by buns to be made more visible. —or in the case of Mapa Corpo: Interactive Rituals “Memory Rites” highlighted the problems for the New Millennium, a time-based piece by that arise when a conscious effort is made to Guillermo Gómez-Peña and Roberto Sifuentes— “make” people remember. Traumatic events often that involved offal, acupuncture (the colonising of link physical and psychic spaces in ways that are the body symbolised by needles with national both sacred and painful. Such spaces expose flags) and wild costuming (addressing the cultural inequalities, such as the allegations that concepts of maps, borders, and the human body black residents of New Orleans were treated in the post-9/11 world). Yet these performances differently during the crisis. Yet they also serve to broadened my concept of “rights” to include those unite those involved; for example, all cultures in of the mental health patient and the political South Africa had to work together to implement refugee, as well as the right of the human body the changes made possible by the Truth and not to be maimed, abused, ignored, or forgotten Reconciliation Commission. In many cases, the (through the use of costumes and tableau, Mapa sites of trauma become places of pilgrimage for Corpo used the bodies of performers as well as both the affected and the tourist: survivors/ the audience to bring attention to countries and descendents as well as tourists are visitors to issues that are not in the news). former concentration camps in Germany or to the sites of African slave deportations. The ability to During my attendance of this, my first travel gives people from diverse cultures the major international conference, the idea of opportunity to cross borders—in these cases geoborders provided me with a handle for the broad graphic as well as cultural—to visit that which topic of human rights. It provided a focus for they find compelling but to which they may have no personal connection. While there is no discussion and reflection, and drew my attention “reason” not to visit Hiroshima, the reasons for to the limitations of my own psychological borders pilgrimage by tourists to such sites include as I realised that the work presented at the interest in war/conflict, history, and peace as well conference was only a small indication of what as cultural voyeurism.

PERFORMING RIGHTS / by Megan Macdonald

the Middle East manifested themselves in a small The inherent problem of “keeping alive” seminar room in London. the past while “putting to rest” the traumas associated with past events becomes more The personal and the political overlapped complicated when the culture of origin has to consistently during this conference, as I thought involve or work with others. For example, German through my own relationship to human rights. As concentration camp sites, many of which are someone with dual nationality —a commodity in located outside Germany, can provide emotional today’s world—and given that my nationalities are or psychological closure for survivors; but if the Canadian and American, I have my own only people who visited were those directly preconceptions about what my “rights” are. affected (or their families), the sites would have With these two passports, I can travel almost to close. Tourists provide revenue, and anywhere in the world. Both governments would researchers from around the world contribute to likely come to my defence if I were imprisoned displays and information. Each country (Germany, unlawfully, and within my own country I do not Poland, the Czech Republic, etc.) knows that normally worry those who visit come for about my rights. In a variety of reasons— fact, that is one of The tourist's demand to family, school trips, the overwhelming war/conflict research; imagine the event is in conflict ideas of the conthus, the design and with the survivor's need to forget, ference: that those marketing of the sites or at least come to terms with, who have rights do has to attract more people not worry about than those directly an event. them and those affected. The resulting without do not know influx of tourists has an of them. In other words, those most in need in the impact on how remembering will happen, raising world today do not have the time to read through questions about who has the “right” to remember. the declaration of human rights and freedoms— The tourist's demand to imagine the event is in that is the luxury of people who live in more conflict with the survivor's need to forget, or at prosperous and stable countries. least come to terms with, an event. When human rights are involved, the whole situation becomes The borders between countries shown on even more complicated: Will there be monuments maps are, of course, simply lines drawn on paper. and sites of the genocide in Darfur to visit in the But their effects are real. Some borders, such as future? The ethical positions at play include the wall between Israelis and Palestinians, have whether it is questionable to generate profit from been made physically manifest in the landscape. the suffering of others. Or does the passage of Other borders are left permeable, or at least time make it acceptable for outsiders to gaze at permeable for certain people. The concept of the traces of human rights abuses if these are borders bleeds into other areas of life, and framed by sites, guides, and brochures? psychological or spiritual borders are just as imposing and restrictive as their physical counterRights concerning remembrance and parts. Yet borders also create spaces—spaces representation in the production of artistic where people wait in lines, passing from one place expression became central to the panel addressing to another; or, in the case of psychological the crossing of the cultural (and very physical) borders, spaces where thoughts can circulate Israeli-Palestinian borders in a rather unexpected and sometimes permeate the boundary. PSi #12 way. Following the presentations, those who created such a border space. asked questions seemed compelled to preface their remarks by stating their cultural background. At no other panel that I attended did people feel the need to clarify where they were from in order to legitimate their comments or questions. Whatever the reasons, the tensions that exist in

NOTES

1 The program of the conference is available at www.psi12.qmul.ac.uk/index.html

BIO

Megan Macdonald IS COMPLETING A PH. D. AT QUEEN MARY, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON ON THE PERFORMANCE OF BELIEF. HER RESEARCH FOCUSES ON RITUALS AND HOW BELIEF IS PERFORMED IN BOTH SECULAR AND RELIGIOUS CONTEXTS. ORIGINALLY FROM PEI, SHE HAS WORKED WITH THEATRE COMPANIES AND HAS PERFORMED IN CANADA, THE US, AND GERMANY. IN 2006, SHE COLLABORATED ON AN INSTALLATION IN LONDON WITH FIVE OTHER WOMAN VISUAL ARTISTS ON BELIEF AND THE EVERYDAY WORK ENVIRONMENTS OF THE CITY.