Placeness and the Performative Production of Space (Paperback or Softback)

How can performance create and transform places of urban renewal and regeneration? What does performance contribute to the creation of community? These are some of the questions addressed in this study of the relationship of performance to urban space. Marrying theory with a series of international case studies of performance practice and interviews with practitioners, this interdisciplinary study examines how space is performatively produced to create a sense of ‘placeness’. Offering multiple perspectives on space and place, this book investigates the connections between space and the construction of social and cultural narratives. It focuses on the multiple ways performative actions produce space, including theatre, installations, site-specific work, visual arts and digital performance. Combining interdisciplinary approaches to contemporary performance, architecture and digital media studies, this study builds on a clear theoretical framework that draws on the work of Walter Benjamin, Michel Foucault, Henri Lefevre, Richard Schechner, Hans-Thies Lehmann, Lev Manovich and Slavoj Žižek. It offers themed sections comprising theory, studies of practice and interviews with practitioners. Case studies include site-specific work by Catalan collective La Fura Dels Baus, Barcelona, Spain, the Prague Quadrennial, community engagement in Praça Roosevelt in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the Portland Inn Project in Stoke-on-Trent, UK, Campo de la Cebada in Madrid, Spain, and digital spaces created by artists in India and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Aleksandar Sasha Dundjerovic is Professor of Performing Arts at Royal Birmingham Conservatoire., Birmingham City University, UK . He is a theatre academic and professional award winning theatre director with international experience working in Serbia, Hungary, Ireland, Canada, Colombia, Russia , Iran and Brazil. He holds a PhD in Theatre Studies from Royal Holloway University of London. His teaching includes University of London (Royal Holloway), Brunel University, University of Manchester, University College Cork (Ireland), University of São Paulo (Brazil), and University of Belgrade (Serbia). He is a published author of number of books and academic articles on contemporary theatre making and cultural production, particularly on the work of Robert Lepage and Brazilian collaborative and performance practices. His forthcoming book Live Digital Theatre: Performance Pedagogies is published by Routledge (January 2023) He is Founder and Artistic Director of Kolectiv Theatre UK. Aleksandar is a Principal Fellow of Higher Education Academy and RSA Fellow.

María J. M. Sánchez is Professor of Architecture and Associate Dean for Research in Scot Sutherland School of Architecture and Built Environment, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, UK. She has published a monograph Dynamic Cartography: Body, Architecture and Performative Space (2020). Her professional practice has been developed across several fields related to architecture with a strong interdisciplinary focus. Her research practice is based on practice and research methodologies. Her work has been presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art Reina Sofía (Madrid, 2012) in the Prague Quadrennial of Scenography (2015, 2019), the Dance Biennale of Venice (2016), or the Biennale of Architecture of Venice (2018).