Theatre research: a convention

Abstract

At the end of the 20th century, ‘research theatre’ - as an artistic practice - became theatrically credible, culturally acceptable and economically possible in the city of São Paulo. This article seeks to briefly present the conditions that made it possible to consolidate this theatrical practice. A generation of creators - young people formed at the end of the 1980s - contributed to establishing new modes of theatre production in the city. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, a structure was developed to ensure ‘research theatre’: public funding policies; the creation of performing arts universities; the definition of an agenda for language research. Social experience and theatrical conventions then blended into a system that is constantly changing, generating new patterns of artistic creation and production.