In front of the theatre, at the museum, from the archive. Scenic (and authorial) modes of contemporary art

Abstract

In the Mínimo teatral exhibition (Macro Museum, Rosario, 2017) we worked, as curators, on how theatre resonates in contemporary art, exploring the different appropriations of theatricality and staging in various art forms. Our intention was to promote a dialogue between visual and scenic arts, even when the exchanges did not occur through direct reference and/or comments between different artistic expressions. At the same time, we were not trying to formulate a history of art (history of the disciplinary field, of their conversations or misunderstandings), though we did inquire into the uses of the archive and its effects in a possible conceptualization of time. This essay proposes to present a perspective and a reflection about that experience. The questions broached are: Which zones (sensitive, social, productive) are enabled by theatrical thought? Which are the effects of the assembly and archive of theatre in the museum? Which would be the effects on the conceptualization and the uses of time? And finally, what repercussions did the research and the hypothesis proposed by the exhibit have for the curatorship not only in what it pertains to the dialogue between theater and art, but also in regards to the archive.

Keywords:
artists; curators; theater; archives; Latin-American contemporary art