Função social da crítica e intervenção cultural [Social function of criticism and cultural intervention] with João Pedro George
Online seminar with discussion and debate, via Zoom.
23rd January 2021
Enrolments
Free enrolment was available through filling in the following form at:
http://bit.ly/escola-da-resistencia3
Criticizing means raising your voice against. To criticize is to lose fear of the fierce freedom of opinion and thought. As António Sérgio says, “the first duty of those who criticize is to be critical (and critical of themselves), just as a warrior is to be a warrior and a sailor is to be a sailor: to want to be critical, therefore, and to hate the spirit of examining freely, is to be a sailor and to have a horror of water” (António Sérgio, Essays, Volume III, p. 116). Criticism, in this sense, can be a declaration of war against institutions, their malfunctioning and attempts to conceal created personal interests. Endowed with critical skills, individuals are in a position to denounce social injustices and the uniformity or absolutisation of worldviews.
João Pedro George has a PhD in Sociology and, for over ten years, was a professor at the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences at the New University of Lisbon, where he taught, among other subjects, Sociology of Culture and Sociology of Literature. A translator, critic (for the newspaper, O Independente, 1997-2000) and ghost writer, today he dedicates himself exclusively to writing, having published several books, including O Meio Literário Português (1960-1998), Não é Fácil Dizer bem: críticas, obsessões e outras ficções, Puta que os Pariu! A Biografia de Luiz Pacheco and O que é um escritor maldito? Estudo de sociologia da literatura. He is currently a columnist for the magazine, Sábado.
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Escola da Resistência [School of Resistance]
Directed and Coordinated by Gonçalo Amorim and Rui Pina Coelho, in a partnership between TEP – Teatro Experimental do Porto and CET.
At the time, TEP was preparing to premiere, in November 2021, Estética da Resistencia, a text by Rui Pina Coelho, based on his reading of the first volume of Peter Weiss’ 1975 novel, Die Ästhetik des Widerstands [The Aesthetics of Resistance]. An iconic work for the European left, it is one of the most important 20th century works of German literature. The action takes place in the late 1930s: three young workers, ages 16-17, look for ways to show their contempt for Nazi Germany. They meet in art galleries and museums and, discussing and conversing, look for links between political resistance and artistic practice. In this, Weiss highlights the incredible affinity between political resistance and art. What the novel exemplarily proposes as a form of resistance is the enjoyment of art, camaraderie, conversation and the stoppage of time. The proposal is for deceleration.
The preparation of the show attempted to respect these coordinates, proposing that the artistic team took a journey in which the contents and themes to be worked on would progressively mature.
This study and resistance session was the SCHOOL OF RESISTANCE
A set of artistic and/or academic sessions were to be carried out in the TEP rehearsal room*. Each moment was to be an informal meeting with the spectators, bringing the audience closer to the processes of artistic creation, blurring the boundaries between who makes and who sees, who speaks and who listens, who thinks and who learns. It thus continued TEP’s recent line of work, which has sought to encourage horizontal and collaborative processes of creation, writing and staging.
*Taking into account the constraints imposed by the Covid-19 outbreak and the recommendations of the Directorate-General for Health, the seminar with João Pedro George took place online. If conditions permit, the next School of Resistance sessions will take place in person.
