Small Acts of Repair

by Stephen J. Bottoms (Editor), Matthew Goulish (Editor)

Goat Island are one of the world's leading contemporary performance ensembles. Their intimate, low-tech, intensely physical performances represent a unique hybrid of strategies and techniques drawn from live art, experimental theatre and postmodern dance. Small Acts of Repair: Performance, Ecology and Goat Island, is the first book to document and critique the company's performances, processes, politics, aesthetics, and philosophies. It reflects on the company's work through the critical lens of ecology - an emerging and urgent concern in performance studies and elsewhere.

This collage text combines and juxtaposes writing by company members and arts commentators, to look in detail at Goat Island's distinctive collaborative processes and the reception of their work in performance. The book includes a section of practical workshop exercises and thoughts on teaching drawn from the company's extensive experience, providing an invaluable classroom resource.

By documenting the creative processes of this extraordinary company, this book will make an important contribution to the critical debates surrounding contemporary performance practices. In so doing, it pays compelling tribute to committed art-making, creativity, collaboration, and the nature of the possible.

264 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2007

About the author

Stephen J. Bottoms is Professor of Contemporary Theatre and Performance at the University of Manchester, where he is also currently Head of Subject for Drama. Previously he taught at the University of Leeds (2005–12) and the University of Glasgow (1993–2005). He is a theatre maker and critic.

Reviews

[Sloan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my cup of tea, but it's fine. I'm a little too cynical for it to have been a big hit with me, but I do think it's worth reading for those interested in devising, movement, philosophies on art. A great section about Work.

[Abraham · Rating 2 out of 5]

In the end, this guy really annoys me. A lot of fancy talk about performance generally means not a lot of actual application of ideas in the productions - I just imagine walking out of one of his pieces thinking: what was that all about? Sort of like reading the book...