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oapen-20.500.12657-632182024-03-28T08:18:54Z Viewers in Distress Mihaylova, Stefka G. avant-garde performance, contemporary performance in Britain and the United States, feminist theory and performance, affect theory and performance, critical-race theory and performance, performance and liberalism, performance and neoliberalism, Sarah Kane, Suzan-Lori Parks, Forced Entertainment, Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti, Young Jean Lee thema EDItEUR::A The Arts::AT Performing arts::ATD Theatre studies thema EDItEUR::A The Arts::AF The Arts: art forms::AFK Non-graphic and electronic art forms::AFKP Performance art Conventional notions of avant-garde art suggest innovative artists rebelling against artistic convention and social propriety, shocking unwilling audiences into new ways of seeing and living. Viewers in Distress tells a different story. Beginning in the tumultuous 1990s, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and in the wake of the Los Angeles riots, rebellious spectators in American and British theaters broke with theater decorum and voiced their radical interpretations of shows that were not meant to be radical. In doing so, audiences tried to understand the complex racial, gender, and religious politics of their times, while insisting that liberal societies fulfill their promise of dignity for all. Stefka Mihaylova argues that such non-conforming viewing amounts to an avant-garde of its own: a bold reimagining of how we live together and tell stories of our lives together, aimed to achieve liberalism’s promise. In telling this story, she analyzes the production and reception politics of works by Susan-Lori Parks, Sarah Kane, Forced Entertainment, Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti, and Young Jean Lee, as well as non-theatrical controversies such as the conflict over Halloween costumes at Yale in 2015. At the core of spectators’ discontent, this book suggests, is an effort to figure out how to get along with people different from ourselves in the diverse U.S. and British societies in which we live. 2023-06-06T08:07:50Z 2023-06-06T08:07:50Z 2023 book 9780472076321 9780472056323 https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/63218 eng application/pdf Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International 9780472903702.pdf University of Michigan Press 10.3998/mpub.11504996 10.3998/mpub.11504996 e07ce9b5-7a46-4096-8f0c-bc1920e3d889 9780472076321 9780472056323 222 open access
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Conventional notions of avant-garde art suggest innovative artists rebelling against artistic convention and social propriety, shocking unwilling audiences into new ways of seeing and living. Viewers in Distress tells a different story. Beginning in the tumultuous 1990s, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and in the wake of the Los Angeles riots, rebellious spectators in American and British theaters broke with theater decorum and voiced their radical interpretations of shows that were not meant to be radical. In doing so, audiences tried to understand the complex racial, gender, and religious politics of their times, while insisting that liberal societies fulfill their promise of dignity for all. Stefka Mihaylova argues that such non-conforming viewing amounts to an avant-garde of its own: a bold reimagining of how we live together and tell stories of our lives together, aimed to achieve liberalism’s promise. In telling this story, she analyzes the production and reception politics of works by Susan-Lori Parks, Sarah Kane, Forced Entertainment, Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti, and Young Jean Lee, as well as non-theatrical controversies such as the conflict over Halloween costumes at Yale in 2015. At the core of spectators’ discontent, this book suggests, is an effort to figure out how to get along with people different from ourselves in the diverse U.S. and British societies in which we live.
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