Leader: Peter Farbridge
Location: Room 7-425, 7th Floor – John Molson Building, 1450 Rue Guy – Concordia University
In-Person Session
Many performing arts organizations have recognized a need for more diversity and equity in practice and to incorporate marginalized experiences and voices in performance to be more relevant to the communities to whom they perform. However, the challenge remains: Once representation of diverse communities is achieved, how do we cultivate ongoing ethical relationships in creation and rehearsal spaces?
We propose an approach aligned with the concept of ethical relationality that could be used in performing arts creation and rehearsal spaces to enable ethical co-creation by inviting and relating with diverse beliefs, perspectives, knowledge and experiences to contribute to more representative arts culture. Ethical relationality is an ecological understanding of human relationality that does not deny difference, but rather seeks to understand more deeply how our different histories and experiences position us in relation to each other. It requires the ability to recognize and hold the tension between different perspectives, allowing them to exist in and enrich the same space, while not attempting to force consensus or sameness.
One possible tool of ethical relationality in rehearsal practice is called an “ethical tapestry”, a dynamic multimedia document that reveals at specific points in time what behaviours and contexts are conducting the intersubjective relationships in a rehearsal practice. The approach we suggest is intended to be a starting point that can be fully developed and tailored to each specific context. They are not simply principles to state at the beginning of a rehearsal or to include in policy, but guidance for ongoing conscious interaction with the people, artifacts, and spaces in and of rehearsal.
Peter Farbridge, Concordia University
Peter is a theatre actor and creator working in Montreal, and founding co-artistic director of the Modern Times Stage Company from 1989 to 2022. He coordinates Postmarginal: Inclusive Performing Arts, a project that he initiated at Modern Times, which seeks to encourage new forms of theatre practice fuelled by the practice of marginalized artists. He has an MA in Anthropology and Theatre and joined the faculty of Concordia University as Artist-in-Residence in 2022.