Herbert Blau
| Herbert Blau | |
|---|---|
Herbert Blau, 2002
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| Born |
3 May 1926 Brooklyn, New York |
| Died | 3 May 2013 (aged 87) Seattle, Washington |
| Education | B.Ch.E., New York University (Chemical Engineering), 1947 M.A., Stanford University (Drama), 1949 Ph.D., Stanford University (English & American Literature), 1954 |
| Notable works | The Impossible Theater, a Manifesto (1964) / Take Up the Bodies: Theater at the Vanishing Point (1982) / Blooded Thought: Occasions of Theatre (1982) / The Eye of Prey: Subversions of the Postmodern (1987) / The Audience (1990) / To All Appearances: Ideology and Performance (1992) / Nothing in Itself: Complexions of Fashion (1999) / Sails of the Herring Fleet: Essays on Beckett (2000) / The Dubious Spectacle: Extremities of Theater, 1976-2000 (2002) |
A director and theoretician of performance, Herbert Blau (3 May 1926 – 3 May 2013) was Byron W. and Alice L. Lockwood Professor in the Humanities at the University of Washington.
Blau earned his B.Ch.E., Chemical Engineering from New York University (1947). Later, his M.A. in Drama (1949), and Ph.D.,English & American Literature (1954), both from Stanford University.
As co-founder (with Jules Irving) of The Actor's Workshop in San Francisco (1952–1965) and co-director of the Repertory Theater of Lincoln Center in New York City (1965–67), Blau introduced American audiences to avant-garde drama in some of the country's first productions of Samuel Beckett, Jean Genet, and Harold Pinter including the 1957 performance of Beckett's Waiting for Godot at California's San Quentin State Prison. This was the Godot that during the second red scare, after extra-legal State Department maneuvers denied travel permission for unstated political reasons to a member of the company, represented American theater at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair. In 1968, Blau signed the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.
In 1968, Blau was named founding provost and dean of the School of Theatre and Dance of the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) where Blau led the way in designing its educational model. With president Robert W. Corrigan, Blau recruited faculty including artists Allan Kaprow, John Baldessari and Nam June Paik, composers Mel Powell and Morton Subotnick, musician Ravi Shankar, ethnomusicologist Nicholas England, designers Peter de Bretteville and Sheila Levrant de Bretteville, choreographer Bella Lewitzky, director Alexander Mackendrick, film scholar Gene Youngblood, filmmaker Pat O'Neill, and animation artist Jules Engel.
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