5 Apr 2019

"Performance, Response, Extraction – Elasticity of Artistic Research" at PSI#25 Calgary, Canada 4-7 July 2019

The deadline for the call was extended to 31 March and we received plenty of interesting proposals. The call is here below in its original form, to remind us of the process:

Call for Proposals

Performance Studies international #25 / Calgary, Canada / 4 – 7 July 2019
Performance, Response, Extraction – Elasticity of Artistic Research
A project of the Artistic Research Working Group of PSi

Inspired by the announced theme for PSi #25 – “Elasticity”— the Artistic Research Working Group proposes to continue to develop the way of working explored at last year’s “Performance and Response: Networking Artistic Research” gathering in Daegu, Korea through a ‘performance-and-response’ adaptation of our established “Porous Studio” model of interaction. Developed several years ago, the Porous Studio was an ambitious but contained invitation to PSi member artists and local practitioners from the constantly changing conference locations to join the Artistic Research Working Group in a space of intermixing, contamination, and multiplicity. While this gathering has traditionally been restricted to the annual conference event, for 2018 we experimented with a new mode of working based on ‘performance and response,’ including structured exchange prior to our gathering in Daegu. This year in Calgary we will introduce a third aspect or phase into the process: the extraction of a research problem or research question, that can then be fed back into future discussion.

Artistic Research is meant as an elastic umbrella concept that includes a range of approaches that use art, creative practice or performance as a primary means and method of inquiry. These include the distinct approaches 'performance as research' (PAR), ‘practice as research’ (PaR), 'practice-based research' (PBR), ‘practice-led research, ‘creative arts research’, 'research-creation', 'arts-based research', and numerous other associated practices. In many cases, the subject of study is artistic practice itself, as in 'artistic inquiry.’ In others, creative practice is used as a way of investigating non-artistic (or not exclusively artistic) subjects. Our aim is to invite a broad spectrum of these approaches, drawn from within and beyond academic and institutional contexts, to reflect the diverse and vital abundance of interrelated orientations, perspectives, and approaches to research in contemporary art. Through the ‘performance, response, extraction’ model of exchange, participants will have the opportunity to respond to presentations, performances and articulations through presentations, performances and articulations and then distil or extract a core question (problem, principle, provocation…) that he/she finds interesting for further discussion. In this way we aim to explore the elasticity of artistic research as a methodology, and to expand our collective horizons through the sharing of knowledge(s) and experience(s) both in terms of preparation for the conference and its aftermath.

Model of Engagement for PSi#25 

In Brief: 
  1. All participants make an artistic submission prior to the conference gathering. The submissions can take a wide variety of forms, including text, video, audio, images, etc.
  2. All participants prepare a response to another participant’s initial submission for presentation at the conference event in Calgary.
  3. All participants are assigned one of the above paired sets of ‘submission and response’ that will be experienced at the conference, and tasked with extracting a core question or problem that they find interesting, based on the discussion in Calgary. Participants then prepare an archivable version of this extraction (in the form of a document, recording, object, etc.) to be shared and preserved after the conference.

The Details:

Confirmation of participation by 1 February 2019

Stage One: Each participant submits an artistic research project (at any stage of development) or performance documented in some manner, supported by images, audio, video, text, etc., together with a written description or abstract of 100-300 words. It should be possible to experience (read, view, or listen to) the submitted materials within a period of 60 minutes. All proposals must be received no later than 15 March 2019. Please send the abstracts (with links to the artistic research materials) in an email with the subject title “ARWG 2018” to the three Working Group conveners (emails below). 

All accepted abstracts will be posted to a dedicated online folder. Participants will then be able to submit additional materials to individual sub-folders, either directly or via links to existing online platforms (such as Vimeo, Youtube, etc.). 

Stage Two: Each participant is assigned another participant’s submission by 31 March 2018, and is invited to prepare a presentational response to that submission, using their own preferred mode of practice to critically engage with the submission. The response can take the form of a performance, a participatory research exercise, a written document to be read aloud, etc. The respondents will submit the title and duration of their response (from 5 min to 20 min.) to the group no later than 31 May 2019.

Stage Three: Participants present their responses at the working group sessions during the conference in Calgary. The 100-300 word abstracts are made available onsite for the other participants and for other attendees at the open session who have not had access to online materials. 

Stage Four: Each participant is assigned one of the ‘submission and response’ pairings witnessed in Calgary and asked to extract a question or problem out of that exchange, leading to the preparation of an archivable object (document, recording, etc.). These ‘extractions’ can be either a distillation or an extension of the witnessed exchange, reflecting the participant’s personal reaction to the presented materials. The extractions should be uploaded to the participant’s individual sub-folder no later than 1 September 2019.

On behalf of the working group convenors:

Annette Arlander: annette.arlander@uniarts.fi
Bruce Barton: bruce.barton@ucalgary.ca
Johanna Householder: jhouseholder@ocadu.ca