Contemporary Theatre Performance Studies

Ongoing research into contemporary theatre performance studies stems from my MA degree study at Sheffield university where I conducted more extensive somatic research into Antonin Artaud.

The title of my dissertation :

What Insights Can Be Gained Into The Medium of Artaudian Theatre By Using Its Theory in Practice to Realise A Contemporary Play Text ?

The play text that I used to provide foundation for this practice based

thesis was The Beauty Queen of Leenane by Martin McDonagh

Additional practice based research embraced the extraordinary work of theatre company Societas Raffaello Sanzio, and contemporary performance artists Marina Abramovic, Marisa Carnesky and Pina Bausch. My key discovery of the course was British playwright and theatre theorist, Howard Barker.

PhD Proposal

Currently my practice based academic research into play text writing in performance focuses on selected plays of Barker and a new methodology for performing his texts and texts of other relatable writers such as Caryl Churchill.

Barker is key to my passion for textual density and poetry. He is also at the centre of my current PhD Proposal.

I have been and continue to be in consultation with Dr David Ian Rabey and also Dr Roger Owen at Aberystwyth University with regards to supervision of the PhD

I am using theorist Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick and her peri performative to examine Barker's texts and develop a new performance methodology that seamlessly combines language, speech and physical embodiment.

I am currently consulting the practice of Eugenio Barba's Odin Teatret with a view to developing this new performance approach.