Interview with Anabelle Contreras (2007)

Diana Taylor: Hi, Anabelle. Can you please introduce yourself for this project?

Anabelle Contreras-Castro: Yes. My name is Anabelle Contreras-Castro, and I am a professor at the National University of Costa Rica. I am a professor in the School of Performing Arts, and I direct a doctoral program, which is called the Interdisciplinary Doctorate of Arts and Letters of Central America.

Diana: Thank you. How is performance studies understood in Costa Rica?

Anabelle: Well, until recently, it was a relatively unknown field; we never had a performance studies movement like other countries had. We had artists who did performance, some without knowing it, some who knew, and very few who had written some. Basically, it was Virginia Pérez Ratton who founded TEOR/éTica, but there were no formal studies in the academy. Then from there came the idea to introduce performance studies in the National University in the School of Performing Arts, and we created, as a first step, a senior seminar at the undergraduate level, in which we introduced performance studies as a mode of research and put into practice some needed new concepts. At the same time, we broke a bit with the direction of the school, which was focused exclusively on theater. 

Diana: So there was, let’s say, a debate or a conflict between theater and the visual arts in relation to performance, as to whether it was interesting as practice or as methodology?

Anabelle: I don’t think there was an open debate, nor a prior conflict. First was the seminar, and the questions came later because the seminar had really positive results, However some people began to ask whether the School of Theater should go down this path or not. It didn’t generate an open debate, nor a conflict, and so we have maintained an elective course that began in the School for Performing Arts and today is open to the entire university. So we have students from all departments, who do their elective course in performance studies. Half the course is theoretical, the other half practical.



Diana: And where do you get your theoretical texts?

Anabelle: That is a problem in the smaller countries in Central America, where they don’t import large quantities of books. Books are very expensive because of high import taxes, and so we have a fairly informal and illegal system. This is to say: we photocopy books, we clone books, we scan books, and we find ways to circulate knowledge through channels that are informal and illegal.

Diana: Who are the theorists with the strongest presence here?

Anabelle: Well, we have worked a great deal with Diana Taylor’s books and with some other virtual periodicals. The e-journal from the Hemispheric Institute e-misférica has been a significant resource and later, some theorists from Brazil, South America, some connected to the Hemispheric Institute, and other things we find on the Internet, basically because in the bookstores you can’t find almost any of this stuff.

Diana: Yes. Is there anyone here who works on these themes?

Anabelle: On performance studies?

Diana: Yes. Who publishes on this, in theoretical terms?

Anabelle: We have many more practice-based works than theoretical at this moment. That is to say, the elective course given at the university is a place to explore these concepts through the body. It takes a lot to convince those in the culture sector that they have to produce intellectually; artists understand themselves as makers and not as thinkers about what they make. So, we’re trying to generate material, but there isn’t much.

Diana: Okay, thank you so much.

Anabelle: My pleasure.

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