The un-peaceful Kingdom of Koreta
Vlatko Ilić
IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta works with conventions that constitute one theatrical performance, that is, translates one public event into a socially recognizable act; with public space, precise duration, ‘a text’ (which in this case is a reason, rather then the proposal for the performance), positions of authors, and performers, audience, that is, with appropriate technical means and social infrastructure.
Spaces of IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta performing, spaces of an assembly, are ones already consented, like a theatre building is, to negotiations and constitutions of meanings. We could trust that processes of signifying in theatre act unilaterally however, a show is always performed with an audience. It is the act of shaping common experiences into a totality, which, as such can be included into some of rational meta-orders. Meanings of a performance are ‘a result’ for which the audience is always in-directly responsible. ‘Drama’ begins in the moment when the propositions for the composition of IX Government are handed to the audience, and the voting, as its release, leads to the end, the Government constitution. Thus, although the structure of this event might seem anti-narrative, it is based upon the principle of casue and effect, and it corresponds to the mechanisms of ‘the text’, even if it is not expectantly drama-like structured. Drama is enacting within the narratives of History, political parties and coalitions, the very materiality of the event and uncertainity of the elections. Its protagonists are: the actress, unmistaken signifier of the theatre space (the historical object of a gaze, traditionally the least visible and most desired, the source of Others’ texts), then the author of Koreta, the initiator of action, the director, the one responsible for the dynamics of intensities that will follow, and the audience.
IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta, is it a theatre performance? The act of naming something with a specific term is always a metter of social contract, and that is exactly IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta offering. Not because it might be easier, or not, to describe every live act as a performance, but because by doing so, by artists’ self-naming, one logical problem is imposed to the (local) art scene What are the consequences on naming IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta a theatre performance?
A theatre performance is confronted with the heritige of its own discipline, whose established basic regulations became unsustainable. The processes of identification are taken over by mediums such as film or television are, a completeness of a sistem is undermined by the interactive programms such as reality shows, and entities of time and space are not anymore part of contemporary everyday experience. At the same time, theatre has to answer to challenges of the time in which it emerges, to its acceleration and fragmentation, as well as to its phenomenons: Internet, web streaming, genetic engineering, etc. Is it possible to think theatre as an artistic practice? Contemporary art pieces are often defined as art practices, through which it is insisted on its effects, and the effects of the environment on it. This terminology switch signifies the change of thinking meanings, they are not clear, self-considered and unchangable, but rather erratic and uncertain, and they are always already in processes of constituting. How does theatre translates this switch into the language of its own discipline, if a performance exists only as an unique materialisation (in a specific time and space, determed by temperature, sound, bodies of performers and audience members, number of audience, etc.). If theatre is always already a practice how to re-territorialize its field in order to achieve critical action?
IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta is created, not only thorughout the nineteen months long collaboration of one visual artist with the theatre director, but as a consequance of re-thinking context, the artistic and the social one, in which this piece is performing/performed. Thus, IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta is a theatre performance that (1) does not stands for, mirrows or represents; it insists that it is one unique experience, one of materialisations of the meta-matrix, through emphasizing the consequances that will cause. By sheer presence, simple manuel-corporal gesture each member of the audience becomes part of one state’s meta-narrative construction processes. This performance (2) creates its ‘text’ exactly while performing, through which the ‘text’ endageres its legitimacy by perturbing its models of representation. Does a body of the actress signify a state as hierarchical indestructible entity, or is that body-machine actually a state-engine for production of meanings? The author of Koreta and the director, are they real or fictional, faithfull to themselves or to the gaze, or they identities are always already the result of constant production/performance? This performance (3) works with the dysfunctionality of closed and concluded identities; the repressentation is replaced with a dialogue, negotiation, a common experience that is different for everyone, with traces of meanings, correct and false directions, rescinding or omitting interpretation. Finally, IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta (4) does not act in public or private space, but in the space that is both public and private, that is both dominantly artistic, such as galeries or theatres are, and socially-parliamentaristic, as an assambly room is, in order to introduce un-peacefulness. Un-peacefulness that will initiate the rethinking of the resposnibility that artists and audience have in the processes of constituting ‘reality’.
Acting and theatre should be constantly re-invented
Hans-Thies Lehmann
Vlatko Ilić
IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta works with conventions that constitute one theatrical performance, that is, translates one public event into a socially recognizable act; with public space, precise duration, ‘a text’ (which in this case is a reason, rather then the proposal for the performance), positions of authors, and performers, audience, that is, with appropriate technical means and social infrastructure.
Spaces of IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta performing, spaces of an assembly, are ones already consented, like a theatre building is, to negotiations and constitutions of meanings. We could trust that processes of signifying in theatre act unilaterally however, a show is always performed with an audience. It is the act of shaping common experiences into a totality, which, as such can be included into some of rational meta-orders. Meanings of a performance are ‘a result’ for which the audience is always in-directly responsible. ‘Drama’ begins in the moment when the propositions for the composition of IX Government are handed to the audience, and the voting, as its release, leads to the end, the Government constitution. Thus, although the structure of this event might seem anti-narrative, it is based upon the principle of casue and effect, and it corresponds to the mechanisms of ‘the text’, even if it is not expectantly drama-like structured. Drama is enacting within the narratives of History, political parties and coalitions, the very materiality of the event and uncertainity of the elections. Its protagonists are: the actress, unmistaken signifier of the theatre space (the historical object of a gaze, traditionally the least visible and most desired, the source of Others’ texts), then the author of Koreta, the initiator of action, the director, the one responsible for the dynamics of intensities that will follow, and the audience.
IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta, is it a theatre performance? The act of naming something with a specific term is always a metter of social contract, and that is exactly IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta offering. Not because it might be easier, or not, to describe every live act as a performance, but because by doing so, by artists’ self-naming, one logical problem is imposed to the (local) art scene What are the consequences on naming IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta a theatre performance?
A theatre performance is confronted with the heritige of its own discipline, whose established basic regulations became unsustainable. The processes of identification are taken over by mediums such as film or television are, a completeness of a sistem is undermined by the interactive programms such as reality shows, and entities of time and space are not anymore part of contemporary everyday experience. At the same time, theatre has to answer to challenges of the time in which it emerges, to its acceleration and fragmentation, as well as to its phenomenons: Internet, web streaming, genetic engineering, etc. Is it possible to think theatre as an artistic practice? Contemporary art pieces are often defined as art practices, through which it is insisted on its effects, and the effects of the environment on it. This terminology switch signifies the change of thinking meanings, they are not clear, self-considered and unchangable, but rather erratic and uncertain, and they are always already in processes of constituting. How does theatre translates this switch into the language of its own discipline, if a performance exists only as an unique materialisation (in a specific time and space, determed by temperature, sound, bodies of performers and audience members, number of audience, etc.). If theatre is always already a practice how to re-territorialize its field in order to achieve critical action?
IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta is created, not only thorughout the nineteen months long collaboration of one visual artist with the theatre director, but as a consequance of re-thinking context, the artistic and the social one, in which this piece is performing/performed. Thus, IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta is a theatre performance that (1) does not stands for, mirrows or represents; it insists that it is one unique experience, one of materialisations of the meta-matrix, through emphasizing the consequances that will cause. By sheer presence, simple manuel-corporal gesture each member of the audience becomes part of one state’s meta-narrative construction processes. This performance (2) creates its ‘text’ exactly while performing, through which the ‘text’ endageres its legitimacy by perturbing its models of representation. Does a body of the actress signify a state as hierarchical indestructible entity, or is that body-machine actually a state-engine for production of meanings? The author of Koreta and the director, are they real or fictional, faithfull to themselves or to the gaze, or they identities are always already the result of constant production/performance? This performance (3) works with the dysfunctionality of closed and concluded identities; the repressentation is replaced with a dialogue, negotiation, a common experience that is different for everyone, with traces of meanings, correct and false directions, rescinding or omitting interpretation. Finally, IX Government Constitution of the Kingdom of Koreta (4) does not act in public or private space, but in the space that is both public and private, that is both dominantly artistic, such as galeries or theatres are, and socially-parliamentaristic, as an assambly room is, in order to introduce un-peacefulness. Un-peacefulness that will initiate the rethinking of the resposnibility that artists and audience have in the processes of constituting ‘reality’.
Acting and theatre should be constantly re-invented
Hans-Thies Lehmann
