Fresh Street: Bursary Recipients

I am really looking forward to getting into the thick of discussions about the future of Outdoor Arts. It is will be great to meet with all of the marvellous creative people that constitute this sector, to share ideas and listen to other people’s stories. I will be looking for inspiration and the potential for new collaborations. Working out of a rural community in Scotland can be isolating to some degree and Fresh Street will help to maintain an essential link to the international Arts community.

We are delighted to be going to Great Yarmouth with a Fresh Bursary to promote our recent outdoor work Alien Species and new project Alien Aquatic which premieres in July 2025. Having recently toured to coastlines around Scotland with Alien Species  Dudendance feel in a good position to promote the work nationally and internationally. The performance is easy to tour due to the lightweight quality of the fabric (packs into one suitcase) and the lack of technical equipment. We would propose to tour with a small core group of three performers and could also offer a wrap- around workshop programme. As Dudendance are rurally based this networking opportunity would not only re-connect us to our national sector but also broaden Dudendance’s international reach by connecting with international promoters. We hope to build new relationships to promoters and artist’s alike. This will be a great opportunity to network, meet like minded people and gain a greater understanding of the physical / outdoor sector outside of Scotland. We hope that we can share our experience of attending Fresh with our Scottish peers and build connections that will have a wider impact for the sector.

As a producer who has come from a performance background rooted in outdoor arts and spectacle I’m delighted to be able to attend Fresh Street Festival in May 2025.
This opportunity will allow me, as an independent producer, to connect more with the outdoor arts sector as I’ve predominantly worked in theatre spaces since the pandemic.

This will help to give me a sense of the work that is being created for outdoor arts at present in the UK and I’m hoping to network and learn from this experience bringing new knowledge back to Scotland through my producing work, supporting and advising artists. This experience will also help me to support Articulation in its growth and development as one of their new board members, which in turn will help with the development of our sector as a whole. Finally I also hope that this opportunity will also spark inspiration for my own creative performance practice.

I am excited to attend Circostrada’s Fresh Street at Out There Festival to learn more about what is being made right now and how that work is managing to travel around the UK and Europe. Drawing on all of my experience in clowning, performance and devising, my plan is to bring this learning and renewed energy for creating outdoor performances into collaborations with the wealth of talent in this field here in Scotland. I also hope to make connections to open up collaborations between work made in Scotland and companies in the wider UK and Europe.