Fifty Key Performance Artists

T. Nikki Cesare Schotzko, Adriana Disman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2026
• eBook ISBN: 9781040709689
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Artist Monographs

Fifty Key Performance Artists is a critical introduction to some of the most influential and innovative performance artists from the emergence of the genre post-World War II to the present, whose work has largely been underrecognized and underacknowledged within an English-language context.

The collection compiles an international and innovative index of artists who, primarily through body art and live performance, have shaped the possibilities of the field. It includes artists whose now-canonical work defined performance art through feminist body art, interventionist public art, and durational performance, as well as new artists who are redefining the genre through emerging technologies and an explicit alignment with social activism. Artists indexed include Arahmaiani, Rebecca Belmore, Rocío Boliver, Lorenza Böttner, Disabled Avant-Garde, Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi aka crazinisT artist, Emily Jacir, Lee Wen, Lorraine O'Grady, Graciela Ovejero Postigo, Tracey Rose, Seiji Shimoda, Leaf? Wilson aka Olga Krause and Marcía X. Each entry considers the artist's body of work in its historical, cultural, and political context, and a map at the end provides additional artists whose work is artistically and historically relational to those included.

This is an essential survey of performance art for scholars and students in visual, theatre, and performance studies and for those interested in matters of the body in performance, reception theory, and live art.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsement Page
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Map
• Introduction
• 1 Chumpon Apisuk (b. 1948)
• 2 Arahmaiani (b. 1961)
• 3 Jelili Atiku (b. 1968)
• 4 Aye Ko (b. 1963)
• 5 Adina Bar-On (b. 1951)
• 6 Rebecca Belmore (b. 1960)
• 7 Rocío Boliver (b. 1956)
• 8 Lorenza Böttner (b. 1959–1994)
• 9 Leigh Bowery (1961–1994)
• 10 Tania Bruguera (b. 1968)
• 11 Chen Jin (b. 1963)
• 12 Nikhil Chopra (b. 1974)
• 13 Vaginal Davis (b. 1969)
• 14 Vlasta Delimar (b. 1956)
• 15 Manmeet Devgun (b. 1974)
• 16 Disabled Avant-Garde (f. 2006)
• 17 Esther Ferrer (b. 1937)
• 18 Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi aka crazinisT artisT (b. 1981)
• 19 Regina José Galindo (b. 1974)
• 20 Tara Goudarzi (b. 1978) and Razieh Goudarzi (b. 1987)
• 21 Kamil Guenatri (b. 1984)
• 22 He Yunchang (b. 1967)
• 23 Adrian Howells (1962–2014)
• 24 Tari Ito (1951–2021)
• 25 Emily Jacir (b. 1972)
• 26 Kollektivnye Deistviya / Collective Actions (f. 1976)
• 27 Lee Wen (1957–2019)
• 28 Alastair MacLennan (b. 1943)
• 29 Tanya Mars (b. 1948)
• 30 Karel Miler (b. 1940)
• 31 Şükran Moral (b. 1962)
• 32 Eli Neira (b. 1973)
• 33 Boris Nieslony (b. 1945)
• 34 Lorraine O’Grady (1934–2024)
• 35 Clifford Owens (b. 1971)
• 36 Clemente Padín (b. 1939)
• 37 Graciela Ovejero Postigo (b. 1956)
• 38 Ashmina Ranjit (b. 1966)
• 39 Rosanna Raymond (b. 1967)
• 40 Tracey Rose (b. 1974)
• 41 Rosemberg Sandoval (b. 1959)
• 42 Hassan Sharif (1951–2016)
• 43 Seiji Shimoda (b. 1951)
• 44 Latai Taumoepeau (b. 1972)
• 45 Sylvie Tourangeau (b. 1957)
• 46 Voina (f. 2007)
• 47 Zbigniew Warpechowski (b. 1938)
• 48 Leafā Wilson aka Olga Krause (b. 1966)
• 49 Watan Wuma (b. 1958)
• 50 Márcia X (1959–2005)
• Map
• Index