The study critically reclaims participatory art beyond its co-option as a fuzzword of neoliberal governance. It examines a range of artistic practices from community theatre, immersive performance and the visual arts in different sites around the world. It offers a refreshing theorisation of participatory art as gesture.

The gestures of participatory art offers a critical investigation of key debates in relation to participatory art, spanning the domains of applied and community theatre, immersive performance as well as the visual arts. Rather than seeking a genre-based definition, it asks how artists, audiences and art practices approach the subject of participation beyond the predetermined options allocated to them. In doing so, it inquires into the ways that artworks participate in civic life.

The study argues that the political premises underlying the call for participation are re-imagined on an aesthetic register. It proposes the concept of the gesture as a rewarding way of theorising participatory art. The gesture is simultaneously an expression of an inner attitude as well as a social habitude; it is situated in between image, speech and action. The study reads the gestural as a way to link discussions on participatory art to broader issues of citizenship and collective action. Moving from reflections on institutional critique and impact to concrete analyses of moments of unsolicited, delicate participation or refusal, the book examines a range of practices from India, Sudan, Guatemala and El Salvador, the Lebanon, the Netherlands and Germany.