Abstract:
The dissertation discusses the occurrences and implications of an
exhausted body and its encounters with its witnesses. The phenomenon is
studied as a specific performance presence that can be located across
cultures and centuries. The study proposes that the impact of such a body
lies within a central paradox: virtuosity and disappearance. Through this
paradox, the exhausted body becomes a vehicle for transformation for the
performer and witness. The destructive qualities inherent in a body in
extreme tension, in pain, or on the verge of death are seen as tools with
which the body becomes a channel for new experiences. New life
emerges from the seemingly exhausted vehicle. This idea is discussed by
using case-studies from different practices around the world; from the
ancient rituals of Sarpam Thullal in India to the more contemporary
practices of Performance Art by artists such as Orlan and Marina
Abramovic. The aesthetic and cultural theory made use of in this
dissertation range across cultures; from Japanese aesthetic theory to
Catholic ideology to Eugenio Barba’s cross-cultural study of the extra-daily
body.
The purpose of this study is not to analyse the cultural or historical
roots of the performance presence of the exhausted body. Instead, it
seeks to shed light on this body as a specific presence that is deliberately
put into action in performance. The first three chapters: The exhausted
body as an act of resistance, its relationship with the community, and its
ability for transformation, discusses the different components in the
encounter between the exhausted body and its witnesses. Chapter Five
brings these three perspectives together by looking at the exhausted body as an action that feeds creation through its act of disappearance.
