Location: Zoom Room 3
Zoom Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/4791764100
Moderator: Cyrus Sundar Singh
Abstracts:
Magdalina El-Masry, “Performance in the Age of Early Cinema”
The cinema of attractions, which Tom Gunning first defined in 1986 as a cinema of “exhibitionist confrontation rather than diagetic absorption,” predates narrative cinema as it developed in the 20th century’s first decade. This new medium quickly developed away from its unique potential and instead towards the replication of theatre and literature. By modelling itself on traditional artforms, cinema aimed to legitimize itself as a new artform rather than simply another technology of entertainment. As cinema found its footing in the transitory space between mass culture and high art, it sought to move away from the former towards the latter. How, then, did performers adapt to this new avenue of exhibition? In this context, I will focus on Loïe Fuller’s Serpentine Dance and Sarah Bernhardt’s foray into the cinema. The Serpentine Dance, created by Fuller in 1891, became one of the most popular types of performance to be shot and exhibited by film pioneers like Edison and the Lumières in the late 1890s. These films rarely, if ever, starred Fuller herself. Meanwhile, Bernhardt, a world-famous theatre actress, was approached by filmmakers to star in motion picture productions of classic works of theatre, in the hopes that her renown in spaces of high art would help to pull the cinema into legitimacy as an artform. By comparing Fuller and Bernhardt, I will examine how performance was negotiated in a time in which exhibition and spectatorship were rapidly transformed by the development of the film industry and its new technologies.
Francesca Marini, “Inheritance, Mentorship and Archival Practices: The Teatro delle Moline in Bologna, Italy”
This paper discusses the history and significance of the Teatro delle Moline, born as an experimental theatre in Bologna, Italy, in 1973. Founded by Luigi Gozzi and Marinella Manicardi, the theatre established itself as a hub of artistic experimentation, and is still active. The theatre is mostly known for its original works and adaptations, including Gozzi’s theatrical adaptations of Freud’s case histories (such as Freud e il caso di Dora/Freud and the Case of Dora, 1979), and Gozzi’s play L’attentato /The Assassination Attempt (2003), about the death of a young boy, accused of attempting to assassinate Benito Mussolini in 1926, in Bologna. The history of the Teatro delle Moline is analyzed within the contexts of inheritance, mentorship and archival practices. Inheritance manifests itself in experimental theatre’s traditions and incarnations, as well as in the physical and cultural roots of the Teatro in Bologna. Mentorship is demonstrated by the artistic and professional mentorship of Gozzi and Manicardi, who have nurtured generations of artists and scholars, including the author of this paper. Archival practices and performance histories are represented by the physical archives of the Teatro, the writings of Gozzi and Manicardi, and, most of all, by their embodied knowledge and their lasting relationships with individuals and communities. This paper argues that the Teatro delle Moline embodies different modes of inheritance, mentorship, and archival practices, through a web of relations and ideas sustained by a wide-reaching passion–for performance and social commentary–rooted in the culture of Bologna and in the history of Italy.
Izuu Nwankwọ , “From Trauma to Triumph: The circuitous journeys of being male and Black in Mason and Cameron”
This paper comparatively discusses Keith Antar Mason’s and Ryan Calais Cameron’s explications of the multitudinous quandaries of being Black and male in their respective plays, For Black Boys Who Have Considered Homicide When the Streets Were Too Much and For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Hue Gets Too Heavy. Built into the mould of Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, these plays centre on Black masculinities, particularly detailing Black male experiences in navigating systemic oppression, personal trauma, and the quest for self-actualization in environments where they are othered by their gender and phenotype. Using performance and textual analyses, this study examines the specific ways Mason and Cameron articulate the struggles and triumphs of Black men. By juxtaposing the two plays, this paper highlights how agential personal accounts and autobiographical storytelling can reinscribe Black masculinities and counter age-old misrepresentations. The analyses reveal how the characters’ journeys challenge monolithic representations and advocate for a more inclusive and empathetic understanding of the struggles and resilience of Black males. In sum, citing Mason’s American and Cameron’s British backgrounds, this study highlights how both texts present multi-layered portraits of Black masculinity by pointedly emphasizing the intersection of immigration status, race, and gender in mental health and overall well-being. This paper thus contributes to the broader discourse on Black male identity in contemporary literature and performance, emphasizing the need to honour their complexity and humanity.
Karen O’Meara, “Inheriting, Negotiating, and Rehearsing Change: An Arts-Based Mentorship Model for Ethical Performance Futures”
This paper introduces an innovative model for applying arts-based participatory action research (PAR) to negotiate the complex inheritances in transition that shape youth identity. The discussion centers on five years of reflections from the Experiential Arts Mentorship Program (EAMP), a highly successful, multi-level partnership in York Region, Ontario, that has engaged over 15,000 students.
The EAMP serves as an innovation hub for rehearsing change. By empowering youth to explore counter-narratives through creative process work, the program positions the classroom as a site for Frantz Fanon’s “ethical transit” (148). This transition actively negotiates problematic inheritances, such as assimilation, racism, and colonial violence, to foster belonging and resilience.
Framed by Indigenous values of relationality and reciprocity and committed to decolonizing research practices, this teacher action research examined how arts-based mentorship fosters student agency. Dissertation findings reveal that caring mentorship increases self-confidence and facilitates the co-creation of collective narratives, propelling a move toward equitable performance futures.
The presentation will also discuss the strategic use of ethnodrama. Following my dissertation research, I engaged 60 elementary students in co-creating the ethnodrama “Transformation” to translate research findings into public discourse. This participatory approach establishes performance and rehearsal as the core mechanism for both generating new knowledge and actively shaping a more equitable social narrative. This work advances the understanding of ethnodrama’s potential for co-creating knowledge with participants, offering vital insights for leveraging community inquiry to rehearse and actively influence new transformative approaches to inheritance studies in theatre.
Fanon, Frantz. Black Skin, White Masks. Pluto Press, 1967.
Biographies:
Magdalina El-Masry is a PhD student in the Department of English at Dalhousie University, with a focus on 20th-century American literature, film history, and performance. Originally from Montreal, Quebec, she completed her MA in Film and Moving Image Studies at Concordia University.
Dr. Francesca Marini (she/her) is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Associate Professor at Texas A&M University, College of Performance, Visualization and Fine Arts. Research: theatre history; performing arts documentation and archiving. Teaching: aesthetics of activism, devised theatre, applied theatre, arts documentation. Degrees: PhD, Library and Information Science-UCLA; BA, Film and Theatre Studies-University of Bologna.
Izuu Nwankwọ is an assistant professor at the Centre for Drama, Theatre, and Performance Studies, University of Toronto, Canada. His research interests revolve around African and African diaspora theatre, performances, and popular culture. He has researched particularly taboo, self-censorship, and the limits of humour in African (diaspora) stand-up and online humour acts.
Dr. Karen O’Meara is the co-founder of the YRDSB/York U Experiential Arts Mentorship Program (EAMP). This multi-level program is in its 6th year and is designed to promote well-being, student voice and access to culturally responsive, arts-based performance work. Karen has a PhD from York University and her primary research focuses on how mentorship programming can support: student agency, identity and centering student voice within meaningful arts-based experiences.