Adrian Heathfield is a British writer and

curator A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...

Overview

Heathfield works on

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic co ...

practices, particularly those involving live elements such as

performance art Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...

experimental theatre Experimental theatre (also known as avant-garde theatre), inspired largely by Wagner's concept of Gesamtkunstwerk, began in Western theatre in the late 19th century with Alfred Jarry and his Ubu plays as a rejection of both the age in particular ...

and dance. His writing has focused on questions of time, memory and the "ethics of the encounter between the spectator and the artwork". He is the author of a monograph on the Taiwanese-American artist Tehching Hsieh. He has edited a number of books on live art and was the co-curator of the Live Culture events at

Tate Modern Tate Modern is an art gallery located in London. It houses the United Kingdom's national collection of international modern and contemporary art, and forms part of the Tate group together with Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives. It ...

, London (2003). He is co-director of a three-year AHRC funded research project
Performance Matters
on the cultural value of performance.

Career

Heathfield received his PhD from the

University of Bristol , mottoeng = earningpromotes one's innate power (from Horace, ''Ode 4.4'') , established = 1595 – Merchant Venturers School1876 – University College, Bristol1909 – received royal charter , type ...

(1997). He was President of Performance Studies international (2003–07). He is currently Professor of Performance and Visual Culture at the

University of Roehampton The University of Roehampton, London, formerly Roehampton Institute of Higher Education, is a public university in the United Kingdom, situated on three major sites in Roehampton, in the London Borough of Wandsworth. Roehampton was formerly an e ...

, London.

Background

Heathfield is the son of trade union leader Peter Heathfield (General Secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers 1984–92) and the feminist activist

Betty Heathfield Betty Heathfield (30 March 1927, Chesterfield – 16 February 2006) was a leading figure in the Miners' Wives Support Groups during the UK miners' strike (1984–1985). Her papers are located at the Women's Library, London School of Economics ...

(co-founder of

Women Against Pit Closures Women Against Pit Closures was a political movement supporting miners and their families in the UK miners' strike of 1984–1985. The movement is credited with bringing feminist ideas into practice in an industrial dispute and empowering women to ...

during the 1984–85 miners' strike)."Betty Heathfield"
The Guardian, 22 February 2006. Accessed 30 January 2012.

Bibliography

* Perform, Repeat, Record: Live Art in History, co-editor with

Amelia Jones Amelia Jones (born July 14, 1961) originally from Durham, North Carolina is an American art historian, art theorist, art critic, author, professor and curator. Her research specialisms include feminist art, body art, performance art, video art, ...

. Bristol: Intellect and the

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including ''The Chicago Manual of Style'', ...

, 2012. * Out of Now: The Lifeworks of Tehching Hsieh, London and Cambridge, Massachusetts:

Live Art Development Agency Live Art Development Agency, also commonly known by its acronym LADA, is a publicly funded arts organisation and registered charity founded in London in 1999 by Lois Keidan and Catherine Ugwu. LADA provides professional advice for artists as wel ...

and

MIT Press The MIT Press is a university press affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts (United States). It was established in 1962. History The MIT Press traces its origins back to 1926 when MIT publish ...

, 2009. * Live: Art and Performance, editor, London: Tate Publishing and

Routledge Routledge () is a British multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanities, behavioural science, education, law ...

, 2004. * Small Acts: Performance, the Millennium and the Marking of Time, editor, London: Black Dog Publishing, 2000. * Shattered Anatomies: Traces of the Body in Performance, editor, Bristol:

Arnolfini Arnolfini is an international arts centre and gallery in Bristol, England. It has a programme of contemporary art exhibitions, artist's performance, music and dance events, poetry and book readings, talks, lectures and cinema. There is also a ...

Live, 1997.

References

"On Memory"

Performance Research ''Performance Research'' is a specialist performance arts journal published bi-monthly (from 2012). It is an independent, peer-reviewed journal published by Routledge Journals, Taylor & Francis Ltd for ARC, a division of the Centre for Performan ...

, edited by Adrian Heathfield and Andrew Quick, 2000. Product description by the Centre for Performance Research. Accessed 31 January 2012. # Adrian Heathfield'
profile
at the University of Roehampton.
"Out of Now: the lifeworks of Tehching Hsieh"
MIT Press book profile. Retrieved 30 January 2012.

Tate Modern website, accessed 30 January 2012.

Performance Matters Website staff profiles, accessed 30 January 2012.
"Representation and Identity in Contemporary Performance"
citation and abstract, Mendeley reference manager, accessed 30 January 2012.
"Performance Studies international: former presidents & sponsors"
Performance Studies international site, accessed 30 January 2012. # Adrian Heathfield'
profile
at the University of Roehampton.
"Betty Heathfield"
The Guardian, 22 February 2006. Accessed 30 January 2012.

External links

Adrian Heathfield website

Performance Matters website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Heathfield, Adrian British writers Living people Year of birth missing (living people)