Black Box Lost
Black Box Lost was a physical piece of theatre developed in collaboration with Slovakia’s The Third Hand Theatre Company. The work premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in August 2008 then transferred to Bratislava in December of the same year opening at the Art Teatro to a sold out house.
I made a conscious decision not to perform in this work feeling I would benefit more from approaching the piece from the outside of the theatre making process rather than inside as a performer. I took on the role of creative collaborator assisting and supporting with all aspects of realising the theatre concept. I also developed and delivered warm-ups and workshops to support the actors with often complex theatre concepts. The role of creative collaborator also gave me the unique opportunity to continue the development of my own skills whilst working alongside artists from different disciplines and working/training methods.
I first met with Emilia Luptakova the Director of TTHTC in January 2008 to hear about her concept for devising a physical piece of work around the themes of Alzheimer’s and Dementia. Emilia had previously spent a year working in an old ladies nursing home and was very enthusiastic about making the work. Confident that the work was coming from a very real place matched with the Directors obvious passion I felt compelled to offer my support and got involved.
After our Fringe Festival run we took the work back into rehearsals for further development and with the kind and much appreciated support of the North Edinburgh Arts Centre, previewed the new work there in December 2008 to a small invited audience before transferring to Bratislava the following week.
With minimal text and a strong emphasis on physicality and gesture the end work was a very beautiful and touching account of what it must be like to be lost in a sometimes funny, often tender, frightening and lonely world locked inside a mind that is sadly failing you.