The Personal Encounter with World Politics : An attempt at criticizing and manifesting an alternative to global capitalism’s way of functioning through research-based performance

Abstract

1. Performance series: A Reversed Crime Story Background: On Christmas Eve 2015, in Rio de Janeiro, Edy Poppy, Julian Blaue, and their six-month-old son are assaulted and robbed by two men, wielding a large knife, from a favela. Blaue & Poppy assume the reason for the assault is poverty, caused by the unjust distribution of common global goods. Are the upper- and middle-classes, which Blaue & Poppy are a part of, not co-responsible for this unjust distribution? This is the initial question for the performance-series A Reversed Crime Story (2018 - 2023), consisting of four performances (A-D): A) The Criminal Complaints Performance (Sørlandets kunstmuseum, 2018): Blaue & Poppy are “enacting a law against structural violence”. Since they watched, and thereby supported, the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, which had horrible consequences for Rio’s economically underprivileged, they “press charges against themselves” for having “broken the law”. Did they commit structural violence against the two poor men who attacked them? The duo travels back to Brazil on an “investigative journey”. B) The Interim Report Performance (Museu de Arte do Rio, Kristiansand kunsthall, Fjaler theatre festival, University of Agder, 2018): In Rio de Janeiro, looking for proof against themselves, they follow the tracks of their assailants to the prison. In The Interim Report, they present the results of their investigation and verify some of their assessments. Blaue & Poppy undertake a harm-profit calculation to answer the question of their guilt and “celebrate” their profit with Champagne and Elvis Presley’s music video for In the Ghetto (1969). C) The Trial Against Ourselves (Stamsund International Theatre Festival, Kilden teater and CourtStageTV, 2021): The core of the PhD project is this theatre trial, including courthouse scenography (by Pelle Brage and Julia Rosa) – a performance that protests the condition of its status as theatre. Blaue & Poppy present their findings as “evidence”. “The prosecutor” (Laura Mitzkus) agrees with their guilt, while they are defended against their will by their “defense lawyer” (Samantha Lawson). “The judge” (Jacob Jensen) considers how Blaue & Poppy have gained cultural capital from the assault through, for instance, this very performance-series. Every Trial Against Ourselves is live and unpredictable, with most of the performances resulting in a different verdict from the in- performance court. D) Death of Theatre, Birth of Law? (Det Norske Teatret, 2023): In this performance, Blaue & Poppy present A Reversed Crime Story, ending by asking a panel of experts (Tuva Hennum, Ivica Buljan, Lily Climenhaga) whether they should take the law against structural violence to politics or not. Philosopher and film critic Wolfgang M. Schmitt makes a final decision on the question. Blaue & Poppy understand his decision as affirmative. That’s why they “destroy the theatre”, i.e., the courthouse scenography, and literally take the law to the nearby Norwegian Parliament Stortinget before running back to the theatre while still carrying the law, confessing the impossibility of enacting the law for real (but still shouting “death of theatre”). 2. A Poem “Criminal Complaint Against Ourselves” (Prosaisk Lyrikkbevegelse, Lik Forlag, 2018): While on their way to Brazil, to investigate the case against themselves, Blaue & Poppy write and publish “A Political Poem in three Cata-Strophes and one Apo-strophe” asking which is the biggest injustice amongst the injustices discussed in the project. 3. Article-Performance Det er jo bare papir?” (It’s only Paper?) (Ny Tid, 2019): This article-performance describes an episode at Frankfurt International Airport, where a refugee asked Blaue & Poppy to “smuggle” a driver’s license to Sofia, the destination of their flight. Did Blaue & Poppy also “break their law” here? Possibly acting out structural violence against a refugee by indirectly denouncing him to the German police? 4. Five Essays A) “Structural Violence as Art” (Art Magazine EE, 2018): In this essay Blaue discusses the fundamental questions of the PhD project with reference to J. P. Sartre and Frantz Fanon: Why try to understand an antagonist who uses weapons against you? And how can shame of privilege be “a revolutionary feeling”, i.e., a state of being that can lead to changing the status quo? B) “The Artist is Capitalism’s Best Fiend” (Norsk Shakespearetidsskrift, 2018c): This essay describes – with references to sociologists Eve Chiapello and Luc Boltanski and design theorist Friedrich von Borries – how performances by Jochen Roller, von Borries, Xavier Le Roy, and Blaue & Poppy criticize global capitalism in, at times, paradoxical ways. C) “Propaganda Art, Trial Theatre and Amazon Anger” (Norsk Shakespearetidsskrift, 2020): With reference to economists Joseph Stiglitz and Thomas Piketty, Blaue dwells in this essay on the importance of taming neo-liberalism by means of political institutions. Swiss theatre-maker Milo Rau’s directing of Brazilian activist Kay Sara as the titular character in Antigone in the Amazon serves as the backdrop for this discussion. One conclusion this article arrives at: A real enactment of a law against structural violence could be an alternative to global capitalism’s way of functioning. D) “The Trial Against Ourselves, pre-enactment and utopia” (Scottish Journal of Performance, 2022): This peer-reviewed essay describes Milo Rau’s The Congo Tribunal and Augusto Boal’s Legislative Theatre as pre-enactments and utopian institutions. It also states a paradox: Blaue & Poppy must “pre-enact” a precedent case for an official enactment of a law against structural violence, while simultaneously protesting that such a law hasn’t been officially enacted yet. E) “The Lie Shall Set Us Free” (Norsk Shakespearetidsskrift, 2024): This article comments upon the performance Death of Theatre, Birth of Law?, going into dialogue with critics, commentators, and other observers of the performance, defining the project as “discussion art”. The article engages with the possible blindspots and practical impossibilities of an enactment of a law against structural violence, but also insists on the necessity of its enactment, while taking seriously a criticism of the law and its possible totalitarian aspects. 5. Mantle Text Structural Guilt – A Self-Critical Practice (2023): The mantle text reconstructs the development of the PhD project The Personal Encounter with World Politics. This entire PhD project is understood as the result of a process of transformation: the performances are improved versions of each other that learn from each previous performance, likewise theoretical ideas are modified in practice and in later texts. Are some of Blaue’s previous understandings – those that are later left behind – traces of common ideologies, at least in the definition provided by The Frankfurt School (Rahel Jaeggi) and Neo-Marxism (Slavoj Žižek)? The mantle text also summarizes the conclusions and findings of the PhD project and spells out answers to the research question. Whereas there are many criticisms of global capitalism’s way of functioning in performance – some of which are discussed or performed in this project – manifesting an alternative is difficult, but not impossible. Blaue & Poppy nevertheless try to find this alternative by developing an artistic precedence case for the enactment of a law against structural violence. The central performance of the A Reversed Crime Story series, The Trial Against Ourselves, takes place in a performative framework where a law that responds to the structural violence of neoliberal, globalized capitalism “exists”. Instead of simply pretending and performing the realness of such a law, Blaue & Poppy expose the political scandal of the failure of the law to be real in the immediate present. There are artists who have manifested performative alternatives to global capitalism’s way of functioning that are able to function on a small scale, or for a limited period of time. However, for A Reversed Crime Story, Blaue & Poppy conclude that politics – not their performance art – make it impossible to manifest a valid alternative. To scandalize this politically is – besides the proposal of a law against structural violence and the self-critical method that reveals ideologies – the main contribution of this research-based performance project to the body of artistic attempts to tame global capitalism juridically.