Live Art Can Change Your Life: An Introduction to Performance Art

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To kick off the practical elements of the course, students will warm up with exercises by two of Oriana's idols: Augusto Boal, the man who invented the Theatre of the Oppressed, and Cher, the legendary diva. Students will be also asked to bring in an object of personal significance and we will use them as storytelling devices to generate performances. Participants will also break down selected performances into elements – identity, context, materials, media/materials, action and duration – and use these elements to begin to produce their own pieces.

The techniques taught during the course include:

• monologue
• tableaux vivant
• durational performance
• re-enactment
• performance art lecture
• phototherapy
• body art
• public intervention

By the end of the course, students will have knowledge of the following:

• the creation of original performances and re-enactments individually and in groups
• the documentation of performances produced during the course
• the ability to distinguish between performance art and performativity, authenticity and theatricality
• the arenas in which performance art takes place, such as the street, the gallery and the club