Venue: Theatre 2
Time: 4pm-5.30pm
Presenter(s): Professor Allyson Green and Professor Helen Phelan
Chair: Dr Eoin Callery
Richard Schechner famously proposed that all rituals are performative, and all performances are ritualised. The functions of performance, identified as early as Aristotle as including education, celebration, entertainment, healing, social cohesion and social disruption, are also the reasons we ritualise. This Tower seminar features Professors Allyson Green (Dean, Tisch School of the Arts) and Helen Phelan (Director, Irish World Academy of Music and Dance) in conversation, chaired by Dr Eoin Callery. Taking their recent ritual collaboration, LABYRINTH, as a point of departure, they explore a wide range of topics including the role of ritual in contemporary practice, the singing and dancing body in ritual, ritual and creative leadership, ritual as provocation, ritual as prophecy, and ritual in the life cycle.
Allyson Green is a choreographer, visual artist, curator and arts educator. Integrating artistic creative development and education, advocacy for the arts, and service to the local and international community has been the mission of her multi-faceted career. Her creative research has been particularly influenced by two decades of residencies in East and Central Europe, South America, and Mexico; community projects for arts engagement; and ongoing site-specific collaborations with visual artist Peter Terezakis that explore the intersection of art and technology and environmental issues. Before joining New York University in 2012, she chaired the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of California, San Diego, having previously spent several years as an assistant professor of dance at San Diego State University. In 2014, Professor Green was appointed Dean of the Tisch School of the Arts in NYU.
Helen Phelan is Director of the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, and Co-Director of the Participatory Health Research Unit at the 九色视频. As Professor of Arts Practice, she is an internationally recognised advocate for the integration of artistic methods into research cultures. She is a multi-award winning Irish Research Council recipient for her work on music, ritual and migration. She is founder of the UL Singing and Social Inclusion research group, co-founder of the medieval vocal ensemble Cantoral, and current Chair of IMBAS, a national network for artistic research in Ireland.