Perpetual Presence and Permanent Absence: The Role of Scenography, Materiality and Affective Processes in the Trauma Representation in Contemporary Russian Theater
Abstract
As art historian Griselda Pollock emphasizes, the representation of trauma in arts should be equally understood in the context of its perpetual presence and of its permanent absence. In her turn, theatre scholar Miriam Haughton underlines, that the staging process allows for the construction of the common space in which indescribable of trauma and traumatic experience will strive towards articulation and apprehension. Taking two plays as an example, this article analyzes different aspects of trauma representation in contemporary Russian theatre. It relies on the latest changes in scenography studies in which scenography is understood not as a background to the dramatic text but as a performative situation and an agent of communication. Specifically, the article explores interrelations between a body’s materiality, object and space and analyzes the role of animate and inanimate objects in construction of atmosphere and affective processes in theatre. This article explores scenography of two plays which are based on representation of traumatic experience in the context of infamous historical events of Soviet and Post-Soviet times: “The Rhyme” (dir. Eugenia Berkovich, scen. Ksenia Sorokina) and “872 days. The Voices of the Sieged City” (dir. Tatiana Voronina, scen. Elena Zhykova). The first play, staged by an independent theatre collective “Soso’s Daughters”, premiered in 2018 in theatre space “Boyarskie Palati” and tell the story of two teenage girls stuck in the middle of the Abkhazian War. The second play, staged in 2019 in a small Sankt Petersburg’s theatre “Subbota”, explores the themes of death and survival in the context of The Siege of Leningrad. Relying on the notions of scenographic orientation and scenographic materialism this article analyzes the role of affective and cognitive processes in a spectator’s experience and explores aspects of scenography that allows to represent unrepresentable – trauma and traumatic experience. The goal of this article is to create a potential analytical structure for the analysis of representation of trauma in performative practice not only in the context of Russian theatre but in the context of contemporary theatre in general.
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References
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