The potentiality of collaboration at Dartington College of Arts and the future of performance training

If the neoliberalisation of cultural institutions has led to a profound crisis of the role of art in society, it is also impossible to ignore the current crisis of solidarity in the West. Meanwhile, interdisciplinarity and socially engaged art practices have found growing audiences in the UK, but these developments are little reflected in university curricula and pedagogies. Considering the progressive models of education at Dartington College of Arts (DCA), this article investigates the ways in which the collaborative ethos of DCA might be rediscovered for exploring the potential of collaborative ways of working in performance within current social contexts. Examining specific phases of the development of the college, the article reviews the DCA’s cross-departmental activities, and its social awareness and balancing of collective and individual creative endeavours. Focusing on the early years of DCA, it discusses the socio-political conditions under which new ways of working together in performance emerged at DCA. This demonstrates how the collaborative aspect of Dartington’s ethos continues to offer insights of relevance for current educational models for collaborative training in performance. While artistic and creative methods are invariably informed by specific socio-political and economic contexts, it is argued that in the rise of collective and creative appropriation by neoliberal agendas, the distinction between utilitarian collaboration and conceptual interdisciplinarity is crucial for understanding the legacy of DCA as a radical site of collaboration and learning.