Liverpool Fairness Commission lacks punch
Liverpool’s Fairness Commission has published it’s report exploring how to tackle poverty and inequality in the city and has launched a website, asking leaders in the city to get behind the campaign to end poverty in Liverpool. The report has many positive features, adopting the position informed by the research of Spirit Level pioneers Wilkinson [...]
Youth Theatre Rehearsed Reading at Liverpool Everyman & Playhouse
Book now for Collective Encounters’ Youth Theatre script reading of a newly commissioned play from local writer, Kellie Smith. ‘Dog Eat Dog’ explores how poverty and inequality affects the experiences of young people in Britain in the 21st Century at the Liverpool Everyman Playhouse on Wednesday 15th May. Contact Liverpool Everyman Box Office for free [...]
Reaching out: becoming part of the Multitude of Opposition
One of the on-going tasks our Research Lab is undertaking is a slow and steady mapping of theatre and arts for social change organisations in the UK and internationally. We’re doing this for three reasons: first, so that we can share ideas, consider international best practice and take inspiration from other artists and companies. Second, [...]
Break Free performance challenges mental health stigma
Two groups have been meeting in St Helen’s since last November to be part of a collaborative project between Collective Encounters and St Helen’s Council. Other Ways of Telling has been using the arts to explore issues related to mental health. Aidan Jolly, the lead artist on the project, has been working through poetry, music, [...]
International Research Intern joins Collective Encounters
We’re delighted to welcome Nadine Arendsen who is studying for an MA at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. Nadine is going to be doing her MA practical internship and her thesis with and through Collective Encounters. As well as attending workshops across the programme and getting to know the work of the company inside out, [...]
Catching up and getting about…
Apologies for the length of time since the last blog. It’s been busy! Apart from the well earned Christmas break and the traditional bouts of new-year illnesses, I’ve been out and about seeking out interesting models of theatre for social change to inform developments in our research lab. I was in Holland meeting with three [...]
Collective Encounters calls for regional access fund
Mandy Redvers-Rowe, Collective Encounters’ Creative Producer makes an impassioned call for help for young people…. Art costs money. It costs money to make it, to watch it, to get to it, to take part in it. If you are a disabled young person wanting to take part in the arts it costs more money. If [...]
Free Accredited Training for Homeless People in March
Our Transitions project for people with experience of homelessness is now in its second year. Over three days in March we will be hosting an accredited course (through OCN) in Alternatives to Violence. The accredited course is open to people who are homeless or have been homeless who want to creatively explore ways to handle [...]
Sex and Docks and Rock and Roll
An extra performance of Boff Whalley’s Sex & Docks & Rock ‘n’ Roll will follow it’s run at Leeds’ City Varieties in January 2013. The show will take place at Crofts Social Club in Liverpool on Sunday 27 January at 7.30pm and is being presented in association with Unite, The Union. To book tickets [...]
Working for radical change
In contemporary global capitalism, ideological naturalisation has reached an unprecedented level: rare are those who dare even to dream utopian dreams about possible alternatives.
Zizek, 2009
As regular readers will know our research lab is focused on exploring how theatre might connect directly to a social change agenda and be a useful tool for opposition and change. I spent the last year (year one of a six year part time PhD) reading around the subject – looking at contemporary applied and [...]
