Manchester University Press
2 Ghost dances in history and performance
Abstract
This chapter elaborates a key analogy between performance art and revolution: the struggle faced by both for a place in historical memory. It adapts the notion of the ‘survival’, linked to the ‘ghost-dance’, a term drawn from Native American rituals, and applied by Brisley to explain the links between a cultural understanding of performance and its use as a term of art. It discusses three films: Being and Doing (1984), notable for its focus on East European performance artists, Ghost-Dance (1983) and Resistance (1976). The chapter concludes by showing how performance behaviours can be used to recover not simply the past that was but also the past that was not, including the unfulfilled pasts of revolution.
Abstract
This chapter elaborates a key analogy between performance art and revolution: the struggle faced by both for a place in historical memory. It adapts the notion of the ‘survival’, linked to the ‘ghost-dance’, a term drawn from Native American rituals, and applied by Brisley to explain the links between a cultural understanding of performance and its use as a term of art. It discusses three films: Being and Doing (1984), notable for its focus on East European performance artists, Ghost-Dance (1983) and Resistance (1976). The chapter concludes by showing how performance behaviours can be used to recover not simply the past that was but also the past that was not, including the unfulfilled pasts of revolution.
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- List of figures vi
- Acknowledgements ix
- Introduction 1
- 1 Into day one of the revolution 23
- 2 Ghost dances in history and performance 70
- 3 Revolutionising the living past 95
- 4 The monument and revolutionary time 121
- 5 Time after history 156
- 6 Portrait of the artist en abîme 200
- Select bibliography 226
- Index 240
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- List of figures vi
- Acknowledgements ix
- Introduction 1
- 1 Into day one of the revolution 23
- 2 Ghost dances in history and performance 70
- 3 Revolutionising the living past 95
- 4 The monument and revolutionary time 121
- 5 Time after history 156
- 6 Portrait of the artist en abîme 200
- Select bibliography 226
- Index 240
