rethinking why performance matters through the matter of performance
3. Potentials of Performance

3 October 2012

to you the spectator

 

 

Dear You

 

  I am already thinking of the letter that will be waiting for you at the Yard’s Theatre. What will I write in it? Then I am thinking of the performative frame that allows this to happen, the frame that creates our future communication, our forthcoming meeting on the 26th and 27th of October. And then I think more broadly of performance. Does it matter? Does performance matter? Why? Does it matter that I will write to you? Does it matter that a letter will be waiting for you there, in Yard Theatre? Does it matter that we meet within such performative frames? Does it matter that a group of great people have dealt with such questions for several months now, playing my game; writing to me and – through me – to each other?[1] Does it matter that the list created by these people now waits for you to be expanded into multiple directions? Why?

  I am thinking of you walking in the space of the Yard Theatre looking for your letter. Or I am thinking of you walking in there and suddenly finding a letter that is addressed to you, without even knowing it. Will you be there? Will you read your letter? Will you reply to it? Will you share your reply?

  I am thinking of you finding that letter, reading it and then stepping on the stage of the theatre. I don’t know what you will do there; things that you may often do or things that you rarely do or things that you never do or things that you would not even imagine doing. It is exactly my ignorance of your actions on that stage that opens up to the potentials of our meeting: the image of You on stage discussing the potentials of performance, continuing the list, offering various perspectives on notions and understandings of potentiality. Creating a performance in a way that I do not know and I do not wish to know or imagine, so that I can explore its potentials on the 26th and 27th of October during our meeting. In performance.  

  Doesn’t it matter?

  Looking forward to reading from you!

 

All my best thoughts,

Danae

 

 


[1] A heartfelt thanks to all those who contributed to the email list of You Have One Unread Message either with their writings or their silence. These are: Eleftheria Rapti, Ioanna Asimakopoulou, Bojana Kunst, Joe Kelleher, Efrosini Protopapa, Myriam Van Imshoot, Reveka Tsiligaridou, Konstantina Georgelou, Ivana Müller, Karen Cristopher, Maaike Bleeker, Annalaura Alifuoco, Karin Verbruggen and George Papadatos.

 

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