part of BMO Lab’s ‘Staging Infrastructures’ Winter Lecture Series
Friday, March 27, 2024, 4-6 pm
A recording of the lecture:
Where does technology lead in the context of performing arts? In the logic of the discipline, technology is often equated with an extended concept of stagecraft, a domain of devices that are of interest in regards to their artistic use and the aesthetic experiences they enable. But a closer look at performance in practice reveals something else: a deeply technological matter, a plurality of entangled socio-technical ensembles, in contrast to the enclosed assembly of humans that theory claims. It is this radical change in perspective, the methodological repercussions it entails and the epistemological questions it provokes, that is interesting about technologies in performance. This talk shows how prevailing ways of making scholarly sense of performance are challenged by the consideration of technology. It tracks down the changing meaning of technology in the course of a cultural historiography of theater; and turning to the transdisciplinary field of Science and Technology Studies, proposes a relational materialist concept of technology. It concludes with sketching the consequences of adopting a corresponding symmetrical perspective and a strong program for Theatre Studies.
Dr. Ulf Otto is Professor of Theater Studies and Intermediality at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich. His research focuses on the interdependencies of theatricality and technology in industrial as well as post-industrial cultures, and is informed by Science and Technology Studies. Recent publications include the monograph The Theatre of Electricity (2020, English 2023) and the anthology Aesthetics of Intervention (Theater der Zeit 2022). His articles have can be read in TDR, Theatre Research International, and Theater Journal. Current projects are pursuing praxeographical and computational methods. More info: www.ulf-otto.de
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