Zoom Performance Symposium

Like “zoom fatigue” and “zoom party”, the term “zoom performance” has become a catch-all for a phenomenon from the years 2020–21: the forms of online live performances that made use of video conferencing platforms. Although many other such platforms exist, Zoom became a typical feature of the pandemic experience of artists and art students and their audiences. In the post-pandemic moment, we want to examine what has been produced online, and how we can expand on a discipline that is much more than a product of circumstance. What streamed performance practices and what hybrid practices—where liveness occurs in person and online simultaneously—exist today?  What tradition is it indebted to?

Since the 1980’s, artists have performed their work via computer platforms, many of which were also originally designed to enable (spoken) information exchange. Practices previously known as Cyberformance, Virtual Theatre, Telepresence Art or Networked Performance incorporated the input of audiences in ways not previously seen in live performance. The nature of the works changed along with the technologies but there is much to be learned from the early makers.

Professor for performative art at the Kunstakademie Münster Nicoline van Harskamp, and professor for stage design at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf Lena Newton, brought together a group of practitioners and theorists from different fields and generations. They were present in Münster, and visitors were welcomed in person and online.

With Mallika Tanjea (India), Jana Kermia and Lex Rütten (Germany), Joan Heemskerk (JODI) (Netherlands), Pablo Fontdevila (Argentina/Netherlands), Ali Eslami (Iran/Netherlands), and Clara Gomes (Portugal).