Sustainable Matter

Open | Matter is a series of inspirational public engagement events for creatives and the general public interested in design-led practice. Each event will offer creatively driven responses to themes of Sustainability, Identity and Co-creation via performative online seminars. The aim is to inspire, learn and invite further calls to action through playful and provocative enquiry.

Sustainable | Matter – Monday 10 May at 18:00 – 19:00.

We invite you to join Variable Matter X Staging Change for ‘Sustainable Matter’ a creative seminar and audio experience exploring locality in relation to sustainable arts practice.

In our first session ‘Sustainable Matter’ we welcome Staging Change artists Josie Dale-Jones and Alice Boyd who have worked alongside David Shearing to create an audio manifesto that questions our sense of hyper-locality and how we might better attune to our surroundings and environment.  We invite you to move about the parameters of your local, and reimagine your sense of place and surroundings. We ask how might creative thinking inspire alternative ways to tackle our climate crisis?  Join us for a deeper conversation with invited respondents Rachel Coleman and Dr Rachel Hann.

An audio track (approx.20mins) will be shared for you to experience on the day prior to the live seminar at 6pm. Please book before midnight on Sunday 9 May.

Open | Matter is a free series of events that invite a pay what you can donation for those who can to support the development of our future community centred practice. Donations will directly support us in working towards our next project.

BOOK TICKETS (CLICK HERE): Eventbrite

Staging Change is a grassroots artist-led organisation, which supports theatre makers responding to the climate crisis.

As storytellers, we have a unique capacity to explore key issues with audiences both on and off the stage. In a warming world, this means taking leadership in communicating the importance of environmental action, whether that be through the content of our projects or the sharing of our practice.

We also believe that the cultural industry has a responsibility to reduce its environmental impact, both in terms of its carbon emissions and waste production.

Our network of performers, makers, venues and organisations work together to discuss how the industry can overcome the challenges it faces in becoming more environmentally sustainable. Whether you’re a green theatre machine or new to the sustainability game, everyone is welcome to join the discussion.

It’s time for change. As part of the wider #CreativeClimate and #GreenArts movement, Staging Change is working to create a green future for theatre.

Staging Change is run by Alice Boyd and Josie Dale-Jones.

www.stagingchange.com @StagingChange

Alice Boyd is sound designer, theatre maker and environmental campaigner. Her work uses the voice, everyday sounds and electronic textures to tell stories about the world around us. She has been selected as one of Sound and Music’s New Voices composers for 2020, supported by Arts Council England, the Garfield Weston Foundation and the PRS Foundation. Alice is interested in the intersection between climate change and the arts, and the power that theatre, film and audio have to communicate big issues. ‘Germination’, an audio piece in collaboration with nonfiction writer Laura Grace Simpkins, was selected for Louder Than The Storm’s climate intersectionality exhibition and Radiophrenia Glasgow 2020. Alice’s sound design in ‘Crisis’ was shortlisted for #CreateCOP25, a competition for the UN’s COP25 Climate Conference in Madrid in 2019. Other audio work includes, ‘Land Skeins’ (OnComm nomination), a binaural series supported by National Youth Theatre, Paines Plough and BBC Writersroom.

www.aliceboyd.info @AliceBHBoyd

Josie Dale-Jones is a theatre maker, performer and producer.

Most recently, Josie received a Culture In Quarantine commission from Arts Council England & BBC and is currently a director in remote residence for the British Council’s Taking The Stage Programme in Ukraine. Josie was nominated as a finalist for the Arts Foundation Theatre-Makers Award 2021. the egg, Theatre Royal Bath appointed Josie a 2019 Leverhulme Arts Scholar.

Josie mostly works under ‘ThisEgg‘. ThisEgg’s show in collaboration with Made My Wardrobe, dressed. received a Scotsman Fringe First as well as a nomination for ThisEgg for Total Theatre Awards’ Emerging Company 2018. The show completed a national tour before returning to the Festival for the British Council Showcase 2019. dressed. was nominated for a 2020 Offie Award for IDEA (innovative/ devised/ experiential/ atypical). ThisEgg won the inaugural Underbelly & New Diorama Untapped Award 2018 for early-mid career theatre companies. Me & My Bee, ThisEgg’s show for family audiences won the inaugural Les Enfants Terribles Stepladder Award 2017 & was nominated for The Fringe Sustainable Practice Award & Brighton Award for Excellence. In 2018 it was performed almost 200 times across over 100 venues in England, Scotland, Ireland & Wales. Before that, ThisEgg’s Goggles, won the NSDF Edinburgh Emerging Artists Award 2016.

www.josiedalejones.com @josiedalejones

Open | Matter has been made possible through a National Lottery Project Grant from Arts Council England.