Gestures of resistance between the street and the theatre: documentary theatre in Egypt and Laila Soliman’s No Time For Art

Article


Hussein, N. 2015. Gestures of resistance between the street and the theatre: documentary theatre in Egypt and Laila Soliman’s No Time For Art. Contemporary Theatre Review. 25 (3), pp. 357-370. https://doi.org/10.1080/10486801.2015.1049822
TypeArticle
TitleGestures of resistance between the street and the theatre: documentary theatre in Egypt and Laila Soliman’s No Time For Art
AuthorsHussein, N.
Abstract

In this article, I explore a direction in contemporary theatre in Egypt that emerged since the 25 January revolution in 2011 and that employed the immediacy of documentary form as a response to political change, unrest and repression, seeing in documentary theatre a mode of resistance that intervenes in hegemonic discourse. Through extending Peter Weiss’s ideas on documentary theatre and its relationship to political protest, I show how the work explored attempts to extend the struggle on the street, occupying a liminal position between the performance space and the public space, instituting a dialogic relationship between performance and audience as active co-participants in a community ‘in the making.’ As such, documentary form models a constantly shifting and open-ended revolutionary process. In light of Weiss’s theatrical model, I focus on Egyptian director and playwright Laila Soliman’s performance series No Time for Art, especially its last performance to date, which demonstrates a particular inflection of the documentary mode contemporaneous to the 2011 Egyptian uprising. The series is shaped by a performance form that seeks a place directly connected to and implicated in the broader events taking place, while disrupting conventional modes of representation and rupturing the tendency to fix and reify events from the revolution. The open and direct mimetic mode shown in this series includes the audience in collective and intimate acts of bearing witness, in ways that extend Weiss’s proposed ideal of ‘theatre of actuality’ and puts forward the practice of theatre itself as a ‘gesture’ of political resistance.

Research GroupTheatre Arts group
PublisherTaylor & Francis (Routledge)
JournalContemporary Theatre Review
ISSN1048-6801
Electronic1477-2264
Publication dates
Print03 Jul 2015
Online17 Jul 2015
Publication process dates
Deposited28 Apr 2015
Output statusPublished
Accepted author manuscript
Copyright Statement

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Contemporary Theatre Review on 17/07/2015, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/10486801.2015.1049822

Additional information

Published online: 17 Jul 2015

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)https://doi.org/10.1080/10486801.2015.1049822
LanguageEnglish
Permalink -

https://repository.mdx.ac.uk/item/852w4

Download files


Accepted author manuscript
  • 38
    total views
  • 23
    total downloads
  • 0
    views this month
  • 2
    downloads this month

Export as

Related outputs

Decolonisation and performance studies: Questions from the border
Hussein, N. 2022. Decolonisation and performance studies: Questions from the border. Global Performance Studies. 5 (1-2). https://doi.org/10.33303/gpsv5n1-2a114
Introduction: Creative practices/resistant acts
Hussein, N. and MacKenzie, I. 2017. Introduction: Creative practices/resistant acts. Contention - The Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest. 5 (1), pp. 1-13. https://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2017.050102
Rewriting Narratives in Egyptian Theatre: Translation, Performance, Politics. Edited by Sirkku Aaltonen and Areeg Ibrahim . Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2016. Pp. 288 17 illus. £110 Hb [Book Review]
Hussein, N. 2017. Rewriting Narratives in Egyptian Theatre: Translation, Performance, Politics. Edited by Sirkku Aaltonen and Areeg Ibrahim . Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2016. Pp. 288 17 illus. £110 Hb [Book Review]. Theatre Research International. 42 (3), pp. 353-355. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0307883317000669
Answer the question
Hussein, N. 2018. Answer the question. Theatre, Dance and Performance Training. 9 (1), pp. 118-119. https://doi.org/10.1080/19443927.2018.1428435
Training and…borders
Hussein, N. and Papadelli, V. 2017. Training and…borders. Theatre, Dance and Performance Training. 8 (1), pp. 109-110. https://doi.org/10.1080/19443927.2017.1275208
Guest editors' introduction: Creative practices/resistant acts
Hussein, N. and MacKenzie, I. 2017. Guest editors' introduction: Creative practices/resistant acts. Contention - The Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest. 5 (1), pp. iv-107. https://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2017.050102
Working with and supporting early career academics. A provocation
Hussein, N. 2014. Working with and supporting early career academics. A provocation. The Standing Conference of University Drama Departments' annual conference. Aberystwyth University.
Performance as a gesture of resistance in Laila Soliman’s No Time for Art
Hussein, N. 2015. Performance as a gesture of resistance in Laila Soliman’s No Time for Art. Theatre and Stratification. International Federation for Theatre Research’s world congress. The University of Warwick 28 Jul - 01 Aug 2014
Here… there… and the question of belonging
Hussein, N. 2015. Here… there… and the question of belonging. Arab Women Artists Now (AWAN) Festival.. Rich Mix, London. 07 Mar 2015
Here, there, and the question of belonging in a time of revolution
Hussein, N. 2015. Here, there, and the question of belonging in a time of revolution. Contested Exchanged: Space, Place and the Performance of Democracy. Artaud Performance Centre. Brunel University, London. 28 Mar 2015
Gestures of resistance between the street and the theatre: documentary theatre in Egypt and Laila Soliman’s No Time For Art
Hussein, N. 2015. Gestures of resistance between the street and the theatre: documentary theatre in Egypt and Laila Soliman’s No Time For Art. New Anarchist Research Group Monthly Meeting. Torriano Meeting House, London 25 Apr 2015
My City, My Revolution
Hussein, N., Papadelli, V., Goely, M. and Picknett, M. 2015. My City, My Revolution. Rich Mix theatre, London 23 Jan 2015
Cairo: my city, my revolution
Hussein, N. 2013. Cairo: my city, my revolution. in: Solga, K. and Hopkins, D. (ed.) Performance and the global city Basingstoke, UK Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 223-243