Radical Retrospectives is a project from Collective Encounters looking back over two decades of Theatre for Social Change in Liverpool City Region. The project was launched in 2024 – Collective Encounters’ 20th birthday year – with funding from National Lottery Heritage Fund. It aims to build an innovative new archive of the company’s work that positions its legacy of participatory theatre within the local and national cultural and policy context that has informed and intersected with Collective Encounters’ practice since 2004.
Continuing into 2025, Collective Encounters is excited to announce an expansion of Radical Retrospectives made possible by additional funding from Arts Council England and Granada Foundation. In addition to the range of workshops and events already underway, this additional funding will contribute to a programme of organisational development and artistic exploration, enabling the company to look back over the past 20+ years and ask: what next for Theatre for Social Change in Liverpool City Region?
Radical Retrospectives will offer workshops, discussion events, performances and exhibitions, involving its staff, artists, participants, trustees and the wider community in looking back to look forward – to celebrate and critically evaluate Collective Encounters’ work, to reflect on histories that are important to our community, to interrogate the key themes and issues that are relevant to our practice today, and to ask what role theatre and creativity will play in meeting the challenges of the next 5+ years.
Events will run throughout 2025, peaking in October with a ‘mini festival’ including the launch of the new Collective Encounters archive, a Radical Retrospectives cabaret night, physical and digital exhibitions of previously unseen material, and events for participatory arts professionals to engage in discussion and debate. Full details of events will be shared on our website as they are announced.
