ARTAUD

ANTONIN ARTAUD AND HIS EFFECT ON THEATRE TODAY

Antonin Artaud is one of the most prominent figures in the evolution of modern theatre as an actor, dramatist, poet, actor and general theoretician of the Surrealist movement in the 1920s. He evolved the idea of the 'theatre of cruelty' and set up an experimental theatre company to embark one exploring his theories. 

ARTAUD'S EARLY LIFE

Antonin Artaud was born as Antoine-Marie-Joseph Artaud on September 4th 1896 in Marseille, France, a metropolitan port town.  His parents were Levantine Greek and he was affected very much by this background through his fascination of mysticism or 'religious ecstasies' In his younger years, Antonin spent a lot of time in Turkey with his mother's side who were inherently Turkish. Antonin was 'bathed in multiple languages', which influenced his later writing', as his family spoke Greek, French, Turkish and Italian. When his grandmother died, it deeply affected Artaud: his summers with her in Turkey as said by Bettina Napp were filled with a sense of 'closeness and a calness, a sense of belonging and an inner joy' which contrasted Antonin's unhappy tense home life. Moreover, Antonin's childhood was filled with more grief as out of the 8 children that his mother had, only three survived into adulthood. He had also survived a very near death experience in Turkey as he had nearly drowned one summer, and had also had a severe attack caused by meningitis when he was only five. This deep suffering was to become recurrent throughout Artaud's life.

 He was only a young man when World War One broke out in 1914, and was conscripted into the army initially spending nine months training in Digne. Nevertheless, he was soon discharged due to his evident depression. Artaud had a history of chronic mental disorder, and as a result he was hospitalised into a mental institute when he was only nineteen for depression. There, he read Arthur Rimbaud, Charles Baudelaire and Edgar Allan Poe. As a result, at age 21 Artaud was prescribed a liquid form of heroin/opium as 'laudanum', which led to life long addiction. He moved closer to Paris so that he could pursue involvement in the arts. 

ARTAUD IN PARIS

In March 1921, Artaud embarked on his journey as an actor and into the world of Surrealism, which subverted his father's wishes. He wrote poetry and essays and trained with directors such as Charles Dullin and Georges Pitoeff simultaneously. At age 27, his own Surrealist poetry such as L'ombilic des limbes of 1925 and Le Pèse-nerfs of 1925 were rejected by La Nouvelle Revue Françajse but then were sent to Jacques Rivière, an influential critic and editor of the journal  who became associated with him from that point.  This progressed into Artaud's first epistolary work called Correspondance avec Jacques Rivière. 

Artaud was interested in cinema and wrote the scenario for the first surrealist film of 1927, The Seashell and the Clergyman which was directed by Germaine Dulac. This film became prominent in inspiring two Spanish surrealists, Salvador Dali and Luis Bunuel. 

He studied as an actor in Paris and then made his debut at the Dadaist-Surrealist Théâtre de l'Oeuvre founded by Aurélien Lugné-Poë. Despite this, he was soon rejected by the Surrealists as he was seen as 'too individual' and had disagreed politically with the deference of the Surrealist leader André Breton to communism.  In fact, Artaud wasn't into politicsat all and hated any kind of ideology - he was an anarchist. Breton also didn't like Artaud's resentment towards the theatrical landscape at his time and despised how he tried to fund his own various theatrical projects, seeing it as 'too bourgeois'. This culminated in Artaud's ultimate rejection by the Surrealists, a common occurrence under the authoritative leader Breton. 

He then joined another defecting Surrealist, Roger Vitrac and started a theatre company called Alfred Jarry along with Vitrac and Robert Aron, which was sadly short lived from 1926-1928 yet they aimed to create a forum for works that could radically change the French theatrical landscape. Artaud was particularly appalled at the way in which Western theatre had become lazy in how it affected and challenged audiences. As a result, he produced and directed works that Vitrac had written, and also became interested in the works of Claudel and Strindberg. Despite the theatre being short lived, it was attended by various European artists and developed significant popularity in its time. 

"I myself am an abyss" -Antonin Artaud 

'THE THEATRE OF CRUELTY': 1938 

Artaud recorded his ideas and criticisms of modern theatre through works like 'Le theatre de la cruaute' and 'The Theater and Its Double, which were published as manifestos in 1938. The theatre of cruelty advocated a type of theatrical experience unbeknown to the time,  combining elaborate props, magic tricks, lighting, gestures and articulations with vivid dark themes to provoke an intense experience for the audience in coming to terms with the base elements of life and creating a 'communion between actor and audience in a magic exorcism'. He thought that a lot of Western theatre wasn't effective in challenging the audience in this way, and wrote about themes such as rape in works like 'Les Cenci', a play about a man who  rapes his daughter. Although it eventually did become produced in Paris in 1935, it received a lot of backlash and was discontinued after only seventeen performances. 'The Fountain of Blood' was another prominent work that discussed the creation of the world and its subsequent destruction by humans, mostly women. Artaud strived to bring out the natural and ugly instincts that were suppressed by the human facade, and wanted these to be exposed through his plays. 'Les Cenci' and 'The Fountain of Blood' both challenged conventional norms. This became known as the 'theatre of cruelty' simply for its cruelty: Artaud believed that this cruelty was needed to essentially wake the audience up and get them to embrace the cruelty of human existence through a violent and physical determination. He was particularly inspired by Eastern forms of theatre, particularly Balinese dance as the ritualised physicality and rhythms advocated the idea of a theatre of cruelty. 

The Theatre of Cruelty re-defined the limits to which an audience could be pushed, and the horrors that they could experience. Artaud's brand of surrealism aspired to strip the illusion of theatrical falseness, and instead he wanted to instigate and provoke reality from theatre itself. He wanted to delve into the inner workings of human nature to ultimately disturb the audience.

Artaud's theatre of cruelty was never really accepted or embraced in this lifetime but today his ideas still have much significance and his concepts are studied and analysed by many authors and writers.

Taken from the Poetry Foundation, Author George E. Wellwarth explained that the theatre of cruelty is 'the impersonable, mindless and therefore implacable cruelty to which men are subject. The universe with its violent natural forces was cruel in Artaud's eyes, and this cruelty, eh felt, was the one single most important fact of which man must be aware... Artaud's theater must be ecstatic. It must crush and hypnotise the onlooker's sense."

The Theatre of Cruelty is still significant today, it allows pre-existing texts to be revived and to be delivered in a much more challenging way through Artaudian techniques. 

 “Theater of Cruelty means a theater difficult and cruel for myself first of all. And, on the level of performance, it is not the cruelty we can exercise upon each other by hacking at each other’s bodies, carving up our personal anatomies, or, like Assyrian emperors, sending parcels of human ears, noses, or neatly detached nostrils through the mail, but the much more terrible and necessary cruelty which things can exercise against us. We are not free. And the sky can still fall on our heads. And the theater has been created to teach us that first of all.” -Antonin Artaud

An article which discusses the significance of Artaudian concept in today's contemporary theatre

After Alfred Jarry was a failure, in 1936 Artaud travelled to Mexico and met his first Mexican-Parisian friend Federico Cantú, who lectured on the decadence of Western civilisation. He studied and lived with the taruhumaran people and learnt their various rituals - his experiences were later published in a volume called 'Voyage to the Land of the Tarahumara'. The content of his work recording these experiences correlates with his later poetry which is dominated around the idea of the supernatural. In Mexico also, Artaud experienced horrific withdrawal symptoms from heroin.  This was the beginning of a number of episodes: significantly, in 1937, Artaud returned to France and soon travelled to Ireland in an attempt to return a walking stick he owned to Jesus Christ, who he thought was the rightful owner. This culminated when he was forcibly removed from the grounds of Milltown house and had refused to leave, and then was deported after being kept in Mountjoy prison. The Irish government papers branded him as a 'destitute and undesirable alien'.  Furthermore, Artaud was arrested when he attacked two crew members on the ship back to France, believing that they were attacking him first. 

After Artaud returned from Ireland, he began to deteriotate and spent the majority of the rest of his life in various asylums. He was penniless, and had been put into a psychiatric hospital in the 1940s where he was administrated electroshock treatment. Although this was controversial at the time, this hiatus led to his release in 1946 when Artaud began to write again. He was encouraged very much to write again during this hiatus, and these writings were published in the journal 'Demain'. His work increasingly reflected his mental afflictions. Artaud became obsessed with the human body, but loathed sex and wanted to separate himself from his sexuality, he also denounced the Church but otherwise would defy himself by pronouncing faith in God. Nevertheless, during this time, he wrote some of his best poetry in the final three years of his life. 

In January 1948, Artaud was diagnosed with colorectal cancer and died soon after on the 4th of March alone in a psychiatric clinic, although it is unknown whether he took his own life or not. 

ARTAUDIAN TECHNIQUES / CONCEPTS

1) Visual Poetry

Artaud accentuated the importance of gesture, dance and movement over the use of words. This was almost the first notion of physical theatre before it was a recognised genre. He hailed the use of soundscapes, sound effects, music and nonsensical language (even inventing his own language at a point) as long as it created emotional impact. Emotional impact was seen as a greater priority in contrast to telling a story. 

2) Creating a 'Dream-World'

Artaud wanted to encapsulate a dream world in his work. He wanted the grotesque, dark and base instincts represented in nightmares and dreams to be potent in his work. In contrast, it could be argued that naturalistic plays would represent a more realistic sense of reality, which he thought was a suppressed illusion. As a result, Artaud wanted to implement  anything that would turn reality on its head such as; rituals (as he thought they were outward symbols for inner meaning), masks, striking costumes and colour, costumes and lights. 

3) 'Assaulting' the Audience

Through his 'theatre of cruelty' Artaud accentuated the idea of shocking the audience and forcing them to come to terms with the dark and inherent elements of human nature. He criticised Western theatre heavily, believing that its 'picture-frame' esque fourth wall stage inhibited any sense of reality, and instigated an illusion. He wanted to make theatre that was visceral, gutsy and shocking, making audiences feel deep and intense emotions such as fear so that they could confront the reality of their own lives. He did this through intensely breaking the fourth wall, with aspirations to eventually put audiences on swivelled wheeled chairs that could give the audience a part in the midst of the action. With this, to truly assault the audience, Artaud exaggerated the importance of highly skilled actors who were emotionally raw, and wanted to push them to their extremes as well as the audience.

"The theatre of cruelty will choose themes and subjects corresponding to the agitation and unrest of our times" -Artaud

A TRIP TO THE TATE MODERN

COLLECTING INSPIRATION

On the 6th of January, we went to the Tate Modern to complete the given commission:

TATE MODERN

During the course of your visit to Tate Modern you will need to do the following:

• Select three works of art.
• Photograph your three pieces making note of the title of the piece, the artist, the year of creation and any other details and notes about the piece.

In response to this commission, I chose three pieces of art after exploring the gallery on two separate days. Here are three of the main pieces that I found most interesting, and that I have chosen to further explore as a stimulus for 'dreams and the subconscious':

1) 'Lobster Telephone' by Salvador Dali

This piece was created in 1936 by Salvador Dali, a Surrealist artist. Before my trip to the Tate, I was actually already aware of Dali and his work. I knew that Dali, a Spanish artist, is well known for depicting a lot of his dreams and eccentric imagined visions into implemented surrealist art. This specific piece of art was displayed in the exhibition display 'In the Studio' under the title 'International Surrealism' and is the only art work I have picked that is explicitly classed as surrealist, as I didn't want to interpret the commission too literally. It is an object, with a lobster placed on a telephone and was made out of steel, plaster, rubber, resin and paper. I found this 'surrealist' object very interesting as a classic example of surrealism made from the conjunction of incongruent objects and associations. Dali thought that this these incongruences reflected in the surreal equally reflected and insinuated deeper desires in the human nature. Dali as an artist thought that both the lobster and the telephone reflected sexual desire and had very sexual connotations, and I thought that due to this, this piece was interesting as an exploration of the sub conscious and the different needs and desires that could fall into our subconscious. 

2) 'Violent Incident' by Bruce Nauman 

Created in 1986, this art installation consists of a video taking place across 12 monitors with use of colour and sound. It is a 'simple scenario, in which a cruel joke escalates into bickering and violence, and is played out four times by professional actors'. When I first saw this piece, I remember being somewhat confused. It didn't seem to make sense, and was quite disturbing to watch the 'simple bickering' transcend into such abrupt violence. In this way, the piece was initially effective. When I saw this piece again with the commission in mind, it resonated with me more. The way in which the scene is played out many times across the monitors, in a sort of nonsensical and random order, was almost evocative of a dream like reality, where nothing really unfolds chronologically or understandably. The use of the monitors also really added to the poignancy of the piece in its sudden and quick escalation and the fact that the scene plays out in different ways across the different monitors also evoked in me the sense of distinction we have between how we perceive and examine events through subconscious evaluation versus how situations play out in reality. Moreover, I think that the 'violent incident' portrayed in this incident could be more so understood as a dream or a vision that someone has in their imagination as opposed to an actual reality, because the way in which it suddenly escalates so dramatically seems almost too exaggerated to be reality. Because of this, the incident could be reflected as someone in a confrontation imagining and envisioning the possibilities of what could happen next. 

3) 'Good Boy Bad Boy' by Bruce Nauman 

This piece is also by Bruce Nauman and was created in 1985. Again, it is a video installation and takes place across two monitors with colour and audio. The duration is 60 minutes and 52 seconds, therefore the effect is different for various audience members across time. Two monitors are displayed head height: the head and shoulders of a young black man are shown and the one represents a white woman - both are professional actors. They both deliver the same 100 phrases repeatedly, transitioning gradually from a flat, neutral tone to becoming increasingly animated and intense. The 5th time the actors say the phrase is quite aggressive, and seems quite instigative of some sort of conflict or struggle. At this point, the viewer is confronted by a barrage of contradictory phrases going from simply monotonous to very aggressive. The continuous loop of the phrases and the various ways in which the actors deliver the lines means that the speed varies, resulting in a slippage of time and the two tapes being out of sequence. Consequently, as a spectator of these pieces, I found it very disorientating and disturbing - it seemed like a nightmare, and the slippage of time of the two sequences made it very surreal and dreamlike. Equally, the use of the monitors in an almost 80s theme made it even more surreal and made me feel more alienated as a view. This effect was intensified by the increase in intensity of the lines and the direct eye contact. I felt quite disorientated and anxious the whole time I was watching it, almost like I was in a nightmare. This piece was the most evocative and immersive for me, and equally I believe that this is the piece I am most enthusiastic about exploring in a theatrical context by not using monitors. I think that within our experimental piece, the opportunity to disillusion and disorientate viewers using similar techniques that this piece uses would definitely evoke the symbols of a dream/nightmare, and would be very potent. 

In the same week, I also made an impromptu visit to the Tate Britain. Although this didn't cover the commission, I wanted to document more interesting pieces I saw and found interesting, as although this might not be directly used within our experimental work, it can still somewhat inform and inspire the way in which we interpret dreams and the subconscious: 

'Study for a Portrait', Francis Bacon, 1952

I was really captured by this Bacon's style primarily because of the really raw, grotesque and macabre depictions of human nature and our basic emotions, which are often ignored in art or romanticised. This particular portrait was one of my favourites: it depicts an old woman and I loved how powerful her mouth was in perhaps depicting suppressed anger and pain (which I thought was very apt for the themes of the subconscious, or even a nightmare). Bacon used sand to make the painting rough and add to the sinister effect, which I thought made it very evocative.

'Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion', Francis Bacon, 1944

I was also fascinated by this triptych by Bacon because its so dark and powerful in its effect. It was produced in 1944 when the first photographs and footage of the Nazi concentration camps were being released, and it draws on the pain and suffering in a post war world. The painting itself is so macabre and disturbing and I thought that this was evocative of a potent nightmare, and the most intense and deep painful emotions that we keep suppressed as the human race - these must have been externalised during periods of absolute horror such as the Holocaust, and I think that Bacon's art really represents this. 

'Green Tea Form: Interior of Woods', Graham Sutherland, 1940

I also liked this piece by Sutherland, whom had associations to surrealist art, because instantly it reminded me of a grotesque nightmare, depicting abstractly an insidious transformation of what seems like a tree trunk into something monstrous.  Graham Sutherland commented that 'the prototype in nature has got to be seen through the terms of art. A metamorphosis has got to take place.' This 'metamorphosis' that Sutherland comments on is further evocative of a nightmare. 

WEEK TWO

16TH JANUARY 2018

In Tuesday's session, we began by discussing our dreams in a class and sharing certain dreams we'd had recently, which prompted us to begin making our dream diaries.  From this discussion, I think the potency of certain dreams really came to life, and the surreal and weird themes that were present within people's anecdotes portrayed how tangible and interesting dreams are as a stimulus for narrative within our piece. 

Many experimental theatre practitioners, such as Grotowski and Artaud believed that an actor had to be malleable and highly skilled in order to portray raw emotions on stage. This included having really skilled voices which could create a multitude of settings, sound effects and noises on stage in contrast to excessive elaborate set/staging. Therefore, as a class we began to explore using the voice, looking at how we could use it to create a force of power as an ensemble, which I found quite interesting. We began by creating vibrations by making strange and inordinate sounds and directing them into the wall, and then we created these strange sounds as a collective ensemble, adding in a gesture. We began to direct these to create ambitious tasks, such as breaking the lead that held the ceiling lights, and by toppling over a chair. Although this was somewhat bizarre and funny in hindsight, it was empowering as an ensemble when the power and force that we could create just with our voices and bodies was transpired.

Similarly, with a partner, we also used the idea of pushing the boundaries of possibility with our voices with one partner laying down in semi soupine and then using our imaginations we created the sounds that we think a baby would hear metaphorically when they first enter the world. This was challenging at first, but equally it showed that we shouldn't restrict our voices and with simultaneous use of our imagination, our voices are capable of portraying emotion and setting more evocatively than even set or props could. 

We also did an improvisation exercise as a class where as groups we would be in a lift/bus stop and people with various archetypal qualities and characteristics would get on at various points. The most interesting group that I observed I would argue was the group portraying the 'Seven Deadly Sins' through specific characters, consisting of 'Pride', 'Greed', 'Lust', 'Envy', 'Gluttony', 'Wrath' and 'Sloth'. Not only did the intensity of these characteristics increase as the improvisation in the lift commenced, making the exercise more extreme and equally intense as an audience member, it was particularly relevant to Artaud, who wanted the contents of theatre to expose the suppressed nature of human kind, particularly exposing our base instincts and assets, which have been covered up by society. Exposing the Seven Deadly Sins could be argued to reduce us to base animalistic instinctual assets, and therefore as we began to explore Antonin Artaud as a practitioner later in the exercise, it was very interesting and practical in displaying his vision. 

WHAT IS EXPERIMENTAL THEATRE

WEEK ONE - AN INTRODUCTION TO 'EXPERIMENTAL THEATRE'

In week one, we gained an insight into what experimental theatre is as a form within theatre through exploration in our first session (with our director Jack) and also through our visit to the Tate Modern, a starting point for gathering inspiration and stimulus for our devised experimental piece taking place later in the term.

What is experimental theatre?

From what I understand initially, experimental theatre or 'avant-garde' theatre subverts all the norms of theatre and has been moved forward as an art form by specific practitioners such as Peter Brook and Antonin Artaud. 

It was significant in very much moving away from naturalism and the typical conventions of the theatre, and more so used as a way of responding to the monotony of the cultural landscape at the time which corresponded with the structure of the lives of people indulging in that culture - allowing them to engage in these art forms and continue their structured lives but not be challenged or provoked in any way that might affect this structured life. Experimental theatre went against this accepted form: it aimed to tackle themes and ideas that weren't usually ideas tackled in a theatrical setting, however surreal or grotesque (for example, dreams and the subconscious) in non conventional ways, such as the use of sound and technicality as a living component within the performance.  As it came about in the 1900s, it was arguably very radical as an art form and hasn't been fully embraced until modern day today.

As a group in our exploration of experimental theatre this term, we will be focusing primarily on the idea of dreams and the sub-conscious as stimulus for our final piece. This is a very exciting prospect to me as I find dreams extremely fascinating, whether it is my own or my friends dreams and it is often a topic of conversation. I think they're very bizarre, but are so important as a form in our everyday reality as dreaming is part of the human experience and perhaps exploring dreams as well as our subconscious which is often suppressed anyway will be a really great and exciting way to focus on the ideas of experimental theatre.

We primarily focused on these ideas of experimental theatre within our first session through creating sound effects with our voices - but also exploring the boundaries of possibility through making almost inhumane and unearthly noises within this, as well as exploring new and exciting noises which allowed to extend our reach as actors. As a class, we engaged as an ensemble by making various soundscapes that echoed water dripping and the sound of a baby crying. This was rewarding and surprising to me as an actor because when all of us worked as an ensemble it was actually quite effective, and again accentuated the experimental idea of 'achieving the impossible'. As well as this, we also made a soundscape with our individual unearthly sounds and that in itself was very organic and different to something conventional and or recognisable, it was quite nonsensical and almost disturbing, connoting for me ideas of the underworld and nightmares. This profound effect encapsulates the overall aim of practitioners such as Artaud who developed the prospect of experimental theatre. 

Again, influenced by the idea of the effect of sound and sound scapes, we listened to a piece of music by György Ligeti which for me really exaggerated the potential potency of music as a component within a piece. The piece is interesting as it is evocative through musicality - for me, it was particularly evocative of the particular sensation of being lost in a massive crowd, being claustrophobic or being chased, somewhat apt for this unit because this sensation is often familiar in a nightmare like dream. The way in which the piece was structured through the layering of sound effects created by singers and the instruments created an ominous, insidious and foreboding atmosphere.

What I also took from this first session was again the idea of 'achieving the impossible' as an ensemble and through this experimental theatre form. As a group we played a piece of music and tried to achieve the impossible through touching the ceiling, pushing the walls, navigating the world upside down, falling through the centre of the earth, crawling through the centre of the earth as well as going through on a slide through the earth. This was quite bizarre initially, but I think as an ensemble the essence of this was very empowering and it effectively introduced us to the prospects of experimental theatre in an insightful way. I feel like I gained a lot from this, and found it really liberating in terms of the fact that there were literally no limits in 'achieving the impossible'. 

To embark more on the idea of dreams, we also got into groups and created dream sequence pieces. We selected one dream, Shifa's dream and represented it quite literally through Anna and Liv acting it out very simply, meanwhile myself, Liv and Stash created sound effects with our voice as a collective three to accompany the emotions of the dream and to accentuate how it turns from virtually calm to very dark and grotesque, very much a nightmare. As we conducted this as a sequence of dreams taking place in a dark room in spotlights, there was a very sinister and foreboding feel to it: creating sound effects with our voices to encapsulate the emotions associated with a nightmare was challenging, but practically demonstrated to me the power of just the individuals involved. The technical aspects of the lighting and the darkness too added to this sinister atmosphere. 

We also explored this quote from Peter Brook, one of the leading experimental practitioners, in understanding and exploring the premise of experimental: 

"I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space, whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged."

-Peter Brook

Peter Brook believes that the theatre is not an orchestra, and that the strength of the individual in creating and awakening vivid themes through experimental is the most powerful tool - this was transpired through the exercises we did as a group/ensemble.  When we all committed, this idea of the simple power of the individual was very evident. 

Within the first week of experimental term, we explored the boundaries of what constitutes art and what constitutes theatre and where this line is blurred through a trip to the Tate Modern.