East Midlands theatre company New Perspectives is arranging a festival that “shuns the digital world and places emphasis wholly on the tangible and the tactile”.
Taking place over one weekend at places all around Nottingham, The Festival of Small Things will expand the idea of theatre “to encompass any live experience than unearths a sense of drama”.
Audiences will experience new work through a limited-edition cassette tape, a rag-and-bone horse and cart, an official town crier, sandwich boards, a private magic show under a tree, a poet stationed at a typewriter, a box of Polaroids and even a natter over a cup of tea.
The festival takes place at locations ranging from schools, market squares and town centres even to audience members’ homes. Artists contributing work, many of whom live and work locally, include Selina Thompson, Mufaro Makubika, Vincent Gambini, Robert MacFarlane, Sophia Hatfield, Daniel Hoffman-Gil, David 'Stickman' Higgins, Panya Banjoko, Unanima, Anabel Dover and Ravelle-Sadé Fairman.
New Perspectives’ artistic director Jack McNamara commented, "The Festival of Small Things stands in joyous defiance of the digital world and its recent attempts to monopolise our lives. It’s a celebration of all the many ways we can connect without needing a good signal or broadband.
“Each piece of work is a radical creative act in miniature, intended to promote joy but also encourage subversive thinking.
“Putting this programme of work together has been a true dream: provoking brave artists to think differently, to work against the market, to celebrate the unique power of forgotten forms and the beauty of face-to-face encounters."
The Festival of Small Things takes place on Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 July. The full programme is available at the New Perspectives’ web site.