Claire Swyzen

A dramaturge and researcher, Claire Swyzen's focus is on the textual aspect of 'postdramatic' theatre, with a special interest in non-dramatic narrativity. She holds MA degrees in English and German literature and in Performance Studies. As a PhD fellow of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and a member of its Centre for Literature, Intermediality and Cultural Studies (CLIC), she currently participates in an international research project on "Literature and Media Innovation: The Question of Genre Transformations". In this context she combines a theoretical study of postdramatic mediaturgies with practice-based research on documentary dramaturgies informed by computer culture. She was formerly engaged in practice-based artistic research: first with the Conservatory of Antwerp/Artesis Hogeschool in collaboration with the Research Centre for Visual Poetics of the Universiteit Antwerpen (BOF-funding; supervisor prof. K.Vanhoutte), then with the drama department of the Lemmensinstituut/LUCA and the FAK K.U. Leuven (OPK-funding; supervisor prof. B.Philipsen). Besides workshops and theatrical productions with students this resulted in two editions, "Het statuut van de tekst in het postdramatische theater" (2011, with K.Vanhoutte) and "Tussen waarheid en waarachtigheid: van mondelinge bron tot theatertekst" (2012). She was a member of the editorial staff of "Sampel. Tijdschrift tussen pulp en kritiek", taught creative writing and narratology at the audiovisual and performing arts school RITS (Erasmushogeschool Brussel) and sat on the advisory committee for 'Theatre' of the Flemish Literature Fund (VFL). For more than a decade she was the dramaturge of theatre company De Tijd (Antwerp), where she collaborated closely with its artistic director Lucas Vandervost. Staging various literary genres, their productions revealed the constructedness of the narrative and the functioning of theatrical mechanisms. Her texts for the theatre - amongst others "4 zusters" (2002) and "Tirannie van de Tijd" (2005, co-authored by S.Hertmans and P.Pourveur) - have been performed and published or translated.