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DRAM20180

Academic Year 2026/2027

20thCentury AvantGarde Theatre (DRAM20180)

Subject:
Drama Studies
College:
Arts & Humanities
School:
English, Drama & Film
Level:
2 (Intermediate)
Credits:
5
Module Coordinator:
Dr Emma Bennett
Trimester:
Autumn
Mode of Delivery:
On Campus
Internship Module:
No
How will I be graded?
Letter grades

Curricular information is subject to change.

During the twentieth century, theatre and performance makers engaged in innovative and often radial experimentation to produce works that came to be known as 'avant-garde'. In a century ravaged by vast political upheaval, avant-garde artists believed that art could be revolutionary, that alternative communities and futures could be formed, and that the tired conventions of the past could be shocked into previously unimagined forms.

This module introduces key theatre makers, playwrights, and performers associated with various 20th Century avant-garde movements and scenes. It also challenges received understandings of the avant-garde and raises questions about who has been excluded from its canon, and why.

Through video, photography, text and other documents, we will piece together the events, practices, and encounters that constitute a history of 20th Century Avant-Garde Theatre. We will test various theoretical discourses of performance analysis, with a particular focus on three focal points: ACTOR, AUDIENCE, and EVENT. We'll consider how each of these categories was challenged and transformed through innovative practices that span the years from 1899 to 2001.

About this Module

Learning Outcomes:

On completion of the module students will be familiar with selected performances of leading avant-garde theatre makers and performance artists of the twentieth century.

Students will be able to:
- Reflect on and critically analyse selected performances
- Discuss avant-garde performances with recourse to theoretical frameworks of ACTOR, AUDIENCE, and EVENT
- Contextualise avant-garde theatrical works as historical events occurring in specific social, economic, and cultural contexts

Indicative Module Content:

Indicative weekly content (subject to change):
Week 1: Provocation: Against Bourgeois Spectatorship
Week 2: A Riot in the Theatre: Ubu Roi by Alfred Jarry (1899, Paris)
Week 3: ‘the aesthetics of HOT-AND-COOL’: Josephine Baker (1920s, Paris)
Week 4: ‘Europe is Indefensible’: A Tempest by Aimé Césaire (1969, Hammamet)
Week 5: Transcendent Acts: Jerzy Grotowski (1960s, Wrocław)
Week 6: Reflection and Discussion: The Work of the Actor
Week 7: ‘What Moves Them’: The Rite of Spring by Pina Bausch (1975, Wuppertal)

READING WEEK

Week 8: Art as Giving: Cut Piece by Yoko Ono (1964-66, Tokyo, New York)
Week 9: Delegated Performance: Santiago Sierra (1999, Los Angeles, Guatemala City)
Week 10: Reflection and Discussion: What Can Art Do?
Week 11: Assignment Support

The United Nations identified seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as core to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and UCD contributes in general to SDG 4 Quality Education. Further SDGs explored within this module if relevant are listed below. A scale of 1 - 5 indicates the extent to which the SDG is covered.


 

Student Effort Hours:
Student Effort Type Hours
Lectures

11
Small Group

11
Autonomous Student Learning

100
Total

122

Approaches to Teaching and Learning:
The module is taught through weekly lecture/seminars, each discussing a key event, artist, or question associated with the 20th Century Avant-Garde. The threads running through the whole module are a) ACTOR, b) AUDIENCE, c) EVENT. We will explore the ways various experimental and radical theatre and performance artists challenged understandings of each, from 1899 to 1999.

Requirements, Exclusions and Recommendations

Not applicable to this module.


Module Requisites and Incompatibles
Not applicable to this module.
 

Assessment Strategy
Description Timing Component Scale Must Pass Component % of Final Grade In Module Component Repeat Offered
Assignment(Including Essay): Descriptive account of an avant-garde performance, with footnotes providing research context. Week 14 Graded No
60
 No
Assignment(Including Essay): Short critical analysis of a selected performance document, or historical source relating to avant-garde ACTORS, AUDIENCES, or EVENTS. Week 8 Graded No
40
 No

Carry forward of passed components
Yes
 

Resit In Terminal Exam
Spring No
Please see Student Jargon Buster for more information about remediation types and timing. 

Feedback Strategy/Strategies

• Feedback individually to students, on an activity or draft prior to summative assessment
• Feedback individually to students, post-assessment

How will my Feedback be Delivered?

Written feedback offered 2 weeks after submission of written work, and formative feedback offered in class discussions week-on-week. Additional support and feedback available on request.

Primary texts:
Alfred Jarry, Ubu Roi (play text)
Aimé Césaire, A Tempest (play text)
Pina Bausch, The Rite of Spring (video)
Yoko Ono, Cut Piece (video)

Critical/secondary readings (will be provided as PDFs on Brightspace):

Bishop, Claire. ‘Delegated Performance: Outsourcing Authenticity’ in Artificial Hells: Participatory Art and the Politics of Spectatorship. Verso Books, 2012, pp. 219-239.

Cardullo, Bert, and Robert Knopf, ‘Pataphysical Theater’ in Theater of the Avant-Garde, 1890-1950: A Critical Anthology. Yale University Press, 2001.

Climenhaga, Roy. 2009. Pina Bausch. London and New York: Routledge.

Das, Joanna D. "Dance that “Suggested Nothing but itself”: Josephine Baker and Abstraction." Arts (Basel), vol. 9, no. 1, 2020.

Grotowski, Jerzy. Towards a Poor Theatre. Methuen, 1976.

Florêncio, João. 2015. ‘Enmeshed bodies, impossible touch.’ Performance Research, 20:2, 53-59.

Harding, James M., The Ghosts of the Avant-Garde(s): Exorcising Experimental Theater and Performance. University of Michigan Press, 2013.

Livingston, Robert Eric, ‘Decolonising the Theatre’ in Gainor, J. Ellen, editor. Imperialism and Theatre: Essays on World Theatre, Drama and Performance. Rouledge, 1995.

Rhee, Jieun. "Performing the Other: Yoko Ono's Cut Piece." Art History, vol. 28, no. 1, 2005, pp. 96-118.

Wolford, Lisa. ‘Grotowski’s Vision of the Actor’ in Twentieth Century Actor Training by Alison Hodge. London, Routledge, 2009, pp. 191-208.

Name Role
Dr Emma Bennett Lecturer / Co-Lecturer
Dr Salome Paul Lecturer / Co-Lecturer

Timetabling information is displayed only for guidance purposes, relates to the current Academic Year only and is subject to change.
Autumn Lecture Offering 1 Week(s) - Autumn: All Weeks Tues 14:00 - 14:50
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