Photo Credit: Ray Gibson. From Project - #WeAreAllSpartacus by Periplum

Session called by: Ailin
In Attendance: Alex, Damien, Martin, Loz, Ana, Sarah, Bryony, Larry, Keziah, Hilary, Jess, Mair, Richard


Terms
o Invisible Theatre
o Disruptive Theatre
o Guerrilla Theatre
o Incidental Theatre
o Pop-Up Performance
o Activist Theatre
o Theatrical Demonstration
o Spectacle
o Incidental Circus

Companies /Projects Worth Looking Into
o Annual Daydream Harvest
o Brandalism
o Bureau of Silly Ideas
o Danny Shine (aka Megaphone Man)
o The European Balcony Project
o Banksy – Dismaland
o The Yes Men
o Mark Thomas – Comedy Product
o Mark Anderson – Furious Folly
o Gobbledegook
o Periplum – 1000 Revolutions
o The Desperate Men – Pig Pen Riots
o Fathers for Justice

Some Examples from our Practice
o Periplum – 1000 Revolutions, We are All Sparticus
o The Desperate Men – Pig Pen Riots
o “Ri-Art” in Bristol clowns on buses, spread city to city like the riots?
o “Pants” social media photo goes viral “No One Should Photograph Our Pants w/o permission” written on pants attached to govt. building, using social media photos to go viral / get press
o Silent visibility solidarity responsibility performance action around the National Theatre, got Rufus Norris involved, the march was silent holding signs.
o Chalk outline of fallen soldiers - Devizes Outdoor Celebratory Arts (DOCA). Raised much debate, total cost = £200 in chalk paint.
o Hickapee – Looking into incidental circus
o Larry currently gathering info to do a piece around the “Almeida Brochure Scandal”


Thoughts / Questions
o What are we interested in
• Guerrilla / Pop up and Incidental vs. Political
• Crossover with activism
• The joy of discovering theatre in unexpected spaces, even if it’s not political
o Ethics
• How to engage and not alienate
• Is the point to provoke?
• What is “impact” and which projects have the most?
• Shouting embeds, dialogue changes hearts and minds
• With social media, everyone sees videos of real conflict all the time now, challenge is we are numb to it, so presenting live versions of “real” scenarios of conflict may be less interesting now than actions that are poetic / artistic / transposed. This could change “guerrilla” theatre from what it used to be
• Re: the above, this calls for some kind of “creative frame”, even for “realistic” performance - the example of a pair of psychology students enacting a fight, a bow at the end would have been more useful, made people think deeper.
o Crossover with Demonstration / Activism
• Spectacle might have a power that gathering / demonstration alone doesn’t have. Think: Fathers for Justice
• Trump protests – funny signs etc. get the coverage
• Can we as a sector help / do more? What expertise do we carry that can be put to use?
o Sustainability
• How to fund?
• Large projects (like Ri-Art) volunteer-driven
• You can build some actions into your advertising budget
• Ultimately it’s the delivery/creative language that carries the impact so this shouldn’t affect the articulation.
• There is a relationship between the spontaneity and the impact, for example with #weareallsparticus by the time they got the funding it no longer felt spontaneous. So how do we act in direct response to things and fund this without the time lag?
o How much can you get away with
• You can explore contemporary themes & politics within historical works
o Crossover with other disruptive art forms (e.g. graffiti)
o Why isn’t there more?
• Loz – as commissioner, always looking for more of this work.
• March against the war demobilised a demonstration, because we protested and nothing happened.
• Funding not around for this stuff anymore, people want art to be safe



ACTIONS / IDEAS
o Nick is interested in linking up with Bristol-based artists for “Ri-Art”
o Winchester Artists – want to put some kind of commentary on the anti-terrorist cement blocks.
o Email list from this group has been collected and shared, email [email protected] to join.