The Belvedere Torso in Contemporary Storytelling Performance: Reflections on Speaking Stone

Harrop, Stephe (2026) The Belvedere Torso in Contemporary Storytelling Performance: Reflections on Speaking Stone. Classical Receptions Journal. ISSN 1759-5134 (Accepted for Publication)

Text SH Reflections on Speaking Stone (2026) [deposited version].pdf - Accepted Version Restricted to Repository staff only until 31 December 2027. Download (346kB)

Abstract

This article is a retrospective, self-reflective, and analytic study Speaking Stone, a contemporary storytelling performance created in response to the Belvedere Torso. It begins by considering the resonances between current storytelling practices and ekphrastic traditions of art-historical interpretation, highlighting the capacity of the former to shed light on the provisionality of successive critical attempts to name and know the Torso. It then goes on to analyse Speaking Stone’s cultivation of a consciously fragmentary story-structure and style, identifying how ‘off-modern’ perspectives can inspire a queer, utopian mode of storytelling, bringing the Torso’s subversive histories and contemporary potentials into imaginative focus. The article concludes by reflecting on how a broken antique statue of a heroic male physique provides the stimulus for a new story-sequence foregrounding physical vulnerability, embodied tenderness, and our profound capacity to experience, endure, and embrace transformation. In so doing, it identifies the particular value of contemporary storytelling in facilitating engaging, complex, and pleasurable public-facing encounters with historic material objects.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	storytelling
Faculty / Department:	Faculty of Creative Arts & Humanities > School of Creative and Performing Arts
SWORD Depositor:	RISE Symplectic
Depositing User:	RISE Symplectic
Date Deposited:	04 Sep 2026 13:12
Last Modified:	04 Sep 2026 13:12
URI:	https://hira.hope.ac.uk/id/eprint/4968

Actions (login required)

View Item