Six dramaturg practitioners and academics from Asia and America collaboratively held a dramaturgs’ meeting, entitled “What happens when Dramaturg Is Present? Reflecting on Creative Practice, Process, and Research in Performance Making”, which consisted of an opening symposium on March 20, lectures and seminars on March 21 at Kyoto Art Theater Shunju-za and workshops at ROHM Theater Kyoto on March 23, 2024. The title suggests a shift in dramaturgy from traditional dramatic theatre to broader performance making contexts, as presented by these dramaturgs working across various fields, including applied theatre, dance performance, performing arts, theatre and art festivals.

Regarding creating context of performing arts in Asia, Dr. Yoshiji Yokoyama, the dramaturg in the literary section of Shizuoka Performing Arts Center—home to the annual World Theatre Festival Shizuoka—highlighted the challenges of programming Asian theatre productions in international festivals. He attributed these difficulties to the existing framework of theatre, which is often rooted in a value system shaped by European contexts. Nevertheless, Yokoyama also examined the reception of modern Western drama and theatre in Japan through exploring the two translated Japanese terms for “theatre” from the Meiji Restoration to the early 20th century. He elaborated on how Western dramatic theatre was introduced to Japan, targeting cultured audiences. In the context of theatre reform, which prioritized realistic plays, stage performances also became increasingly focused on spoken dialogue. Although reflecting historical contexts enables a dramaturgical awareness regarding to the limitations to the conceptualization of a local international theatre festival, it is relevant to focus on contemporary local institutional and governmental policies relating to public theatre festival, as well as audiences’ understanding and expectations regarding theatre and festival. Understanding these contextual conditions might help create a festival that resonates with the local community while also embracing global exchanges.

Focusing on meaning-making in performance, Charlene Rajendran, the Malaysian theatre educator and an associate professor at the National Institute of Education—Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, reflected on the interconnectedness of precarity, listening and dramaturgy in creative practices. She posited that the dramaturg’s role embodies thought leadership, driven by vision and collaboration through dialogical relationships. Positioned precariously between the collaborators’ creative processes, a dramaturg may sometimes need to step back, allowing uncertainty to foster emergence. Rajendran advocated for dramaturgs to approach their work with naivety rather than judgment and to embrace conflict for opening new possibilities while facilitating change. She highlighted that the practice of deep listening invites diverse perspectives, including those of the marginalized and fragile, shaping further dramaturgical actions. Consequently, dramaturgical practice develops into a collaborative choice, which encompasses multiple viewpoints and navigates with political consciousness during the creative process. Different from emphasizing the sensing skill of looking, it is interesting to hear more about the dramaturgical mode of listening, by which Rajendran wrote in “Three Attunements for a Listening Dramaturg”¹. While intriguing in the precarious presence of dramaturg, the issue on the dramaturg’s role in crossing fields and disciplines remains to be addressed.

Having working experiences across fields, Kaku Nagashima, an associate professor teaching dramaturgy and curatorial practice in the Graduate School of Global Arts at Tokyo University of Arts, clearly demonstrated his expertise through his works in the documentary theatre Atomic Survivor (2007) and the participatory art project “←” (arrow) at the local festival of Saitama Triennale 2016. His works in both projects included concept development, editorial work—such as writing the text for the documentary performance and selecting images and quotes for the art project panels— and creating materials to engage with the public. Notably, both projects showcased Nagashima’s dramaturgical knowledge and ability to draw connections to earlier dramas. Atomic Survivor featured excerpts from Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, while the concept for the art project was inspired by Ōta Shōgo’s Yajirushi (Arrow). This dramaturgical knowledge and ability are valuable assets for dramaturgs, while working across fields, for instance, from theatre to visual arts, by which dramaturgy and curating could be synergistically developed.

Pil Hansen, a professor in the School of Creative and Performing Arts at University of Calgary, Canada, has developed the concept of dance dramaturgical agency² through practical experience and research. She unfolded how artistic inquiry, and dramaturgical facilitation can work together, paying specific attention to ethical dimensions. Performing artists, engaging in artistic inquiry, can be supported by a dramaturgical agency which enables them to explore possibilities and make informed choices. As recent inquiries prioritize ethics and equity, dramaturgy can handle complex ethical dilemmas while creating space for diverse perspectives and modes of unknowing. With the example of Ame Henderson’s dancer group challenging conventional notions of choreography through a method of “futuring memory” in the performance of relay, Hansen explained dramaturgical agency was distributed more equitably among the dancers. Lee Su-Feh’s solo work EVERYTHING II, which explored migratory relationships in fragmented social-environmental connections and histories through engagement with the severed heritage and connection with the audience and the dancing environment, demonstrated the way of unknowing through doing dramaturgy. Viewed from Hansen’s ethical perspective in doing dramaturgy, one would wonder, whether this equity will also be distributed to the dramaturg, when claiming the ownership of the creative practice?

Hikaru Okamoto, an assistant professor, teaching dance studies and creation at the Professional College of Arts and Tourism in Hyogo prefecture, presented an interesting dialogue with Teita Iwabuchi, a choreographer experienced theater, butō, traditional Japanese dance, based in Yokohama. After participating in Iwabuchi’s body research workshops, Okamoto found his method and terminology relevant to her research, which led her to invite Iwabuchi for a conversation to reflect on their practices. Iwabuchi explained his term “reticulated body”, a movement method system inspired by martial arts that emphasizes fluidity within defined boundaries. This made Okamoto reconsider her initial view of his approach as purely improvisational. She raised questions about the balance between freedom and restriction in improvisation, to which Iwabuchi responded by referencing the martial art “Systema”. Iwabuchi explained if survival is the goal, dancers naturally gravitate towards movements that ensure their safety, thereby expanding their possibilities for expression. In response to Okamoto’s essay on his movement method, Iwabuchi suggested exploring alternative analytical frameworks rooted in Eastern philosophies, such as Confucianism and Taoism, rather than Western theories. Their lively exchange highlighted Okamoto’s dance research through experiential learning, reflective writing with misinterpretation and a humble approach to dialogic feedback, which are methodologies commonly found within the realm of dramaturgy, particularly in exploring the unknown.

The first Asian received the Special Commendation of the Elliot Hayes Award from the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas, Nanako Nakajima, currently an associate professor in dance studies and dramaturgy in the School of Culture, Media and Society at Waseda University in Tokyo, embodied dramaturgs’ outside eyes in dialogue with Koji Takabayashi, an 89-year-old Nō actor of the Kita School. Nakajima believed that a dramaturg’s somatic presence—integrating both body and mind—was essential. Though referring the term of acting, riken no ken 離見の見, or “vantage from a vision apart” coined by the performer, playwright and aesthetic theoretician Motokiyo Zeami of the Nō theatre, which allows actors objectively observing themselves just from the spectator’s perspective, even while emotionally identifying the character represented³, Nakajima focused on the dramaturg’s distance viewing of seeing with the somatic presence. Being invited to showcase a distant viewing scene, Takabayashi emphasized his acting style from Kita School distinct from Zeami’s Kanze School. He portrayed a Nō character type of elderly women gazing sorrowfully at the moon, illustrating the expressive gesture of watching, where people far away could still see. Being aware of the Japanese performance concept of geidō芸道, or “the way to achieve bodily skills and knowledge of the artists”⁴, Nakajima wished to practice the performing of distant viewing or to watch the moon together with Takabayashi as a dramaturg using outside eyes to herself become creators, who knows the principles of performing and appreciation of the scene. The presentation with Takabayashi’s Nō performance showed that Nakajima, though having understood the Western concept of dramaturgy as an outside perspective, traced back her Japanese cultural performance concept of doing dramaturgy as creators, who, with subjective experiences, formulate creative aesthetics, including the methodology of dramaturgy in performance.

In this first meeting on dramaturgy held in Japan, although many participants were Japanese, presentations were consecutively interpreted from Japanese to English or vice versa for international audiences, which was highly appreciated as ways of communication, especially in nowadays global arts world. Besides the interdisciplinary role of dramaturg, issues on “glocal” or intercultural dramaturgy are suggested to be discussed in future meetings.

¹ See Rajendran, Charlene. “Three Attunements for a Listening Dramaturg”. In: Rajendran, Charlene, et al. eds. (Asian) Dramaturgs’ Networking: Sensing, Complexing, Tracing and Doing. Centre 42, 2023, pp. 163-177.

² See Hansen, Pil. “Dance Dramaturgical Agency.” In: Butterworth, Jo, and Liesbeth Wildschut eds. Contemporary Choreography: A Critical Reader, 2nd Edition. Routledge, 2018, pp. 185-200. Also, Hansen, Pil. Performance Generating System in Dance: Dramaturgy, Psychology, and Performativity. Intellect, 2023.

³ See Fischer-Lichte, Erika, et al. eds. The Routledge Companion to Performance-Related Concepts in Non-European Languages. Routledge, 2024, pp. 413 and 461.

⁴ Ibid, pp. 424-5.