The Growth of Performance

The vast growth of ‘performance species’ - performance studies, practices and research during the last decades. In relation to this, the knowledge itself has become performative: postmodern knowledge “legitimates itself by ’optimizing the system’s performance-efficiency — be operational (that is: measurable), or disappear’”, (J-L Lyotard/Jon McKenzie 2000). It is said, that we live in performative societies, where human subjectivity is based on performance and spectatorship, and people have a global addiction to performance. (McKenzie, Baz Kershaw, 2007)

A question and a proposal

Our time has been called the age of global performance; it has been said that performance and spectatorship define us living at the beginning of 21st century. At the same time we are living in an age of ecological crises, and many researchers consider the extinctions of animal species to be our greatest thread.

How would it be possible to find a way out of the performative society, or at least move to its periphery, and change the meaning of spectatorship?

A proposal: Create a performance with non-human actor(s), or create a performance for a non-human spectator. Other than human, as non-human agents, we mean here beings and processes of “nature”: other animals, plants, phenomena of weather, various durational processes. If you wish to share your experiences, you can do it via the Chronopolitics Facebook page. But public sharing might not be the most meaningful way to approach this issue in the performative societies. You can also contact Maus&Orlovski performance collective by e-mail: Enable JavaScript to view protected content.