Brecht and Adorno

Brecht Art is by definition a political intervention. It can never be apolitical Alienation effect “A” effect Art works producing entertainment. Theatre’s ultimate purpose is pleasure ? Anti-instrumentality of the endeavor (as opposed to fascist art?) Emphasis on historical specificity: each society produces its own kinds of theater Unexamined: B does not rethink the role of science, but he proposes to apply scientific methods to social life Influence of Brecht in the US and Latin America: tools, theater, goals. Brechtian theater contradicts the hegemonic training of actors in the US Pleasure and politics: Marxist approach to pleasure in politics his audience is working class Need to work with emotions, but at distance (anti-theatrical) Pleasure does not need justification Theatricality trains the audience to be a good audience About Brecht: Contradictions rational / irrational . Reason / emotion . working class / intellectuals

Brecht’s proposal for theater Goal: To transform audience to a state of suspicious inquiry. Make strange the ordinary Tools: making the state of things looks “strange.” Split between representation and the object represented? Theater for “children of the scientific age” Pleasures: weaker (simple) and stronger (complex) Attitude towards society as attitude towards nature Appeals to rationality (as opposed to the irrationality of fascism) Anti-naturalist: making things look strange: separating the character and the actor/actress so there is no way of identify both

Adorno Art not only addresses its issues by taking them as subject There is no un-political art, for there is no outside of society Committed: explicit political involvement and message of art. Art as a means Autonomous: art for art’s sake. Art as an end even when oppositional, art is always part of society Showing suffering as obscene about Adorno: ? Consumerism / victimizing? How to talk about violence without reproducing violence? Educating audience vs. creating work ? Reenactment of traumatic situation can be healing:

Fascism and Political Performance Private vs. public Private is exposed

Notes to retake Popular Commodification of the tools political effective Role of the audience in live and mediated (transmitted) performance

Notes on the images The intellectuals, politics, the academy Artists and the state. How can art be socially relevant? Adding to the problem vs. addressing something that is silenced Contributing to healing process How can academic work be socially relevant? Latour’s “factishes,” in the analysis of belief and fact