PUBLISHED: Critical Stages/Scènes Critiques New Issue

The IATC journal Critical Stages/Scènes Critiques has been published just in time for your new year reading. Editor-in-chief Savas Patsalidis announced publication December 29 with a Special Topic for Number 16 edited by renowned international artist and author Johannes Birringer on "Sound/Theatre: Sound in Performance."

Flesh Waves (phase #4), by Isabelle Choinière,
with dancers Laurie-Anne Langis, Édith Doucet,
Nadège St-Arnaud, Béatrice Trudel, Frédérique
Forget, 2013. Photo: Mateo H. Casis, Cie Loc & Mac

Sound designer Chris Wenn weighs in on "Acoustic Ecologies of Independent Theatre in Melbourne." Scholar and artist Gretchen Jude explores the "Sounding Body as Digital Assemblage."

Bill T. Jones and I-Ling Liu perform Story/Time. Photo by Paul B. Goode

Performance thinkers from around the globe consider varied topics within editor Birringer's "ensounded" construct such as aural choreography, Bill T. Jones "repurposing" John Cage, soundscapes of "narco silence" in the border areas of the United States and Mexico, corporeality in choreography of new music, sonic energy and the body, and other intersections of sound and performance as the impact of design creates new ways of thinking about theatre and performance.

La Terquedad, a project on which writer and director
Rafael Spregelburd started working in 1996.

Also featured in this edition are national reports on theatre in Ireland, Hong Kong, Argentina, Serbia, Greece, Anglophone Canada, Israel, and Chile. Performance review editor Matti Linnavuori of Finland has once again curated a lively selection on international perspectives from around the globe. Don Rubin of Canada offers his usual thoughtful collection of book reviews on performance topics.

Coming in February 2018, Critical Stages/Scènes Critiques will roll out the second installment of Number 16 featuring interviews, conference papers, and essays. Stay tuned for more and let us know how the journal might better provide news, reviews, essays, and special topics of interest to you.

PROTEST: IATC Statement on Serebrennikov Detention

Kirill Serebrennikov in court December 4, 2017.
Photo: Artyom Geodakyan/TASS

According to the website of Radio Free Europe, which based its reporting on TASS and Interfax, a Moscow City Court upheld on December 4 an extension of house arrest for Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov. He has been detained on fraud charges, accused of embezzling approximately $1 million in State funds. Serebrennikov was arrested in August. In October, the district court extended his house arrest to January 19. The 48-year-old director has repeatedly stated that the charges are "absurd."

Prior to his arrest, Serebrennikov

clashed with Russia’s Culture Ministry over the staging of a ballet about legendary Soviet ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev, who defected to the West in 1961. Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky suggested that production might violate a 2013 'gay propaganda' law. (RFE)

As a result of his detention, Serebrennikov was not allowed to attend the Europe Prize for Theatre festivities in Rome, December 12–17, where he was to receive one of the top prizes bestowed in the category of "Theatrical Realities." The International Association of Theatre Critics (AICT-IATC) issued an official protest against the detention of the artist at its meeting in Rome on December 17. The critics' organization noted that despite Serebrennikov's isolation, his Nureyev ballet opened recently at the Bolshoi Theatre. The IATC also noted that the organization "shares the deep worries of the Russian critics, who already launched a protest in August, against the arrest of Serebrennikov. The accusations . . . alleging misuse of funds in his theatre, do not justify his prolonged detainment."

The IATC statement concluded, "the world of the arts and free expression will never accept the maneuvers of any state trying to stop an artist from speaking with a clear voice for freedom."

NOMINATIONS: 2018 Thalia Prize Deadline

2016 Thalia Laureate Femi Osofisan

The International Association of Theatre Critics (AICT-IATC) requests proposals for candidates for the IATC Thalia Prize. National and regional sections of IATC are invited to propose candidates. The 2018 Prize will be given at the IATC World Congress in Banff, Canada.

2006 Thalia Laureate
Eric Bentley

The Thalia Prize is IATC’s prestigious award for outstanding contribution to the field of theatre criticism, and to critics and theoreticians who have played significant roles in shaping our understanding of theatre spanning different cultural settings, politics, and aesthetics.

Previous Thalia Prize honorees have featured an impressive selection of laureates: Eric Bentley (USA, 2006), Jean-Pierre Sarrazac (France, 2008), Richard Schechner (USA, 2010), Kapila Vatsyayan (India, 2012), Eugenio Barba (Denmark, 2014), Femi Osofisan (Nigeria, 2016).

2008 Thalia Laureate
Jean-Pierre Sarrazac

Recommenders are urged to consider 
candidates whose body of work has been influential at home, in their regions, and abroad, or whose writing they feel merits attention on an international platform. National and regional sections are therefore not restricted to suggesting candidates from their own countries, but may refer any candidate believed to fulfill the criteria of the Prize.

2010 Thalia Laureate
Richard Schechner

National and regional sections proposing candidates must submit a brief biography of the candidate along with translation (where needed) of excerpts from the candidate’s work in English or in French, the working languages of IATC. Thalia honoree recommendations must be submitted by December 19, 2017.

2012 Thalia Laureate
Kapila Vatsyayan

Each national or regional section may propose only one candidate. National and regional sections should note that the successful candidate must be present to receive the award at the Thalia Prize Award Ceremony at the World Congress in Banff, Canada (September 23–28, 2018).

2014 Thalia Laureate
Eugenio Barba

The Executive Committee of IATC will prepare the candidacies received from the national or regional sections for its next meeting in Craiova, Romania in April 2018, where the decision on the laureate will be taken.

For more information or to make a recommendation, members of the American section should contact Jeffrey Eric Jenkins (jej [at] illinois.edu).