A selection of Stacy Klein’s writings for and about Double Edge Theatre - a feminist ensemble and artist-run organisation founded in the US in 1982.
Featuring interviews, artists' statements, essays and speeches in which Klein articulates the mission of Double Edge Theatre as it evolves, as well as a scholarly introduction that situates the material in the wider theatre landscape, the volume as a whole captures the democratic spirit and boundary-pushing theatre that the company has championed.
The writings capture the theatrical and cultural practice to have come out of the theatre company Klein founded in 1982. It showcases the company's dedication to collective artistic creativity, cultural survival and sustained, equitable organization-building, with Klein's artistic and social vision at its centre.
It also celebrates the company's connections across the globe, including with Eastern European and South American theatres (such as Grenland Friteater, Norway, and Grupo Cultural Yuyachkani, Peru), and its links with rich theatrical traditions (such as the Laboratory Theatre, Poor Theatre, Street Theatre, and Theatre of the Oppressed).
An Alchemy of Living Culture offers first-hand insights into experimental creation across performance and speaks to a broad and multi-national community of theatre-makers.
Preface (Stacy Klein): Hidden Territories/ Republic of Dreams
Introduction (Jonathan P. Eburne): Stacy Klein and Double Edge Theatre
Double Edge Theatre Timeline, 1982-2023
1. Training with Double Edge Theatre: An Address (2022)
Search Determines Form: Foundational Writings
2. Proposal for the Staging of Maureen Duffy’s Rites (1981)
3. Three Artist Statements (1992 - 2002)
An Artists’ Ensemble: On Autonomy and Collectivity
4. Letter from Sardegna (1985)
5. Do We Search for Theatre? (1986)
6. The Living Actor (1986)
7. On the “Magic Theatre” (1993-1997)
8. Director’s Mirror: On Collaboration (1997)
Art, Living Culture, Art Justice
9. Culture Can Still be Alive (1991)
10. Letter to CGN Editors, “I no longer consider myself feminist” (c. 1987)
11. Art, an Endangered Species (1993)
12. Notes from the Director on Authentic Culture and Double Edge (1995) and related texts about Ukraine
13. Art Justice at the Double Edge Theatre (2018)
14. Excerpt from interview with Maria Shevstova (2021)
15. Excerpt from “Double Edge Theatre in Its Ashfield Community: An Interview with Stacy Klein,” (2020) (previously published in The Drama Review Vol. 64, Issue 4 (248), Winter 2020)
16. On the Okheteau Cultural Center (2022)
Training
17. Selections from Training Speeches (1980s-2010s).
18. “The Impulse to Train: An Interview with Stacy Klein about the Beginnings of Double Edge Training” (previously in Howlround Theatre Commons, 2015)
19. Excerpt from an interview on Rena Mirecka and physical training (c. 2012)
20. Excerpt from “To Think Intergenerationally” Consortium of Theatre Practices (2000)
On Double Edge in and as Theatre History
21. Excerpts from diaries and journals
22. Under the Perfume of Analysis (On Eugenio Barba), 1988
23. Excerpt from an interview with Maria Shevtsova (2011)
24. On the Polish Theatre (c. 1993)
25. Excerpt from “Why Devise, Why Now? Creating the Impossible” (previously published in Theatre Topics, 2005)
Appendix 1: Cycles and Spectacles: Double Edge Performances 1982-2023
Appendix 2: Remodelling Theatre
Afterword (Stacy Klein)
Bibliography
Index
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