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The Researchers
"PLATFORM is part of the art of the 21st Century taking place
in the last decade of the 20th Century"
Since 1984 PLATFORM has established itself as one of Europe's
leading exponents of social practice art, combining the talents
of artists, scientists, activists and economists to work across
disciplines on issues of social and environmental justice. Its
projects have been recognised for their innovation and imagination
not just in Britain but internationally - over recent months it
has made major presentation of its work in Yugoslavia, Canada
and the U.S.A. Since 1996 it has been working on its most ambitious
project to date - 90% CRUDE - focussing on the culture and impact
of Transnational Corporations, with particular reference to London.
PLATFORM gives a presentation on: "New Models for Working
with Audiences"
1. The Community of Place. Ways of exploring any city on an ecological
basis ( its own bio-region). Ways of exploring a city as a patchwork
of communities.
2. The Community of Interest How to make work that responds to
specific audiences eg. environmentalists, corporate employees.
New interdisciplinary methodologies - eg.artists working with
economists on oil industry.
3. The Community of the Dead and Unborn Linking living generations
to the past and future, especially with regard to environmental
work.
Colleen Scott, editor, writer, lecturer, Amsterdam
In the early summer of 1997 Colleen Scott spent several weeks
in South Africa following the work of the South African Truth
and Reconciliation Commission. She has published several articles
and essays on that theme and given lectures. She is presently
working on a book on the application od reconciliation in "societies
in transition". " Intrigued by a theme of some of Peter
Sellars' old lectures that "the arts must promote reconciliation,"
I decided to investigate how that might be accomplished. My understanding
of theatre is dependant on Aristotele's maxim that narrativity
is the center of dramatic art, and that conflict is the soul of
narrativity. To make a longer story very short, conflict is built
out of a chain of cause and effect, of action and reaction on
the part of the characters in any given dramatic expression. And
although conflict must be resolved (in classic dramatic form)
I've seldom read or seen artistic expression of conflict solved
through reconciliation. I am now more concerned with how the concepts
of reconciliation may be applied by people in daily life, and
in political action. My concern is now the attempt to redefine
the concept of justice, and to develop ways in which the human
need for revenge, and vengeance, may be addressed without bloodshed.
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