Skip to main navigation menu Skip to main content Skip to site footer

Articles

Volume 32, Number 2 (2011)

Crossing Over: Theatre Beyond Borders / Telematic Performance

Submitted
August 1, 2012
Published
2011-06-06

Abstract

This article discusses “Crossing Over,” a pedagogical art / performance project linking university students around the world that investigates the notions of cosmopolitanism and mobility as ways to constitute meaningful social networks by exchanging virtual performances—and suitcases—over the internet. The questions that the project asks are critical in light of the globalization of information that the World Wide Web and other crossing over points represent. While globalization opens borders to all manner of material exchanges (including people), endless digital data stream through the Internet portal providing opportunities to trade on personal information. We explore and share our identity at our peril. “Crossing Over” also explores the idea that there is an intrinsic relationship between embodied presence and one’s place in the world. Performing or representing who we are is indistinguishable from the place from which we come. The Internet shows us that the experience of presence is manifold and strongly manifest in virtual environments. Cyberspace is not a non-place—it is the ever-mutable backdrop, the mirror held up to a virtual spectator—who will always see something more than a mere reflection—will see differently based on his/ her place in the world.