A di­a­logue on per­fo­mance the­o­ry and gallery ed­u­ca­tion

Based on Judith Butler's definition of the performative act as an action that has to be constantly repeated and socially legitimized, the text discusses the relation between performance, pedagogy and agency as Garoian conceptualizes it in his Performative Pedagogy (1999). Thoughts on contemporary performance art practices are «read across» the perspectives of different fields of knowledge in a dialogue betwenn performace theory and gallery education. We focus on four themes: presence and embodiment, strategies of enabling action, collective practices of reception and constructions of place, starting from performative projects by artists Alexandra Bachzetsis, San Keller, William Hunt and Kateřina Šedá.