Digital resources in the Social Sciences and Humanities OpenEdition Our platforms OpenEdition Books OpenEdition Journals Hypotheses Calenda Libraries OpenEdition Freemium Follow us

Keynote «Mediating Cultural Meanders: Dance, Narration, Music» Gannat, France, 25-28 July, 2019

Nic Leonhardt, Director of the Centre of GTH, has been invited as a keynote speaker of the conference Indigenous Languages, Traditional Music and Dance within an Intercultural Performance/ Langues autochtones, musiques et danses traditionelles au sein de performances interculturelles in Gannat (Auvergne, France). The conference, organized by Vikrant Kishore (Australia) and Etienne Rougier (France) takes place along with the Festival des Cultures du Monde, which is a part of UNESCO‘s intangible cultural heritage. Gannat is famous for the festival that takes place every summer since 1974. The conference will be the first of its time.

Nic Leonhardt’s tal “Mediating Cultural Meanders: Dance, Narration, Music” will discuss the circulation of intangible cultural phenomena using the examples of Thai choreographer Pichet Klunchun and his performance “Nijinsky Siam” as well as the figure and stories of Mullah/Hodja Nasreddin.

New Publication: Theater über Ozeane. Vermittler transatlantischen Austauschs (1890-1925) by Nic Leonhardt

The latest monograph by Nic Leonhardt, director of the Centre for Global Theatre History @LMU Munich, Theater über Ozeane. Vermittler transatlantischen Austauschs (1890-1925) (in German), was published recently. The book is about the history of theatre business and follows the professional itineraries and business strategies of hitherto unknown theatrical agents, playbrokers and producers (among them Alice Kauser, Elizabeth Marbury, Richard Pitrot and H. B. Marinelli) who handled the transatlantic showbiz. Theater über Ozeane enters the infrastructural „backstage area“ of global and cultural mobility in the late 19th and early 20th century, and is based on a rich body of primary sources from archives in the United States and Europe. 

The book will be officially launched on Wednesday, 12 December, 6.30pm, at IBZ Munich, Amalienstraße  38

Nic Leonhardt: Theater über Ozeane. Vermittler transatlantischen Austauschs (1890-1925). Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 2018 (341 pages, 38 illustrations; hard cop ISBN 978-3-8471-0805-4. Info and Order here.



 

“Iste – Ille. Here and There”. Keynote by Nic Leonhardt on Global Theatre Histories (Stockholm, 22-24 Nov, 2018)

Nic Leonhardt, Director of the Centre for Global Theatre Histories, has been invited as a keynote speaker to the symposium “From Local to Global: Interrogating Performance Histories”. The symposium is organized by the Department of Culture and Aesthetics, University of Stockholm, Department of Culture and Aesthetics, and will take place at the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities.

In her talk, entitled Iste-Ille. Here and There. What and Where is Europe in a Global History of Theatre?, she will introduce into ways and methodological challenges of writing the history/ histories of the performing arts from a transnational and global perspective.

Conference Philanthropy, Development and the Arts: Histories and Theories (23-25 July, 2018), Final Programme

The final programme of our conference Philanthropy, Development and the Arts: Histories and Theories is now online and can be accessed here: Philanthropy Conference_23-25 July 2018_ final programme

dates:

Monday, 23 July, 5pm –

Wednesday, 25 July, 5:30pm

conference venue:

Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung – Südliches Schlossrondell 23 –80638 Munich

Keynote speakers:

Monday, 23 July, 6pm:

Volker Berghahn (Columbia University, New York City): American Foundations, the Arts, and high Politics (1898–2018)

Tuesday, 24 July, 11am:

Inderjeet Parmar (City University of London): Foundations of the US-led Liberal International Order: From the ‘Rise to Globalism’ to ‘America First’

Registration is mandatory. Please register via e-mail to Gwendolin Lehnerer indicating your name and affiilation: gwendolinlehnerer@yahoo.com

_______________________

#philanthropyconference2018 #DevelopingTheatre #PhilanthropyMunich #GTHCentre 

Sharon Lehner, Guest of GTHC, on Emerging Performance Archives (13 June, 12-1:30pm)

On Wednesday, 13 June, Sharon Lehner (Brooklyn, New York), currently guest of the Centre for Global Theatre Histories, will be talking about her work at the HAMM Archives of the Brooklyn Academy for Music in Brooklyn (BAM), N.Y.

Her talk, Emerging Performance Archives, is taking place in the context of the colloquium of the Department of Theatre Studies (TWM) at LMU Munich

Time: Wednesday, 13 June, from 12 (sharp) to 1:30pm.

Venue: room #109, Theatre Studies Munich, Georgenstrasse 11, 80799 Munich

The event is open to the public. Registration is not required.

Abstract

Performance is an ephemeral, impermanent experience. It is also typically collaborative, formed from a web of people, their relationships and ideas. Collecting and describing performance is fundamentally different from describing a physical object. That static repository model– archives as dusty, 19th century curio cabinet–has been replaced by a more contemporary living archive. A recent Google search for “Living Archive” brought up many thousands of hits. The term, appropriated by numerous disciplines, describes everything from open data projects in computer science programs to Asian Art Museums. While the use of the term Living Archive is applied differently across these projects, all seem to crave live-ness and who understands this better than those who create performance? Performance archives mirror the collaborative process they describe, creating webs of knowledge that can be connected back to the original event. Archiving performance is also practical, working with a dizzying array of media to collect, organize, describe, preserve, and make available objects related to performances, history, and people. We work with creators, performers, designers, photographers, videographers, subject area specialists, and numerous others. The process is open and creative, with discussion about how best to document and share work. Performing artists already understand the limits of representation and the power of embodied experience. In performance archives we attempt to reflect the complexity.

Biographical Note

Sharon Lehner has directed the BAM Hamm Archives in Brooklyn, New York since 1999. She holds degrees in Performance Studies and also in Historical Editing and Archival Management from New York University and has presented at conferences and published in both disciplines. She has served as a consultant to performance archives and acted as advisor to the Pina Bausch Archives from 2009-2017.  Recent projects include the launch of The Leon Levy BAM Digital Archive, an encyclopedic resource documenting the history of BAM, In Terms of Performance at BAM, Co-produced by BAM, the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, and UC Berkeley, an interactive installation exploring the terms that describe contemporary art and performance. Most recent publications include How to Create an Archive? Inheriting Dance: An Invitation from Pina ([transcript] Press, Verlag 2014) Forthcoming, BAM: The Next Wave Festival edited by Susan Yung and Steven Serafin and interview in the Routledge Companion to Digital Humanities in Theatre and Performance edited by Dr. Nic Leonhardt

 

 

Conference “Philanthropy, Development and the Arts” (23-25 July): preliminary programme online

From 23–25 July, the ERC project Developing Theatre will hold its first international conference at the Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung. International scholars of disciplines such as international relations, art studies, performance studies, and history as well as representatives of foundations and museums will gather in Munich for discussing Philanthropy, Development and the Arts: Histories and Theories.

The preliminary programme can be accessed here.

 

 

Keynote Lectures (open to the public, registration mandatory):

Monday, 23 July, 6pm: Volker Berghahn (Columbia University New York): American Foundations, the Arts, and High Politics, 1898-2018

Tuesday, 24 July, 11am: Inderjeet Parmar (London): Foundations of the US-led Liberal International Order: From the ‘Rise to Globalism’ to ‘America First’

Registration: We cordially welcome external guests to attend the conference and/ or the keynote lectures. Please note: registration is mandatory due to the house rules of the Siemens Stiftung. If you would like to register, please send an e-mail indicating your name, e-mail address, affiliation, and if you would like to register for the entire conference and/ or the keynote lectures, to project assistant Gwendolin Lehnerer (MA):  gwendolinlehnerer@yahoo.com

For regular updates on the conference, please also consult the Conference Website .

 

Doug Reside, PhD, Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Global Theatre History

We are very pleased to announce that Doug Reside, PhD, curator of the Billy Rose Collection at the Library of the Performing Arts, New York, will join the Centre for Global Theatre History, LMU Munich, as a visiting fellow in January 2018.

In close collaboration with the Centre’s Academy of Digital Humanities in Theatre Research, he will give a talk, teach a seminar for students of theatre studies, DH, media culture and dramaturgy of the LMU Munich and the Theatre Academy August Everding, and will be holding workshops for the research team of the ERC project Developing Theatre.

His talk How do you Catch A Cloud and Pin it Down: Preserving Digital Creativity on Wednesday, 17 January, 12-1:30pm, is open to the public and will be taking place at the Institute for Theatre Studies, Georgenstrasse 11, 80799 Munich, room #109.

Short biography Doug Reside

CfP: “Philanthropy, Development, and the Arts”, International Conference, 23-25 July, 2018

From 23-25 July, 2018, our ERC funded project Developing Theatre will be hosting its first international conference with a special focus on Philanthropy, Development and the Arts: Histories and Theories. At the conference, we seek to interrogate the impact of philanthropy on the field of arts – visual arts, theatre, music, dance, opera, drama education, etc. –  between the 19th and 21st centuries. The conference aims at discussing the work, impact, successes and failures of private and corporate philanthropy and NGOs, including semi-statist organizations such as the Goethe Institut, or the British Council, from the perspectives of history, cultural history, political sciences, art and theatre history.

We are looking for paper proposals addressing the following aspects:

  • Shifting discourses of philanthropy in respect to arts and cultural funding
  • Philanthropic and NGO initiatives in the arts in countries such as Africa, India, Chile, etc.
  • From colonialism to philanthropy: the de/re-colonization of cultural aid
  • Philanthropy vs./ the state: how non-governmental can non-governmental organizations be?
  • Case studies on the private funding of arts and artists with a special focus on development
  • Case studies on field officers, representatives and ‘arts experts’ in charge of philanthropic foundations and NGOs
  • Soft power: arts philanthropy and cultural diplomacy
  • Other related topics will also be considered.

The complete call for papers can be downloaded  here.

Deadline for paper proposals: 30 November, 2017.

The conference will take place from Monday, 23 to Wednesday, 25 July, 2018 at Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung, Munich.

A preliminary programme will be available by spring 2018.

For any inquiries, please do not hesitate to contact PD Dr Nic Leonhardt, Associate Director of the Developing Theatre Project: n.leonhardt@lmu.de.

 

 

 

Team “Developing Theatre” travelled to São Paulo.

     The ERC-Project “Developing Theatre“, led by Prof. Dr. Christopher Balme, was represented at the Annual Conference of the International Federation for Theatre Research (IFTR, 10th-14th July, 2017, São Paulo, Brazil) by Prof. Balme, Dr. Nic Leonhardt, Dr. Gautam Chakrabarti and Dr. Rashna D. Nicholson. The first three members spoke in a panel titled “Collective Modern Theater from the 1st Part of XXth Century and Beyond”. Prof. Balme spoke on “Theatrical modernism for the world: Theatrical Epistemic Communities 1920-1960”, and also introduced the ERC-Project to the audience, which was much larger than expected and necessitated a change of the venue to a larger room. He also demonstrated the beta-version of “Our History“, the Digital Humanities platform of the Project. There was, evidently, a lot of interest in this DH-interface and how it may redefine scholarly conceptualisations of global theatre history.

The ERC-Project “Developing Theatre” group, with Dr. Azadeh Sharifi (LMU-München).

Dr. Chakrabarti presented a paper, based on his sub-project within the ERC-Project, titled “The Red Bear has Awoken!: Soviet Engagement with Indian Theatre Artists in the Cold War”. He spoke about the Soviet connection of post-Independence India’s ‘progressive’ theatre. He sought, based on his archival and other researches since the beginning of the Project in end-2016, “to attempt a tentative theorisation of the Cold-War-era geopolitical spatialisation of Eurasian cultural geographies as a reactive and subversive function to Eastern Bloc conceptualisations of colonial modernity.”

Dr. Leonhardt‘s paper was titled ‘“…Enlarging the Boundaries of Human Knowledge“– by Means of Theatre: Multiple Theatricalities and the Philanthropic Agenda of Stabilizing Cultural Geographies after 1945’. She presented her research on various, mainly American philanthropists and the foundations established by them and sought to conceptualise philanthropy as a tool of cultural politics in the post-WW2 years. Both her paper and that of Dr. Chakrabarti led, during the Q&A, to animated discussions that underscored the current relevance of the research questions this Project seeks to foreground.

As part of the four-member “Developing Theatre” delegation, Dr. Nicholson spent most of her working hours at the Historiography Working Group. According to her, she “was moved by a series of thought-provoking keynote speeches, struck by the warmth and generosity of the conference volunteers who stood at all hours of the day at strategic points in Sao Paulo’s Butantã subway station and enjoyed the pão de queijo served up with our coffee each day.” We also noted the adequate presence of security personnel and are thankful to the organizers, from the University of São Paulo, for their special attention to the delegates’ well-being and security.The crowning glory of the conference was a farewell reception at an exciting theatrical space, which soon dissolved into dance and music that gave us a delightful impression of Brazilian joi de vivre!

Farewell reception.

The overall impression we had of the conference was that of a frenetic and dynamic environment that opened up multiple opportunities and pathways for dialogue and debate. We look forward to the next IFTR Conference in 2018 at Belgrade with pleasant expectations and fond memories of a colourful and productive experience in São Paulo.

The colourful houses of São Paulo.

Guest Lecture by Kate Elswit: “Tracing Dynamic Spatial Histories and Networks of Movement on the Move”

Ernst Oppler. Pavlova as bacchante. Drawing. (Public Domain)

The Centre for Global Theatre History cordially invites to a public talk by London based reader and researcher Kate Elswit ( (Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London)  on Tracing Dynamic Spatial histories and Networks of Movement on the Move on Wednesday, 14 June, 12-1:30pm @ Institute for Theatre Studies, Georgenstrasse  11, Room #109.

“The talk is based on a series of collaborations between Kate Elswit and Harmony Bench regarding the ways in which digital research methods can work in tandem with more traditional scholarly methods to manage the scale and complexity of data in accounts of what we call “movement on the move,” which we explore through the phenomenon of dance touring alongside other modes of circulation and transmission. In the first part of the talk, I draw on the project’s early research into South American tours by Anna Pavlova’s company during World War One and American Ballet Caravan during World War Two. Here focus is on the database and the map as tools that expand our capacity to trace “dynamic spatial histories of movement.” In the second part of the talk, I turn to a new collaborative work in progress that focuses on the archives of African American choreographer and anthropologist Katherine Dunham. This new work broadens the scope of transmission to explore geographical and cultural mobilities in tandem, ultimately revealing the scale of personal, professional, and political networks surrounding a single artist, and proposing what such histories of circulation can offer to dance history.”

Kate Elswit is Reader in Theatre and Performance at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London and author of Watching Weimar Dance  and Theatre & Dance. She has won three major awards for scholarly publications and her research has been supported by many sources, including a Marshall Scholarship, a postdoctoral fellowship in the Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship of Scholars in the Humanities at Stanford University, the 2013 Lilian Karina Research Grant in Dance and Politics, and most recently a Batelle Engineering, Technology, and Human Affairs (BETHA) Endowment Grant with Harmony Bench. She also works as a choreographer, curator, and dramaturg.

Public Talk on ‘Post-Migrant’ Theatre

Was war vor dem Post?

Eine historische Perspektive auf postmigrantisches Theater.

We happily announce and cordially invite to the public talk on Post-Migrant Theatre by Azadeh Sharifi, associate of the Centre for Global Theatre History,

Dr. Sharifi’s talk (in German) will take place on Wednesday, 17 May, 12am (sharp)-1:30pm at Georgenstraße 11, 80799 Munich, room 109.  The event is jointly organized by the Department of Theatre Studies LMU and the Centre for Global Theatre History.

Azadeh Sharifi abstract & biographical note

 

 

 

 

Global Clicks through Theatrescapes. Invited talk by Nic Leonhardt @ CREATE Salon, Univ. of Amsterdam

Nic Leonhardt, director of the Centre for Global Theatre History, and the new Academy of Digital Humanities in Theatre Research @ GTH Centre, was invited by the research program CREATE of the University of Amsterdam to give a talk on Digital Humanities in Theatre History in the context of the program’s “CREATE Salon“, on 14 March, 2017.

Her Talk on Global Clicks through Theatrescapes was followed by a presentation of Frans Blom, Rob van der Zalm, and Jan Vos on “Amsterdam City Theatre Repertoire and ONSTAGE, 1638-2016”, and a project presentation of “MEPAD: Mapping European Performing Arts Databases” by Julia Noordegraaf, Claartje Rasterhoff, and Vincent Baptist.

 

“Developing Theatre” – Presentation of our new ERC Research Project

header_worldtheatreday
http://www.world-theatre-day.org/

Developing Theatre: Building Expert Networks for Theatre in Emerging Countries after 1945 reads the title of our new ERC funded research project under the umbrella of the Centre for Global Theatre History.

On Wednesday, 18 January, 2017, 12 (s.t.)-2pm the project’s leaders and researchers will introduce to the agenda of Developing Theatre at the Institute of Theatre Studies, Georgenstrasse 11, 80799 Munich, room #109. 

Abstract

This new research project, sponsored by the European Research Council, proposes a fundamental re-examination of the historiography of theatre in emerging countries after 1945. It investigates the institutional factors that led to the emergence of professional theatre in the post-war period throughout the decolonizing world. The particular focus will be on the massive involvement of internationally coordinated ‘development’ and ‘modernization’ programs both East and West. The project will introduce the concepts of epistemic community, expert networks and techno-politics to theatre historical research as a means to historicize theatre within transnational and transcultural paradigms and examine its imbrication in globalization processes.

With contributions by Christopher Balme (PI), Nic Leonhardt (Associate Director & Senior Researcher), Gautam Chakrabarti (PostDoc), Rebecca Sturm (PhD candidate).

The project website will be online soon.

Contact: n.leonhardt @ lmu.de

 

 

Public Talk by Helen Gilbert: “Deep Time, Slow Violence, Haunted Lands”

The Centre for Global Theatre History cordially invites you to this guest lecture by Helen Gilbert, professor for theatre studies and currently a Alexander von Humboldt fellow at the Rachel Carson Centre, Munich.

The lecture will take place on Wednesday, 14 December, 12-2pm at the Institute for Theatre Studies, Georgenstrasse 11, 80796 Munich, room 109.

Her talk aims to set up a dialogue between philosophical debates informing the concept of the anthropocene (loosely defined as the age of unprecedented human disturbance of the earth’s ecosystems) and recent indigenous performances concerned with the effects of climate change, not just on indigenous lands and lifeways, but also in global terms.

Helen Gilbert is Professor of Theatre at Royal Holloway, University of London, and author of several influential books, notably Performance and Cosmopolitics: Cross-Cultural Transactions in Australasia (2007) and Postcolonial Drama: Theory, Practice, Politics (1996). From 2009–14, she led the transnational ERC-funded project on indigenous performance across the Americas, the Pacific, Australia and South Africa. She has curated experimental performance work in universities and museums and brought performance-based insights to scientific research, notably in Wild Man From Borneo: A Cultural History of the Orangutan (2014). Recent books: In the Balance: Indigeneity, Performance, Globalization (2017) and Recasting Commodity and Spectacle in the Indigenous Americas (2014).

Public Talk: Theatre in Occupied Berlin and Vienna, 1945-1948

theater1Public talk by Rebecca Rovit (University of Kansas, Fulbright Fellow IFK Wien) Organized by the Centre for Global Theatre Histories.

30 November, 2016, 12-2pm. Theaterwissenschaft, Georgenstrasse 11, 80796 Muenchen, room #109.

“Cultural historians have not sufficiently analyzed how theatre directors and performers coordinated artistic endeavors in the years before Soviet and Western-Allied powers set parameters for cultural life in postwar Berlin. The re-emergent culture after 1945 arose from an artistic collaboration between German-language artists and military officers from four zones of foreign occupation. Evidence suggests that before a German defeat was inevitable, Soviet leaders and exiled artists planned a future cultural policy for Germany and Austria. Officers in the occupied zones recognized the political power of culture and subsidized theatre. Artists knew that the theatre could be a useful conduit to bring recent history to the public. What does this suggest about the theatre repertoire in Vienna, another city, defeated and managed by four world powers? This lecture will explore the interplay of forces that defined the cultural heritage of the occupation in the early postwar years, while tapping into historiographical, national narratives of Germany and Austria.”