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In the period between 2000 and 2004, the Norwegian Research Council funded a research project on ‘cultural-aesthetic practice and welfare’. This project includes two independent studies about theatre and young people. In her dissertation Rikke Gürgens investigates the theatre experience of exceptional and extraordinary people who produce their own theatre. Bjørn Rasmussen conducted an action research project, which established a ‘reflection room’ for teenagers at risk in high schools by means of drama and theatre practice. In both studies, the notion of art as an important part of everyday life became important. The theatre experience had strong implications both socially and aesthetically. In this article we discuss the link and the difference between the aesthetic and the social dimension from the perspectives of John Dewey and Hans-Georg Gadamer. In different ways we believe these philosophers provide a bridge between an autonomous view of art and a present cultural aesthetic that emphasizes the social perspective to a greater degree.

Through historical evidence and a research review, the positive assumption behind the Norwegian project is that theatre may provide democratic inclusion where any felt understanding can be accepted as aesthetically valid insights to be uttered on stage. This is how drama is created, and ultimately how diversity is treated and tolerated. However, dilemmas occur when applied theatre aims to be participatory democracy in action. These dilemmas, which are linked to conflicting practices and discourses, as the French philosopher Jacques Rancière (2004) shows, also connect to conflicting aesthetic thinking or regimes. The particular dilemma discussed here deals with the location of aesthetic autonomy as well as the dilemma of free utterance versus transformed mediation. A short analysis of two contemporary performance cases further illuminates the dilemma.

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