Bambalinas Project

The field of performance has always faced a lack of primary sources when it comes to street theatre due to its ephemeral nature. It is largely a form of art that cannot be easily studied as it occurs in random public spaces. It circulates outside the boundaries of traditional venues and thus outside the sight of traditional scholarship. Creating and preserving memories of street theatre has depended in large measure on photographs that happen to be taken at the time of the performance. Although, there have been few interviews with performers or academic articles there has been no serious effort to create a repository of materials related to the memories of those who participate in or witness street theatre. Also, these interviews have not been collected and the newspapers themselves might well be considered ephemeral.

Bambalinas (which translates to backstage) aims to establish a digital archive of original material related to street theatre in Latin America. With archival, curatorial, and pedagogical dimensions, this collection looks to create an oral and visual history of key street performances that have taken place from the 1970s to the present day. It fills a void of primary sources related to this art by hosting interviews with artists, directors, and playwrights who record their memories of the acting, audience reception, plots, and rehearsals, among other elements. These interviews begin to create narratives that intertwine and explain this form of popular culture across different countries, societies, and cultural moments. Bambalinas allows an earlier generation of artists to leave a digital trace by reflecting on their ephemeral art form. It also brings the stories and memories of a younger generation into contact with a previous one. I expect this archive to contribute to debates on Latin American performance studies as it will help students and scholars better understand the development of street theater in Latin American as crucial to our understanding of theatre history in the modern era.