Title: Strategies of subversion: the power of live performance within the walls of a Renaissance city

Authors: Sergio Costola

Addresses: The Sarofim School of Fine Arts, Southwestern University, P.O. Box 770, Georgetown, Texas 78627 0770, USA

Abstract: According to Argan, during the early modern period, |a theory, or science, of the city was created|, a science founded on the principle that |the perfect architectural and urban form of the city corresponded to the perfection of its political and social arrangements, conceived and carried out by the wisdom of the prince|. This process was supported by spectacular and festive events which were regulated by a common vision of reality informed by the overarching Renaissance perspective. This perspective eventually created a form of representation that, as Lefebvre states, |became enshrined in architectural and urbanistic practice as the code of linear perspective|. What I hope to investigate with this paper, however, is not so much the emergence of this code and the hegemonic set of discourses and practices controlling vision, but rather the oppositional moments – within theatrical representations – by means which dominant practices and techniques were resisted.

Keywords: Ludovico Ariosto; live art; body; city; festivals; Italy; live performance; perspective; power; Renaissance cities; strategies of subversion; technology; theatre; visual order; science of the city.

DOI: 10.1504/IJART.2009.028925

International Journal of Arts and Technology, 2009 Vol.2 No.3, pp.187 - 201

Published online: 12 Oct 2009 *

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