This book investigates theories and practices shaped by a performance’s relationship to the archive. The contributions in the volume examine how the changing nature of performance practices has made it imperative to understand how the archive and archival practices could add to the performance work. They explore a variety of themes, including artistic engagement with the archive in both conceptual and material terms; physical, virtual and digital forms; publicly and privately collected; oral, written and digital ways; or organized and unorganized collections. Finally, the volume examines how archives are modelled on existing structure and the ways in which they can be brought into discourses and practices of performance making through engagement and contestation.

A novel approach to performance theory, this volume will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of performance studies, media and culture studies, studies of technology and art as also literature and literary criticism.