Output details

The Speechmaker

This work is a 12 hour uninterrupted performance of a speech. Texts were sourced and composed live, comprised of submitted speeches (pre-existing and written) from the general public via social media, and various seminal, important or (in)famous speeches from history.

Principal research question: How might contemporary notions of authorship, speech-making, rhetoric and participation be utilised and disrupted in a live, durational performance context?

This work investigates the function of the author out of context, deliberately leaving references out (and authorship ambiguous) to allow the audience to experience a ‘constellation’ of texts and floating citations. This research resulted in two public performances, firstly at the Compass Festival of Live Art 2011, Leeds, and secondly at the Sibiu International Theatre Festival 2012, Romania. The lead performer (Oliver Bray) read from an autocue non-stop for the duration of the performance, a second ‘performer’ found and composed the text to be spoken. Consequently, the order and content of the delivery were not predetermined. Over the course of each 12 hour performance, 102 and 140 separate speeches were delivered, no speeches were referenced, or authors disclosed, in the moment of delivery. The work demonstrated in its execution, performance strategies for taking words out of context and highlighted the inherent rhythmic, perlocutive and rhetorical functions of the composition of the words. This work prioritised the ‘spoken word’ as an impacting performative device, even as the body of the live performer started to fail.

Research findings were disseminated in one international conference paper (Performance Studies International #18 Leeds 2012)