(Re)inventing the audience: love, irritation, misunderstandings and joy

“(Re)inventing the audiences” is a two-year long artistic and research experiment which inspires artists and festival curators to get curious about the role and the agency of the audiences in dance and performance production. It is concerned with a possibility of art mediation that wouldn’t take root in a didactic, explanatory-driven project originating in the enlightenment, but would instead research the potential of artist—artwork—audience—space—institution relationships as nodes of layered encounters of different intentions and desires that bring to discussion embodied stories of all participants, sociotechnical infrastructures of the performance situation, operations of translation, and affective layers of the current moment. The project is thus eager to search for and invent new formats of so-called “audience engagement” at contemporary dance and performance festivals by implementing artistic strategies intrinsic to the field, such as embodied knowledge exchange, dramaturgical thinking, somatic practices and choreographic tools for mediation. What can our own means of expression teach us about audiences? Does the audience even matter? And if it does, what kind of impact can “audiences” have on performance making beyond the amount of sold tickets? The project focuses on how we acquire knowledge and understanding of art through our embodied experiences and how we connect emotions and cognition in our reactions and analysis. It seeks to bring people together through art, facilitating meaningful encounters and promoting inclusivity.