Reading week 6

Reading – Week 6

Bonney, J. (2000). Extreme Exposure: An Anthology of Solo Performance Texts from the Twentieth Century. New York: Theatre Communications Group.

GUILLERMO GOMEZ-PENA

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Gomez-Pena is a visionary artist and cultural critic who refuses to let his work be circumscribed within pre-existing categories who performs in theatres as well as art venues, halls, and galleries. He critiques the xenophobia present in society, as well as U.S. imperialism. His audience is metaphorically stabbed in the back because he plays on their ideas and preconceptions, but they might not realise this until after the performance. Most of his work is site specific, and he uses poems and performance texts in his work too. ‘He uses performance as a tool to initiate dialogue on a range of complex issues, including censorship, immigration and Anglo-American attitudes toward Latinos and indigenous people’ in a process he calls ‘reverse anthropology.’ His work ‘explores situations of radical, historical, political and cultural contingency, strategically occupying a mythical centre from which he is able to explain the dominant culture to itself.’ His work looks at what might be achieved, a world without borders and cultures are hybrid, and identities dissolve. His work generally centres on the fears, hopes, desires, and tensions around U.S./Mexican relations at the end of the twentieth century.

Borderstasis

Gomez-Pena acknowledges his performance status as narrator/performer. He infuses humour and multiple languages. He looks at what might be a utopian society and critiques the government and says that citizens hold more responsibility. The piece is split into sections, and one of them looks at U.S. attitudes to Latino workers, and what will happen to the country if a law is passed regarding immigration. Is not a utopian society, it is one where no ‘American’ wants to do the minimum wage jobs of the Latinos because health care is not included. It is a society that fails, and becomes bankrupt and corrupt within days because of an epic self-deportation programme by the Latino population. ‘Are you guys truly, truly aware of the logical consequences of your anti-immigrant politics?’. The following section discusses the scapegoat of society’s problems and completely ridicules it. El Nino sounds Latino, therefore he is to blame, but this is not the case, and is made to seem ludicrous. He calls it ‘Mexi-fobia.’ The following section discusses a real life situation that occurred to him, he was detained for answering back to a border patrol guard simply because of the phobia around immigration. He has a ‘suspicious’ look. He reveals that he lives in a society of irrational fear that demonizes Mexicans. The next section discusses the fear around stereotypical character, but looks at the other side of the story and shows the fear of the oppressive American character. The penultimate section mocks the immigration laws and shows a society that is twinned with other cities across the world that are nothing like each other. The final section looks at what the world would be like if there were no identity borders separating society, and talks about the Americas as one land mass that could be travelled without crossing a border, and is humanized into a living being which one can travel from head to toe.  Gomez-Pena is interested in the borders and what separates people and societies. His work is political, but not controversial, and he discusses the utopian potential of a new society.