Over the course of the module we have been exploring different aspects of Site Specific performance and many of them have made me question what exactly Site Specific performance actually is. Pearson states that “Although the search for a practical, encompassing definition of site-specific performance has long claimed scholarly attention, it remains slippery” (2010, p.7). Therefore, a struggle begins to find an exact definition of the subject. Pavis observes that “This term refers to a staging and performance conceived on the basis of a place in the real world (ergo, outside the established theatre). A large part of the work has to do with researching a place, often an usual one that is imbued with history or permeated with atmosphere” (1998, p.337-8). This statement has helped to decipher the subject broadly. That Site Specific is a type of performative theatre that takes place and is centred around a non-traditional theatrical location, absorbing the historical and contemporary devices that surround it, and that by discovering stories, secrets and memories of the site will supply the ‘actors’ with the abilities to create a performance about it: Layers of the site are revealed through reference to: historical documentation; site usage (past and present); found text, objects, actions, sounds, etc.; anecdotal guidance; personal association; half-truths and lies; site morphology (physical and vocal explorations of site)” (Wilkie,2002, p.150) permitting ‘the past to surge into the present’” (Pearson, 2010, p.10).
However, as Pearson observes “Rather than simply occupying an ‘unusual setting’, site-specific performance is adjudged to hold ‘possibilities for responding to and interrogating a range of current spatial concerns, and for investigating the spatial dimension of contemporary identities’” (2010, p. 8-9). The performers must use their knowledge of the ‘unusual setting’ to create a performance that can engage with an audience and provide them with new modes of perception and understanding, “It’s not just about a place, but the people who normally inhabit and use that place. For it wouldn’t exist without them” (Wilkie, 2002, p.145). Pearson extends this to emphasise that, “Places are about relationships, about the placing of peoples, materials, images and the systems of difference that they perform” (2010, p. 13). The site itself performs in its own way and the actors must use this in order to create a performance where the familiar becomes the unknown and the audience can question what they think to be truth. Pearsons statement “Moving between places, wayfinding, more closely resembles story-telling than map-using, as one situates one’s position within the context of journeys previously made.” (2010, p. 15) provides links directly to my own performance and has highlighted how the simple act of ‘a walk’ through a familiar space can entice personal past memories into the present situation.
Although throughout the process I have been unable to pin point the exact definition of Site Specific, by exploring key theories, practitioners and critical reading has provided me with the means to create my own ideas of what I personally feel Site Specific is to me and has allowed me to use these ideas to create a performance that I feel relates to the Site and the people who occupy it.
Works Cited:
Gibson, K (2014) Site Specific Performance. [Taken] 8th May.
Pavis, P. (1998) Dictionary of the Theatre: Terms, Concepts, and Analysis. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Pearson, M (2010) Site Specific Performance. Palgrave Macmillan: Hampshire.
Wilkie, F. (2002) ‘Mapping a Terrain: a Survey of Site-specific Performance in Britain’. New Theatre Quarterly, 18, 2, 140-60.