The third bank of the river: o olho (the eye) performing beyond disciplinary and capital

After the 1974 Revolution, in Portugal, following a troubled period of democratic normalisation and the establishment of the institutional foundations of the arts and independent theatre, the OLHO collective, directed by visual and performing artist João Garcia Miguel, developed a unique set of hybrid and transdisciplinary artistic projects and performances. In a democratic Portugal, their creations represent the transition of theatre and drama into a more clearly performative paradigm, where sound art, dance, performance art, video, the body, and the visual arts coexist in creative processes marked by a collective and transdisciplinary dynamics. This essay aims to analyse this path, paying particular attention to different editions of “Festival X” and to performances such as “Humanauta” (1994), among others, which add to these paradigmatic characteristics a utopian dimension, which combines excess, vertigo, and the radicality inspired by the notion of an alternative territory, where a contemporary hybrid art world in Portugal emerged.