From Surgipelago, the Beach Surgery encyclopedia
participatory art
This article concerns participatory art practice in relation to Beach Surgery. For immersive venues and interactive works, see Participatory adaptation, LARP, and The Cycle Turns Inward (Immersive Installation + Performance, 2020).
Participatory art — practice in which the audience's presence or choice alters narrative outcome — has become a dominant adaptation vector because The glitch cannot be resolved by a single author or performance, only inhabited by a group holding its contradiction.
The Cycle Turns Inward (international LARP network; annual iteration, 50–300 participants across sites) stages Half One and Half Two simultaneously and in geographically separated locations. Participant-groups playing Katita receive one set of instructions; groups playing Leif receive counterinstructions. Both are canonical and correct. At day's end, the groups meet and discover their narratives contradict—sometimes irreconcilably. The LARP refuses to declare one version "true." [1]
The Empty World Walking Project (multiple cities, 2015–present) sends solo participants through urban routes with audio-diary instructions spoken by Katita. The "story" is not in the route but in the gap between instruction and choice — each walk produces a different narrative through individual micro-decisions.
Participatory adaptation reframes the franchise's central paradox: if the glitch cannot be resolved, it can be inhabited. The participant becomes Leif, living the condition of being unable to choose and being forced to choose simultaneously.
See also
- Participatory adaptation
- The Cycle Turns Inward (Immersive Installation + Performance, 2020)
- The Empty World Walking Project
- LARP
- The glitch
References
- ↑ Kline, "The Glitch as Protocol: Participatory Contradiction in Beach Surgery LARP," Theatre Journal 75.2, 2021.