Le présent mémoire propose de croiser les démarches de deux auteures et artistes contemporaines, Sophie Calle et Miranda July, dont les quatre œuvres à l’étude – Douleur exquise (2003), Aveugles (2011), Rachel, Monique (2012) de Calle et Il vous choisit (2013) de July – se fondent sur des expériences en amont de l’écriture qui mobilisent le corps même des auteures, les engagent dans une action concrète et, bien souvent, dans des interactions avec autrui. Cet art de la contrainte, cet art action qui devient le sédiment de leurs écrits s’inscrit dans la filiation hypothétique des théories du philosophe pragmatique John Dewey et de celles de l’artiste Allan Kaprow – l’un des premiers à réfléchir l’art de la performance. L’écriture intermédiale qu’elles pratiquent – ce jeu de relations entre différents médias au sein même de l’œuvre – permet à la fois de réactiver la valeur performative de l’expérience qui a impulsé la création littéraire et d’embrayer une expérience de lecture qui devient elle-même performative. Exemplaires d’une esthétique relationnelle, polyphoniques dans les voix qui s’expriment, les quatre ouvrages du corpus donnent à sentir le bruissement d’une communauté. Il s’agit d’une littérature interdisciplinaire et intersubjective, mais surtout performative dans son questionnement incessant sur le pouvoir de l’art pour transformer la vie. / This master’s thesis proposes to establish a dialogue between the practices of two contemporary writers and artists, Sophie Calle and Miranda July. The four studied pieces of work – Calle’s Douleur exquise (2003), Aveugles (2011) and Rachel, Monique (2012) and July’s Il vous choisit (2013) – are based on concrete experiences occurring beforehand, prior to the act of writing itself. Those experiences mobilize the body of the writers engaging them in a real action and often in interactions with other people. This form of action art becomes the foundations of their writing and could be linked to the theories of pragmatic philosopher John Dewey and artist Allan Kaprow – one of the first to develop a reflexion on performance art. The intermedial writing that Calle and July practice as a game of relations between different medias in the same work allows both artists to revive the performative value of the experience. It impulses the writing and initiates a reading experience which itself becomes performative. Exemplary of a relational aesthetic, polyphonic in the voices that are expressed, the studied body of work reveals glimpses of community to feel and experiment. It is a literature that is interdisciplinary and intersubjective but primarily performative in its constant questioning of art’s capacity to transform life.

This thesis aims to present a practical example of how art can become an instrument capable of investigating, showing and facing a social problem. For doing so, art can overcome communication issues; secondly, it can create a “common world” of shared values that leads to changes in society. The ethnographic example shown here is set among the theatrical company of the KulturParken association (Uppsala, Sweden), which works with people with disability. The fieldwork focuses on the development and staging of their theatrical show “Sagan om Liv och Lust” which deals with the problem of sexuality and disability. The thesis structure follows two main arguments: communication process and evolution in society. The arguments are framed and analysed through the embodied knowledge concept and Turner’s theory about ritual in theatre, as well as through Kester’s dialogical and relational aesthetic theory and Rancière’s Dissensus one. This thesis highlights how disability arts and a disability aesthetic allowed the members of the company to develop a personal awareness, leading them to overcome self-imposed barriers and those imposed by society. Moreover, it shows how the receivers of the theatrical message become active actors themselves, carrying forward the communicative process.

This exegesis examines the proposition that playwriting is an entrepreneurial activity when combined with the role of producer. The thesis demonstrates that, when a playwright combines the two roles and considers the development of a network of relationships in the process, positive steps can be made towards the marketing of a work and the career progression of the playwright. The issues of marketing and career progression are considered in a regional context. The thesis comprises the creation of a full-length theatrical work through the MA (Research) Program at Queensland University of Technology and an analysis of that journey in the context of regional theatre practice in Queensland. Nicolas Bourriaud’s theory of the Relational Aesthetic is used as a way of charting my practice and of examining how this approach might be appropriate to theatre-making in regional Australia. The paper establishes strategies by which the playwright, when also undertaking the role of producer, might manage the complex set of circumstances and interactions between the work, the community and the industry. Using practice-led research methodologies, the exegesis examines the process of the creation of a new play, Sinking, and explores, through the use of an autobiographical case study, what the process has meant to the author’s development as a playwright over a fifteen month period. The paper uses a network map to explore the interactions created through a rehearsed reading of the first draft of the play in October 2006 and, in doing so, demonstrates how a close engagement with the community formed the basis of the entrepreneurial strategy. The exegesis demonstrates that Bourriaud’s work connects very closely with the author’s practice and examines how the approach might be useful for other regional arts practitioners, particularly those in the early stages of their careers. The research aims to identify how the creation of the play, and the subsequent interactions generated within a regional community, can lead to opportunities to create connections both within the author’s place of residence and in broader theatre industry contexts, nationally and internationally, in order to provide commercial and professional outcomes.