Performing Arts Curation as a Means of Advocating for Change in Cultural Policy

This article explores the potentials of performing arts curation to challenge current European cultural policies. It opens with a brief comparison of the genealogy of the curator in the visual and performing arts. Suzana Milevska’s concept of “curatorial agency” and contemporary understandings of the “curator as an intermediary” serve to highlight the discrepancies between the socio-political conditions of production and circulation in the two fields. The second part of the article draws on interviews with five performing arts curators from independent organizations active within European project networks to further examine the implications of curating as a mediating cultural-political practice. Finally, in a context where cultural policies increasingly support market-oriented cultural actors, it calls for a stronger accountability of the performing arts curator in the negotiation of values between the artistic community, audiences, and policymakers.

Music Worlding in Palau

Music Worlding in Palau: Chanting, Atmospheres, and Meaningfulness is a detailed study of the performing arts in Palau, Micronesia as holistic techniques enabling the experiential corporeality of music’s meaningfulness—that distinctly musical way of making sense of the world with which the felt body immediately resonates but which, to a significant extent, escapes interpretive techniques. Drawing on long-term ethnographic research alongside Pacific Islander and neo-phenomenological conceptual frameworks, Music Worlding distinguishes between meaning(s) and meaningfulness in Palauan music-making. These are not binary phenomena, but deeply intertwined. However, unlike meaning, meaningfulness to a significant extent suspends language and is thus often prematurely considered ineffable. The book proposes a broader understanding of how the performing arts give rise to a sense of meaningfulness whose felt-bodily affectivity is pivotal to music-making and lived realities. Music Worlding thus seeks to draw the reader closer to the holistic complexity of music-making both in Palau and more generally.

Why Curate Live Arts?

To Discover Meaningful Ways to Be Together by Bertie FerdmanIn the Era of Context by Ken TakiguchiThe Cultural Industries in Africa by Funmi AdewoleSome Observations on Terminology by Gordana VnukNational Dance Platforms: Building Danceland or Curating the Nation? by Gustavo FijalkowA Reflection on the Start of It All: Festival Curation as the Artist’s Liberation of Divulgation by Lieven BertelsWhen Curatorial Practice in the Performing Arts Meets Production by Ashley Ferro-MurrayToward the End of Innocence in Programming Live Arts by Brandon FarnsworthCuratorial Practice as a Claim to Public-ness by Gurur ErtemSome Aspects from a European Perspective by Sigrid Gareis and Nicole Haitzinger

Socioeconomic and Psychosocial Adversities Experienced by Creative Freelancers in the UK During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Qualitative Study

There are concerns that the socioeconomic consequences of COVID-19, including unemployment and financial insecurity, are having adverse effects on the mental wellbeing of the population. One group particularly vulnerable to socioeconomic adversity during this period are those employed freelance within the cultural industry. Many workers in the sector were already subject to income instability, erratic work schedules and a lack of economic security before the pandemic, and it is possible that COVID-19 may exacerbate pre-existing economic precarity. Through interviews with 20 freelancers working within the performing arts, visual arts, and film and television industries, this article explores the impact of the pandemic on their working lives. Findings suggest the pandemic is affecting the psychological wellbeing of freelancers through employment loss, financial instability and work dissonance, and illustrates the need for urgent economic and psychosocial support for those employed within the cultural sector.

The Provenance of Selected Sets of Wardrobe in the Costumes Collections of the Cultural Center of the Philippines and GMA Network, Inc.

Costumes play a significant role in theatrical and television practice as age, gender, socioeconomic status, occupation, and the setting and climate are shown through them. This paper will enumerate some of the productions in which the costumes are included in the collections of two organizations: the Cultural Center of the Philippines, a government arts agency for the performing arts, and GMA Network, Inc., a media conglomerate that is chiefly in the business of producing and airing television programs. Information on the production plot and setting, key players such as directors, actors, production designers, and costume designers, and general descriptions of costumes are presented in this narrative survey. This work serves as a preliminary attempt to trace the provenance of costume sets in the collection of CCP and GMA Network. It may also awaken the need to document costumes as part of institutional collections.

The impact of independent campus learning program (MBKM) through matching fund program for lecturers, students and partners in Minggirsari Village, Blitar

One of the activities in the implementation of the Independent Campus Learning Program (MBKM) has been implemented through the Matching Fund program which was held in Minggirsari Village, Blitar. This activity has succeeded in establishing the Creative Economy and Tourism Research Center. The potential of Minggirsari village is divided into 17 sub-sectors based on creative economy sub sector, namely game development, architecture, interior design, music, fine arts, product design, fashion, culinary, film-animation-video, photography, visual communication design, TV-radio, crafts, advertising, performing arts, publishing and applications. The synergy between intellectuals, business, and government is the main actor driving the birth of creativity, ideas, science and technology that are vital for the growth of creative industries in Indonesia. Based on the existing potential, this activity provides the widest possible learning space to improve students' ability in creative thinking and critical thinking to enter the business world. In addition, this activity is also a forum for lecturers to develop research results on the creative economy. This activity also facilitates village residents to get provisions in developing their potential to help build Minggirsari village into a creative economy village. For this reason, this research is expected to be able to measure the impact resulting from learning activities that have been carried out through the matching fund program for lecturers, students and partners. This research uses a quantitative approach with a survey method. Data analysis in this study used descriptive data analysis methods.

A Review of The Sundanese Scale Theory

This article aims to discuss Kusumadinata’s scale theory in Sundanese music which has been taught in educational institutions in West Java, Indonesia. According to Kusumadinata’s scale theory, sorog and pelog are scales derived from salendro scale in gamelan salendro performance. In my previous research, I investigated three genres of Sundanese performing arts which have existed since the Hindu era, namely goong renteng, pantun, and tarawangsa. The results indicate that the pelog scale has independently existed since the Hindu era. Then, I analyzed the phenomenon that occurs in the gamelan salendro performance, i.e., its melody (rebab and vocals) conventionally modulate into scale ‘like sorog’, occasionally into scale ‘like pelog’. In contrast, the instruments of gamelan are in the salendro scale. However, the analysis on the sorog in the previous research was not enough, so that in this paper, I will focus on the sorog. To find out the relationship between melody (vocal and rebab) and gamelan instruments, I examined the actual performances of gamelan salendro and wayang golek purwa. It became clear that the salendro scale derives four types of sorog. The findings of this study indicate that sorog has existed since the 19th century by this phenomenon, and the scale now called sorog is a scale derived from salendro.