The Gathering

Season 3: “Exploration”

Episode 1:

Reinvention, Reconnection, Reimagining: Conversations Exploring Theatre, Digital Technology and Live Performance

Thanks for listening to The Gathering, a podcast for artists and creatives from Arts Lancashire.

This season is all about exploration, and features conversations led by Lancashire based artists discussing themes and ideas that are important to their practice and the future of their work.

In this episode, Lancaster-based theatre company imitating the dog explores the ways in which the sector and its practitioners, creatives and freelance artists, have responded to the pandemic, by reinventing ways of collaborating, reimagining methodologies and processes of making work, and reconnecting with audiences, our communities and our networks, both here in the UK and internationally.

Comprising three conversations, this episode attempts to unpack what we mean by ‘digital performance’, what we want and need from the live encounter, questions around access, how audiences are responding to what theatre companies are currently offering online, and what we’ll be taking with us from the last 14 months or so.

A transcript of this episode is available here

Contributors:

Andrew Crofts

Morven Macbeth

Andrew Quick

Liliane Rebelo

Graeme Rose

Paula Varjack

Some of the things we talk about in this episode:

  • Live performance and how it has been made during the restrictions imposed by the Covid pandemic
  • The digital platforms upon which live performance has been offered to audiences thus far and what they might look like in the future
  • The relationship between form and content
  • Digital burn out
  • How we as audience members and theatre makers engage with performance in live contexts, be they in theatre or other spaces where we are ‘in-person’ together, or online in digital spaces
  • What we’re missing
  • What we’re looking forward to

Links to companies, shows and projects mentioned on this episode:

Creation

Charisma AI

Sound Stage (Pitlochry Festival Theatre/The Lyceum, Edinburgh/Naked Productions)

Crave dir.by Tinuke Craig (Chichester Theatre Festival/Royal Court)

Forced Entertainment

Lights Up! BBC Four Festival

The Wooster Group

Varjack Lowry

I, Melania

Cultura Inglesa Festival 24th Edition