AustLit

'This article examines an archived Theatre for Young People (TYP) performance, Funerals and Circuses, by Magpie Theatre from South Australia. Funerals and Circuses premiered at the Adelaide Festival in 1992, and was touted as a festival highlight by critics. It then went on to tour the Melbourne International Festival of the Arts and the National Festival of Australian Theatre the following year, where it received similar glowing reviews. The authors consider the factors that contributed to the perceived success of Funerals and Circuses, paying particular attention to how the use of space and design served to enhance the experience for the audience as well as contribute to meaning-making. This article draws on the past in order to consider the future of young people's festival performances and asks what can be learnt from a show like Funerals and Circuses. The research draws on interviews with key informants from Magpie Theatre, archival documents and visual artefacts.' (Authors abstract)

'Founded in 1983, Sydney's Performance Space spent almost quarter of a century at 199 Cleveland Street, Redfern, before moving to Carriageworks in 2007. In doing so, it gave up being the sole occupant of a building, albeit a rather dilapidated one, for the promise of being an anchor tenant in a newly converted, post-industrial arts space. Since then, it has also had to negotiate the shift from being an anchor tenant to one of several resident companies, alongside Carriageworks' own curatorial team. This article undertakes a 'distant reading' of the dataset assembled under the auspices of AusStage, to analyse how this shift has changed Performance Space's programme, artists, audiences and aesthetics. Specifically, we identify three continuities: a deep and abiding commitment to liveness; an ongoing interest in interdisciplinary and intermedial art forms; and a home for independent dance. We also identify several differences, including: a decrease in the volume of programming and a narrowing of the types of performance and visual art on offer; a decline in the number of ensembles and a rise in live art; and a festivalisation of programming. Nonetheless, this cannot be attributed solely to the move, as the carriageworks era coincides with a period of major cuts to arts funding.' (Authors abstract)

'Contemporary performance can expose and dismantle the ideologies that have supported the enduring cultural and mythic dialogues associated with the Australian landscape. As threats of catastrophic climate change accelerate, theatre-making research can play a significant role in making sense of the ecological transformations that we experience. As a practice-led playwright researcher, I investigate how Australian landscapes are re-imagined in contemporary performance contexts that investigate the accelerating climate crisis. Further, I am mindful of how enviro-cultural expression can effectively emerge through a playtext or production and contribute to eco-critical discourse. Eco-critical analysis is becoming popular in both theatre studies and theatre production as the definition of 'text' extends into both written and performative methods. In offering a valuable contribution to eco-critical discourse, the performance text establishes a unique relationship between the theatrical encounter, the audience and the place and time in which the encounter occurs. This research discusses how the enduring Australian cultural legacies, which have defined our mythic relationship to the beloved Bush or Outback, are being superseded by investigations concerning disappearing Nature and the part we have played in our present ecological situatedness. From a historical perspective, Australian theatre has always provoked discussion about our conflicting relationship to the land, the culture, the environment and its human inhabitants. However, contemporary playwrights are choosing to investigate these questions through politicised ecological lenses. Specifically framed through one such theatrical lens - that of Dust (Hassall 2015) - this discussion explores the landscape as both a geographic place and a psychological space. In positioning landscape in this way, the text is associated with contemporary Australian Gothic drama. It suggests that the Australian cultural identity is embedded in brutal psychological, cultural and physical landscapes, which are acknowledged as normative. The play deconstructs familiar ideologies through climate change experiences by investigating themes of environmental human legacy. Throughout this discussion, excerpts from Dust are utilised to support an eco-critical analysis of the performance text. Overall, this discussion explores the intersection between playwriting practice-research, environmental themes and eco-critical concerns. It exemplifies how theatrical text can become a point of eco-critical examination and therefore has the power to question and in some ways expose the repercussions of colonisation and the master narratives that support greenhouse gas emission, unsustainable resource extraction, advanced industrialisation and unsustainable practices.' (Author's abstract)