Encounter Becoming: Using the Performing Object to Challenge Identity

Josiah Pearsall (University of Exeter)

This presentation, which comprises a paper and a performance, challenges the very notion of interaction by troubling the traditional ontological model of pre-existing subjects which interact. Through theatrical exploration in physical performance and puppetry, and through simultaneous philosophical questioning, I propose an alternative model where interaction happens to and engenders subjects. I initially seek, following Bruno Latour’s multiplication of agents, to encounter the ‘life’ of everyday objects without imposing anthropomorphic ideas of character, mind, or subject on them. The resulting piece, in which dramatic episodes arise out of the interaction between human and non-human object, resonates with Jean-Luc Nancy’s conception of community and ex-position, as well as Deleuze’s understanding of immanence. The performance piece explores the possibility of immanent agency that does not reside in a pre-formed subject. The paper expands on this way of working and the discoveries made through practice. What implications might this method of engaging with partners have for communities and identity?

While not specifically in the tradition of interactive theatre as it is commonly viewed, this work challenges essentialist notions of identity and existence. The practical side of this presentation both stems from and embodies a new understanding of the very nature of interaction. The paper makes more explicit the ontological shift from beings or ‘things’ towards the space between or the movement between. In seeking to preserve and even amplify the ‘other-ness’ of the Other, this work advocates, along with Nancy, the necessity of difference and recognizing difference. Interaction is vital for existence, not only because it heightens our qualities but because interaction is what allows existence to emerge.