Towards an Oral History of Performance and Live Art in the British Isles
Lead Research Organisation:
University of the Arts London
Department Name: Central Saint Martin's College
Abstract
The theme of this workshop series is the oral history of performance and live art in the British Isles since the mid-1960s, when non mainstream performance and time-based art began to be recognized as a significant part of art practice. Its aim is to prepare the groundwork for a nationally and internationally significant oral history project that will record and archive the voices of the artists, curators, directors, arts administrators, producers, critics and writers who have contributed to the field.
The yearlong workshop series will address the methodological, research design and intellectual issues involved in setting up a full oral history project in the field, and assess the ways in which it may help to inform future practice in curating, education and scholarship. The workshops will be cow ordinated by a steering group whose membership reflects expertise in the field, and skills and track records in research design and project management.
The workshop series will bring together invited participants in the field, and will include arts administrators and critics, artists and scholars. It will reflect an emphasis on the significance of local histories and knowledge of performance and live art. The workshops will address a variety of issues in the curating, collecting and archiving of performance histories across the whole of the British Isles. This principle is reflected in the membership of the Steering Group, and in the holding of regional workshops.
Existing archives, and the experience of those who curate them, will inform this workshop series. They include Wimbledon School of Art's 'The Development of British Theatre Design 1945-2000: An Oral History'. Live Art Archives, at the University of Bristol: Arts Archives, curated by Peter Hulton at Exeter University; and the AHRC funded partnership between the British Library and Sheffield University, The Theatre Archive Project, which deals with British theatre from 1945-1968. Each of these is complementary to the field we now wish to address, and each has important methodological and curatorial approaches on which we wish to draw.
The outcomes will be both an application for a larger project, and a web presence that will help to generate, archive and publicise the workshop findings The findings of the workshops will be addressed to a wide group of users: art, cultural and performance historians, scholars, artists and students, and to a wider public interested in the ways in which the arts have contributed to public culture and collective cultural memory.
The yearlong workshop series will address the methodological, research design and intellectual issues involved in setting up a full oral history project in the field, and assess the ways in which it may help to inform future practice in curating, education and scholarship. The workshops will be cow ordinated by a steering group whose membership reflects expertise in the field, and skills and track records in research design and project management.
The workshop series will bring together invited participants in the field, and will include arts administrators and critics, artists and scholars. It will reflect an emphasis on the significance of local histories and knowledge of performance and live art. The workshops will address a variety of issues in the curating, collecting and archiving of performance histories across the whole of the British Isles. This principle is reflected in the membership of the Steering Group, and in the holding of regional workshops.
Existing archives, and the experience of those who curate them, will inform this workshop series. They include Wimbledon School of Art's 'The Development of British Theatre Design 1945-2000: An Oral History'. Live Art Archives, at the University of Bristol: Arts Archives, curated by Peter Hulton at Exeter University; and the AHRC funded partnership between the British Library and Sheffield University, The Theatre Archive Project, which deals with British theatre from 1945-1968. Each of these is complementary to the field we now wish to address, and each has important methodological and curatorial approaches on which we wish to draw.
The outcomes will be both an application for a larger project, and a web presence that will help to generate, archive and publicise the workshop findings The findings of the workshops will be addressed to a wide group of users: art, cultural and performance historians, scholars, artists and students, and to a wider public interested in the ways in which the arts have contributed to public culture and collective cultural memory.
People |
ORCID iD |
| Claire MacDonald (Principal Investigator) |