Sustainable Theatre: Theory, Context, Practice

How does the world of theatre and the performing arts intersect with the climate and environmental crisis? This timely book is the first comprehensive account of the sector’s response to the defining issue of our time.

The book documents a sector in transition and presents theatre professionals, practitioners and organizations with a synthesis of information, knowledge and expertise to guide them to their own endorsement of sustainable thinking and practice. It is illustrated with inspiring case studies and interviews, from London’s National Theatre, to Sydney Theatre Company, to the Göteborg Opera and the American Repertory Theatre. These foreground the work of pioneering institutions and individual practitioners whose artistic ingenuity, creative activism and sense of public mission have given shape, content and purpose to what we can now call ’sustainable theatre’.

Spanning almost three decades, the book approaches the topic from multiple angles and through an international perspective, recording how climate and environmental concerns have been expressed in cultural policy, arts leadership and organizational ethics; in the greening of infrastructure and daily operations; in the individual and institutional practice of sustainable theatre-making; in performing arts education; and in touring practices and international collaboration. It investigates, too, how the climate crisis influences theatre as a story-teller - on stage and beyond.

Written by a leading expert in the field of culture and environmental sustainability and distilling many years of research and hands-on experience, Sustainable Theatre: Theory, Context, Practice is intended to be relevant and useful to professionals involved in the theatre and performing arts sector in many different capacities: from policy-makers, arts leaders and managers to administrators, technicians, artists, scholars and educators.

Iphigenia Taxopoulou is a founding member and general secretary of the European theatre network mitos21. She’s an associate partner of Julie’s Bicycle, the UK-based charity that mobilises the arts and culture to take action on climate change. She has worked in theatre as literary advisor, programming consultant and international projects manager in Greece and abroad for several years. She is an experienced sustainability consultant, lecturer and educator. She holds a degree in Philology & Modern Greek Studies from Aristotle University (Thessaloniki) and an MA in Cultural Management & Theatre Criticism from City University of London.