Oliver Frljić
Dvije produkcije OOUR-a, Stvarajući Eve (2006) i Salon (2007), na kojima sam radio kao dramaturg, pokušale su naći mehanizme kojima se naglasak s primarne izvedbe gledanog seli na sam čin izvođenja gledanja i gledateljsku zajednicu. Ono što ni u jednoj ni u drugoj produkciji nije niti u izvedbenoj, niti u diskurzivnoj sferi artikulirano jeste to što u ovakvom mišljenju reprezentira gledateljska zajednica. Ukoliko i sami izvođači, uz sve ostalo, izvode i određeni čin gledanja, te ulaze u određenu ekonomiju gledanja, pitanje je koju vrijednost dobiva njihovo izvođenje čina gledanja te kako taj čin mijenja vrijednost gledanog unutar dominantnih reprezentacijskih modela.
I u jednoj i u drugoj izvedbi kao izvođačice su nastupile Sandra Banić i Selma Banich. Obje predstave su se bavile pozicijom ženskog subjekta kroz naglašavanje režima objektificirajućeg gledanja. Stvarajući Eve je u nekoliko navrata proizvodila prekid u tom režimu kroz naglašeno izvođačko fokusiranje gledatelja. Međutim, taj prekid, koji je bio jedan od osnovnih dramaturških otponaca u predstavi Fleshdance Nikoline Bujas Pristaš, i kroz koji se uspostavljala dijalektika gledanja od izvođačkog subjekta na sceni, preko redukcionističkog gledanja, koje je izvođačke subjekte svodilo na promatrane objekte kroz koje se konstituirao sam gledateljski subjekt, do samog naglašavanja bispektakularnosti izvedbe i reverzibilnosti čina gledanja, u Stvarajući Eve se događao sporadično. Ukoliko je određena politika gledanja samim činom izvođačkog gledanja bila destabilizirana, ona se defokusiranjem restaurirala, ojačavala i dobivala novu legitimaciju.
Banić i Banich su u dugim intervalima izlagale svoja tijela nereflektiranom objektificirajućem gledanju, ne predlažući nikakve jasne perceptivne i interpretativne strategije, ostavljajući samim gledateljima, a onda i gledateljskoj zajednici, da odluči o načinu na koji može kreativno strukturirati svoju želju na podloženim tijelima. Međutim, gledateljska zajednica, ili barem ono što se pojavilo kao njezin reprezentant, izostanak recepcijsko-interpretativnog diktata nisu shvatili i uzeli kao mogućnost vlastite aktivacije, nego kao nedostatnost: “U rodnom smislu, predstava Stvarajući Eve mogla bi se shvatiti i kao esej o momentu variranja rodnog identiteta, jer jedno od ponovljenih kretanja izvođačica uključuje zgrčenost i preokretanje tijela na podu, najprije s istaknutim obilježjima ženskog tijela te kasnije s umetanjem u gaćice predmeta nalik penisu, no ni ova interpretacijska linija nije dostatno razrađena, nego tek nabačena.”
Iskustvo rada na Stvarajući Eve, način na koji se fokus prebacio s objektno orijentirane proizvodnje u plesu na proizvodnju zastoja u prostoru u kojem se događaju različite izvedbe čina gledanja, postao je dominantan u radu na produkciji Salona. Ukoliko je Stvarajući Eve još uvijek nudila jedno šire problemsko polje, koje je uključivalo i pitanje scenskog konstruiranja različitih identiteta (rodnog, izvođačkog...), statusa kolektivnog autorstva, prostora upisivanja hijerahija u izvedbi koje su u procesu, deklarativno i, donekle, praktično, bile dokinute, Salon je problemsko polje pokušao ograničiti na politike gledanja. Taj pokušaj mu je u bitnom odredio i formu i sadržaj. Banich i Banić cijelo vrijeme izvode jednostavne repetitivne svakodnevne radnje (slaganje i raslaganje kućica, rukovanje, hopsanje...). Ideja korištenja ovakvih radnji bila je neproduktivnost ili minimalna proizvodnja estetskih višaka, bilo čega što bi moglo preuzeti ornamentnu funkciju. Jednostavni zadaci od kojih je sastavljen Salon i konzekventnost u njihovu izvođenju, te njihovo trajanje koje je ukidalo ikakvu mogućnost progresije ili narativne organizacije scenske građe, bili su mišljeni kao mogućnosti naglašavanja izvedbe samog čina gledanja i njegovih konstitutivnih elemenata, kao i postavljanja pitanja zašto sam čin gledanja, kao ono što ostaje konstitutivno u izvedbi (nešto dobiva status izvedbe jer ulazi u specifičan režim gledanja), u većini izvedaba nema vidljivost ili tek minimalnu i sporadičnu. Čin gledanja i iznevjeravanje njegovih očekivanja u okvirima najšire postavljene objektne konzumacije unutar logike neoliberalnog umjetničkog tržišta, mišljeni su kao mogućnost gledateljske autorefleksije samog gledanja. Na onaj način na koji dokida/ukida/minimalizira dominatne reprezentacijske modele u izvedbenoj sferi (utrajavanje, svakodnevne repetitivne radnje, izostanak narativnog minimuma, itd. ne proizvode potrebnu kritičnu masu u kojoj bi scenska stvarnost postala adekvatan reprezentant vanscenskog), Salon problematizira i reprezentaciju gledateljske zajednice. Na koji način gledatelji uopće postaju zajednica? Koji je njihov zajednički interes koji ih određuje kao zajednicu i koji model reprezentacije adekvatno zastupa taj interes? Može li naglašavanje verifikatorske uloge gledateljske zajednice, koja upravo činom gledanja nešto potvrđuje ili diskvalificira kao izvedbu, postati zajednički nazivnik njezinog interesa? I, ukoliko da, postaje li Salon kao izvedba reprezentant tog interesa?
Ovaj tekst je nastao s intencijom da se pozabavi ne konkretnim učincima dviju produkcija OOUR-a u kojima sam i sâm sudjelovao, nego onim što se kroz rad na njima i kroz izvedbe koje su uslijedile pokazalo kao njihova daljnja mogućnost. Pisanje ovog teksta vidim prvenstveno kao njihov nastavak kroz diskurzivnu izvedbu.
From Viewing the Performance to Performing the Viewing
Oliver Frljić
The two productions of OOUR in which I collaborated as the dramaturge – Creation of Eve (2006) and Salon (2007) – sought to find mechanisms that would transfer the accent from the primary performance of the viewed to the very act of performing the viewing and the community of spectators. What is not articulated in either of the productions, be it in the sphere of performance or in that of the discourse, is what the community of spectators represents in this sort of thinking. If the performers, beside everything else, also perform an act of viewing, thus entering a sort of economy of viewing, the question is what value can be ascribed to their performance of the act of viewing and how that act alters the value of the viewed within the prevailing models of representation.
Sandra Banić and Selma Banich featured in both performances and both performances were about the position of the female subject, emphasizing the regime of objectifying viewing. Creation of Eve generated a gap in that regime on several occasions by emphasizing the way in which performers brought the spectators into the focus. Although that gap, which had been among the main dramaturgical triggers in Fleshdance by Nikolina Bujas Pristaš, establishing the dialectics of viewing between the performing subject on stage, the reductionist viewing – which reduced the performing subjects to viewed objects that constituted the very subject of the spectator – and the very emphasis on the bi-spectacular character of the performance and the reversibility of the viewing act, it occurred only sporadically in Creation of Eve. Whenever an established policy of viewing was destabilized through the very act of the performers’ viewing, it was subsequently restored by defocusing, thus gaining power and new legitimization.
Banić and Banich were exposing their bodies to a non-reflexive, objectifying viewing through long intervals of time, not suggesting any clear strategies of perception and interpretation, but leaving it to the spectators, to the community of spectators, to decide on the way in which they could creatively structure their desire on the subjected bodies. However, that community of spectators, or at least what appeared as its representative, did neither understand nor use the lack of dictate regarding reception and interpretation as a chance for their own activation, but saw it rather as a deficiency: “In terms of gender, Creation of Eve might be understood as an essay on the moment of varying gender identity, since the performers are repeatedly rolling on the floor in convulsions, first with the accentuated forms of the female body and then with something resembling a penis placed into their panties; and yet, even this line of interpretation is insufficiently elaborated and remains merely a hint.”
The experience of working on Creation of Eve, the way in which the focus shifted from an object-oriented production in dance to the production of suspension in space in which various performances of the act of viewing occur, became the dominant feature while working on the production of Salon. While Creation of Eve was still offering a broader field of problems, which included the question of constituting various identities (gender-related, performing, etc.) on stage, the status of collective authorship, the space of inscribing hierarchies of performance that were declaratively and to some extent even practically abolished in the process, Salon sought to limit that field of problems to the policies of viewing. That quest essentially defined both its form and its content. Banich and Banić continuously perform simple, repetitive everyday actions (assembling and disassembling small houses, shaking hands, hopping around). The idea behind using such actions has been minimal or zero production of aesthetic surpluses, of anything that might acquire an ornamental function. The simple tasks that constitute Salon and their consistent performance, as well as their duration, which abolishes any possibility of progression or narrative organization of stage material, are conceived as the possibilities of emphasizing the performance of the very act of viewing and its constitutive elements, as well as asking the question why the very act of viewing, as that which remains constitutive in the performance (something gains the status of performance because it becomes part of the specific regime of viewing), has no visibility in most performances, or only minimally and sporadically. The act of viewing and the betrayal of its expectations in the framework of very broadly set consummation of objects within the logic of the neoliberal art market, are thought as the possibility of self-reflection on the very viewing on the side of the spectator. In the way in which it abolishes/negates/minimalizes the dominant models of representation in the sphere of performance (endurance, everyday repetitive actions, lack of a narrative minimum, etc. do not produce a critical mass in which the reality of performance would become an adequate representative of the extra-performative), Salon questions, among other things, the representation of the community of spectators. In what way do the spectators become a community in the first place? What is their common interest, which defines them as a community, and which model of representation does adequately stand for that interest? Can emphasizing the verificatory role of the community of spectators, which acknowledges or disqualifies something as a performance precisely through the act of viewing, become the common denominator of its interest? And if so, does Salon as a performance become the representative of that interest?
I have written this text not with an aim of analyzing the concrete results of the two productions of OOUR in which I have participated, but with that of dealing with those things that emerged as a possibility during our work on these productions and the ensuing performances. Thus, I consider my writing about them primarily as their continuation through discursive performance.
