Maja Murnik (Editor)

Amfiteater, Journal of Performing Arts Theory, Volume 11, Number 1

This issue of Amfiteater journal mainly comprises papers based on Amfiteater’s academic symposium on the theme Theatre Experiment in Slovenia (1966–1986) and Its Resonance, which took place at the Slovenian Theatre Institute (SLOGI) in Ljubljana in autumn 2022. The symposium’s theme was born alongside the recent publication of the anthology Generator:: za proizvodnjo poljubnega števila dramskih kompleksov (The Generator:: for Manufacturing Any Number of Drama Complexes, UL AGRFT and SLOGI, 2022), in which editor Blaž Lukan collected almost 60 Slovenian experimental dramatic and performance texts from the modernist period (1966–1986) by more than 30 Slovenian authors.

Amfiteater’s first issue of 2023 thus brings us eight original papers in Slovenian and English. Several articles deal with the new forms of performance writing that emerged during the 1960s and 1970s. Although these new forms did not abolish the traditional dramatic form, they radically changed the role of textuality in the theatre. Branislav Jakovljević discusses the various relations between writing and performance. He shows the difference between mass performances – such as those in Belgrade every 25 May on the Youth Day celebrations – and similar performances with subversive and aesthetic potential. Ultimately, this distinction represents the difference between art and the mere reproduction or random combination of elements, which Jakovljević uses to reflect on the potential of contemporary artificial intelligence, which is becoming evermore pertinent in light of the latest developments with ChatGPT.

In their papers, Tomaž Toporišič and Gašper Troha write about the question of the dramatic text and the theatrical event, particularly in the context of Slovenian drama and (experimental) performance practices. Toporišič discusses how selected authors from the 1960s to the present day deconstructed the concept of drama and invented new forms of redramatisations and post-dramatic intermediality. Troha demonstrates the close connection between contemporary playwriting and experimental texts from the modernist period. While modernism sought to arrive at automatic writing and truth through chance and event, today’s artists seek to create a stronger sense of authenticity and emotional impact through the procedures of combinatorics and manipulation of the spectator.

Some of the contributors address the theoretical positioning of staged readings (Barbara Orel, Varja Hrvatin, Maša Radi Buh and Jakob Ribič).

Some more specific aspects of theatre experiment in Slovenia are also addressed: Krištof Jacek Kozak examines an almost-forgotten playlet by Taras Kermauner, pointing out Kermauner’s interesting view of modernist poetry. Gregor Pompe analyses the musical theatre oeuvre of Darijan Božič to, on the one hand, demonstrate the Slovenian composer’s prolific work for the musical stage, which presented the most up-to-date modernist procedures of the time, such as those introduced by John Cage in the United States. On the other hand, the Slovenian theatre and music scene remained highly suspicious of opera, and Božič had to constantly search for more appropriate genre labels for his works. Nika Leskovšek deals with the representation of woman(liness), or the absence of it, in The Generator anthology, which perhaps points to the patriarchal nature of the period, a time of student unrest and demands for complete individual freedom.

The issue concludes with Tajda Lipicer’s review of the book Eseji o komediji (Essays on Comedy) by Jure Gantar (MGL, 2022).

The issue was editey by the new Editor-in-Chief Maja Murnik.

Colophon

Contents

Preface

Amfiteater 11/1

Theatre Experiment in Slovenia (1966–1986) and Its Resonance

Branislav Jakovljević

Performance Writing: On, Around and Off the Page

Tomaž Toporišič

Deconstructions of the Opposition Between Representation and Presentation from the Neo-avant-garde to the Post-millennium: From Pupilija, Jesih and Jovanović to Zupančič, Živadinov, Frljić, Semenič and Divjak

Gašper Troha

Contemporary Drama and the Question of the Neo-avant-garde Legacy of the 1960s and 1970s

Barbara Orel

Performing Literature and Staged Readings

Varja Hrvatin, Maša Radi Buh, Jakob Ribič

THE GENERATOR:: for Any Number of Staged Readings

Krištof Jacek Kozak

Disputation on the Five Paradoxes of “Toilet Poetry” with a Prologue and an Epilogue

Gregor Pompe

Darijan Božič’s Musical Theatre Opus in the Context of the Slovenian Musical Theatre Scene: An Escape into the Literary-Dramatic in Opposition to the Desire for the Institutional

Nika Leskovšek

Silent Characters: Women Playwrights, Women’s Writing and the Representation of Woman(liness) in the Slovenian Drama Experiment (1966–1986)

Review

Tajda Lipicer

Slojevit naboj komedije (Jure Gantar: Eseji o komediji)

Submission Guidelines

Call for Papers

Editor-in-Chief: Maja Murnik, PhD (Institute of New Media Art and Electronic Literature)

Editorial Board:  Zala Dobovšek, PhD (University of Ljubljana), Primož Jesenko, MA (Slovenian Theatre Institute), Matic Kocijančič, PhD (Slovenian Theatre Institute), Bojana Kunst, PhD, Prof. (Justus-Liebig University Gießen, DE), Blaž Lukan, PhD, Assist. Prof. (University of Ljubljana), Aldo Milohnić, PhD, Assoc. Prof. (University of Ljubljana), Barbara Orel, PhD, Prof. (University of Ljubljana), Mateja Pezdirc Bartol, PhD, Prof. (University of Ljubljana), Maja Šorli, PhD (University of Ljubljana), Tomaž Toporišič, PhD, Prof. (University of Ljubljana), Gašper Troha, PhD (Slovenian Theatre Institute)

International Editorial Board: Mark Amerika, MFA (University of Colorado, US), Marin Blažević, PhD, Assoc. Prof. (Sveučilište u Zagrebu, HR), Ramsay Burt, PhD (De Montfort University, GB), Joshua Edelman, PhD (Manchester Metropolitan University, GB), Jure Gantar, PhD (Dalhousie University, CA), Anna Maria Monteverdi, PhD (Università degli Studi di Milano, IT), Janelle Reinelt, PhD (The University of Warwick, GB), Anneli Saro, PhD (Tartu Űlikool, EE), Miško Šuvaković, PhD, Prof. (Univerzitet Singidunum, RS), Stephen Elliot Wilmer, Prof. (Trinity College Dublin, IE)

Published by: Slovenian Theatre Institute (represented by Gašper Troha, Director) and University of Ljubljana, Academy of Theatre, Radio, Film and Television (represented by Tomaž Gubenšek, Dean)