About

Modes of Production – Performing Arts in Transition is a Research & Development project that intercrosses the field of artistic studies with the hybrid field of arts management and cultural production. Based at the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of the University of Coimbra (CEIS20-UC), it is the result of a partnership with the Artistic Studies Programme at Faculty of Arts and Humanities, the Post-Graduate Diploma in Cultural Management and Sustainability and the Gil Vicente Academic Theater (TAGV-UC).

Its initiatives and studies are carried out in permanent and updated articulation with practitioners and institutions in the arts and cultural sector. It aims to reflect upon the relationship between concrete practices of arts production and management and the different regimes of artistic creation and programming.

In particular, it analyzes the modes of production and management models of arts and cultural projects and organizations in the face of several contemporary transformations, namely those that are raised by the demands of fair practices and social and environmental sustainability.

Types of work:

• Research & Development
• Consultancy
• Capacity-building

Fields of expertise:

• Professional contexts of artistic and cultural production and management
• Organizational and institutional models in the performing arts
• Governance, ethics and leadership in cultural organizations
• Cultural policies: constitutive bases, financing models and democratic challenges
• Ecological transition in the performing arts: discourses and transformation
• Sustainable production modes and circular economy in the performing arts

The Center for Interdisciplinary Studies (CEIS20) is a Research Center at the University of Coimbra integrated into the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research and funded by the FCT since 1998, providing excellent conditions for teams dedicated to interdisciplinary research in the field of the arts. Its strategy, monitored by an international SAB expert, unfolds in four lines of cross-research in areas such as democracy, inequalities, the post-digital era, social technologies, and the arts. Within the scope of its educational practices and the promotion of advanced training, CEIS20 ensures the link with the doctoral programs in Art Studies and Contemporary Studies and has three peer-reviewed journals.

Modes of Production – Performing Arts in Transition arises in the context of the Research Group “Artistic Practices: Imagination, Materialities and Transitions”. It reflects on the mechanisms and contexts that compose and determine the material conditions of artistic and cultural production, in its various quadrants and historical moments, seeking to reach a better understanding of the economic, financial, labor, cultural, social and political contexts that have surrounded the arts. It specifically reflects on the relationship between production and the different regimes of creation, paying particular attention to emerging discourses and work models and their impact on the ways of producing and managing cultural projects and institutions. In Portugal, it is a relatively unique centre in that it intersects artistic studies with the hybrid field of arts management and cultural production.

Vânia Rodrigues

Vânia Rodrigues is a practitioner-researcher with a renowned track-record as an independent arts manager, curator and consultant, having worked for over 15 years’ in various capacities in the performing arts sector, both in the institutional sphere and with independent artistic structures.

She holds a PhD in Artistic Studies – Theater and Performative Studies from the University of Coimbra (2022) and a Master in Cultural Policies and Cultural Management from the City University of London (2009), both awarded with Distinction.

Among other recent assignments she oversaw the artistic and executive management of mala voadora, a well-known collective working on the cutting edge of international contemporary theatre which has performed in over 12 countries in the EU and the USA. She also acted as Strategy Advisor for Artemrede, a Portuguese theatre network between 17 cities. In that capacity she advised the Executive Director and supervised the writing and management of various national and international funding grants and drafted the network’s strategic plan 2015-2020. She has been a consultant for projects such as Guimarães 2012 European Capital of Culture, D.Maria II National Theatre, or EGEAC, Lisbon’s municipal agency for culture, administrating +20 cultural spaces. She has teached and written extensively on arts production, and is regularly invited as a jury member in competitive support for creative practitioners. Recently, she was appointed curator for the Creative Europe 2021-27 Launch Conference, as part of the Portuguese Presidency of the EU, in charge of the Panel “Mobility and sustainability: challenges ahead for the performing arts”, whereby she intensified her engagement with sustainability issues in the arts production cycle.

She is the author of two books on production and management in the performing arts, “AS PRODUTORAS - Produção e Gestão Cultural em Portugal. Trajectos Profissionais” [THE PRODUCERS - Arts management and production in Portugal. Professional Trajectories](2020) and “Modus Operandi – Produção e Gestão nas Artes Performativas” [Modus Operandi - Production and Management in the Performing Arts](2022).

Currently, she is a Principal Researcher at CEIS20 – Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies | University of Coimbra where she leads the R&D project “Green Production – Performing Arts in Transition”, dedicated to analyzing the ways in which the performing arts perceive and act upon the growing demands of social and environmental sustainability.

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Ciência Vitae

Fernando Matos Oliveira

Associate Professor at the University of Coimbra, Portugal (Department of History, Archaeology and Arts). His main areas of interest are Theatre and Performance Studies, Modern and Contemporary Portuguese/European Drama. He is the Course Director of the PhD Programme in Art Studies of the University of Coimbra, where he teaches Portuguese Theatre, Performance Art, Analysis and Critique, Arts Production and Management, Hybridism and Transdisciplinarity in the Arts.

He has been publishing essays on theatre, performance and literature in several portuguese and international journals (Performance Research; Theatre, Dance and Performance Training; Arti dello Spettacolo/Performing Arts Journal; Santa Barbara Portuguese Studies; Art Teatral; Sala Preta; Sinais de Cena; Revista de História da Arte; Colóquio/Letras). He is the editorial director of the collection “Dramaturgies” at the University of Coimbra and the author of “O Destino da Mimese: Teatro Português Moderno” (1997), “Teatralidades. 12 Percursos pelo Território do Espetáculo” (2003), among others. He was the editor of the following anthologies and thematic volumes: “Writings on Theatre” (by António Pedro) (2001); “Conceitos e Práticas de Criação em Artes Performativas” (2017); “Ensaios Ruminantes sobre a Obra de Patrícia Portela” (2017, with Thiago Arrais); “Práticas de Arquivo em Artes Performativas” (2019, with Cláudia Madeira and Hélia Marçal).

Additionally, he is the Director of Teatro Académico Gil Vicente (TAGV), and in that capacity he has been promoting the approximation between research and artistic creation, hosting cycles and projects that bring artists, students and artist-researchers into contact, namely in the activities developed in the context of LIPA - Laboratory of Research and Artistic Practices. In that joint capacity as researcher/teacher and Director of a theatre, he has been supporting creative work within the university environment, promoting several practice-led research PhD’s since 2010. Specifically, he has created and runs the “Practice as Research” programme since 2012, aimed at supporting doctoral projects with practical and experimental components in the field of the arts.

He is a member of CEIS20 - Center for Interdisciplinary Studies [www.uc.pt/iii/ceis20], where he is currently leading a research group on Art and Performance and co-leads, with Vânia Rodrigues, the project Modes of Production - Performing Arts in Transition.

UC Profile

Previous Collaborators

Silvia Carballo

She has a degree in Artistic Studies (Theatre, Cinema and Music) from the Faculty of Letters of the University of Coimbra and is currently studying for a master's degree in Artistic Studies at the same university. She has a degree in Cultural Management from the Faculty of Culture of the CLAEH University in Uruguay and training in Business Management and Human Resources. As an assistant, she was part of the research team at the Faculty of Culture (CLAEH University) that developed the project "Los públicos del ballet nacional" (The audiences of the national ballet) in 2017 and 2018. The research was recently published by the CLAEH University under the title “La nueva cultura del ballet en Uruguay. El BNS y sus públicos” (Montevideu, 2021).

Since 2021, she has been a member of the secretariat of the Laboratory for Research and Artistic Practices (LIPA) at the Faculty of Arts of the University of Coimbra. She has worked in the production of shows and artistic projects in Uruguay and Portugal. She is currently working on the formulation and management of cultural projects and is collaborating on the implementation of the R&D Modes of Production – Performing Arts in Transition.

Email: modesofproduction @ uc.pt

Principal Researchers:

• Vânia Rodrigues: vania.rodrigues @ uc.pt
• Fernando M. Oliveira: fmatos @ fl.uc.pt

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