Writer and
researcher.
About
Vlad Butucea is a Glasgow-based, Romanian-born playwright.
Formerly mentored by Playwrights’ Studio Scotland, Vlad made his professional debut writing one part of National Theatre Scotland’s sci-fi trilogy Interference (2019). Recently, he was a contributing writer on Hope Dickson Leach’s film Ghost Light (National Theatre of Scotland, Edinburgh International Festival) and received a grant from the Edwin Morgan Trust to create work for Morgan’s Centenary celebrations (2020/2021).
His new play Silkworm, nominated for the 2020 Popcorn Award, will premiere at next year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe in a Pearlfisher x The Byre Theatre co-production and in association with Assembly Festival.
Vlad's work explores a variety of themes including digital culture, queer politics and ecology. He is working towards a PhD in queer digital theatre at the University of Glasgow.
Representation: Michael Eliot-Finch at Brennan Artists Associates.
Current projects
past projects
2020 - Ghost Light (contributing writer)
Conceived by Hope Dickson Leach, Jackie Wylie and Philip Howard.
A National Theatre of Scotland film in association with Selkie Productions. Commissioned by
Edinburgh International Festival.
202x - Silkworm (writer)
Pearlfisher in co-production with The Byre Theatre and in association with Assembly
Festival. Nominated for the 2020 Popcorn Writing Award.
2021 - The Edwin Morgan Bot (digital/ AI practice)
Awarded one of The Second Life Grants by the Edwin Morgan Trust to create experimental digital work for
Edwin Morgan's Centenary.
"The trilogy ends with Vlad Butucea’s impressive debut Glowstick, about the evolving relationship between a woman with severe disability who just wants to die, and Ida, the android sent to look after her. Amid some brilliantly vivid and dream-like language – and with Maureen Beattie and Moyo Akandé both in exquisite form – the play emerges as a richly memorable piece of theatre". Joyce Mcmillan in The Scotsman (22nd March 2019)
academic
academic
academic
2017 - ongoing. PhD Candidate in Queer Digital Theatre. University of Glasgow.
Queer digital theatre brings humans and technologies in a close, intimate embrace. In the sensual exchange between flesh and digital, spectators can experience their bodies differently. Queered, touched or invaded by technological agencies, they enter a process of transformation beyond the limits of skin, beyond the known ways to be human.
My PhD asks what is the relationship between human bodies and digital technologies in theatre? How can spectators' bodies be digitally queered, touched or challenged? What does it mean to share an intimate embrace with a non-human performer? What are the possibilities and ethical limitations of these actions? Employing theoretical frameworks from Judith Butler, Donna Haraway or Sara Ahmed, I argue that queer digital theatre can change the ways in which we understand our bodies, our sexualities, our genders, and our humanity in general.
Just published: 2020. "Gaming as Everything. Challenging the Anthropocene through Nomadic Performativity" in
Nordic Theatre Studies special issue on "Theatre and the Anthropocene".
Recent conference papers: 2018. The Cyborg Spectator: Cyborg Embodiment in Digital Performance. Paper presented at the International Federation for Theatre Research Conference. July. Belgrade.
2018. Limbo: The World through an Asylum Seeker’s Body in The Guardian VR. Paper presented at the Theatre and Performance Research Association Conference. Sept. Aberystwyth.
2018. Nicola Hunter’s MOTHERFUCKER: Queer Embodiment in Digital Performance. Paper presented at the Connections PG Conference. June. Glasgow.
CONTACT:
