Overview

Presenting a groundbreaking account of an audacious theatrical undertaking Created by the Norwegian/German duo of Vegard Vinge and Ida Müller, the Ibsen-Saga (2006–present) is a six-hundred-year project to restage Henrik Ibsen's entire oeuvre. Andrew Friedman presents a groundbreaking historical narrative of this project's development and dramaturgy, through the theories and practices of modernism's most influential and controversial artists, including Henrik Ibsen, Richard Wagner, F. T. Marinetti, Erwin Piscator, and Jackson Pollock. Vinge and Müller treat Ibsen's plays as the urtexts of a mythical struggle between artistic vision and material limits, which they explore through analogous narratives ranging from Hamlet to World Cup soccer matches, all unified by a singular aesthetic that juxtaposes totalizing fiction and extreme reality. As Friedman shows, they mythologize Ibsen's themes of artistic ambition to resurrect and test modernism's fantasies of artistic autonomy, totality, creative license, and provocation. By reading Vinge and Müller's project through its modernist inspirations, Friedman demonstrates the material and ethical limits of modernist ideals in current theatrical practice, providing new perspectives on the legacy of these pioneering figures. Ibsen Apocalypse is a bold, cross-disciplinary reappraisal of the persistent power of modernity in contemporary performance.

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9798899480232

Table of Contents

Reviews

""Ibsen Apocalypse offers a first-in-English look at an epochally crucial artistic team. Friedman's writing is vivid and engaging, and his knowledge of the artworks is exceptional."" --Kimberly Jannarone, Yale University ""Like the saga it elucidates, Friedman's book is an exceptional celebration and critique of the foundations of modernity, of theatricality, and of our lasting contemporary Ibsen. Vivid first-person accounts reanimate one of the most radical endeavors of the twenty-first-century theater and render a complex of theoretical underpinnings into legible and resonant terms."" --Daniel Sack, University of Massachusetts Amherst

""Ibsen Apocalypse offers a first-in-English look at an epochally crucial artistic team. Friedman's writing is vivid and engaging, and his knowledge of the artworks is exceptional."" —Kimberly Jannarone, Yale University ""Like the saga it elucidates, Friedman's book is an exceptional celebration and critique of the foundations of modernity, of theatricality, and of our lasting contemporary Ibsen. Vivid first-person accounts reanimate one of the most radical endeavors of the twenty-first-century theater and render a complex of theoretical underpinnings into legible and resonant terms."" —Daniel Sack, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Author Information

Andrew Friedman is an associate professor of theater history and associate dean in the College of Fine Arts at Ball State University.

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