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Company number: 3724349
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Past programme
Showcases an eclectic range of fresh and interesting contemporary work, largely by emerging artists
Keith Gretton at Blue Elephant Theatre
Keith’s first exhibition after leaving art school was of landscapes (1958). He moved to London as a member of the Free Painters and briefly produced abstracts before exploring the visual relationships between maps and landscape. He was a printmaker in the 1990s before moving on to make figurative ceramic sculptures and showing them with the London Potters. He moved to Camberwell in 2013 to a house with a studio, while still making ceramics, but struggled for direction.
Keith turned 81 in December 2015, and looking at his children’s drawings, became inspired by their particular perceptive nature and in 2016 the creative surge has resulted in over 50 paintings and prints. This exhibition is a representative selection, as part of the 2016 Camberwell Arts Festival.
It is open pre and post show and by appointment during the week. Please call us on 02077010100 if you would like to call in to see it.
The Countess (Rehearsed Readings)
In March 2010 Marianne Jonson was found guilty of 23 counts of fraud at Harrow crown court and was sentenced to four and a half years in prison.
Told through first-hand interviews, court transcripts and extensive research, this verbatim play documents the story of a woman who led an extraordinary double life, conning the council out of a whopping £197,000 in fraudulent benefit claims.
Tickets are free but should be reserved in advance by emailing boxoffice@blueelephanttheatre.co.uk
In The Gut
A funny, tragic and ridiculous show about pregnancy, parenting and growing up.
Meet an array of charming and grotesque characters from chefs with birthing recipes to smug mothers, barmy historians and more. Les Femmes Ridicule play with their audience from beginning to end, walking a fine line between comedy and tragedy as they explore many themes of potential parenthood, including miscarriage, infertility and grief. The company's ultimate goal is to have fun with the audiences whilst tackling some of life’s paranoia in a light and unsettling way.
"Slapstick explains childbirth”, "Madness, Genius, Moving” (Audience feedback)
"I was crying with laughter… so good!” (Audience Feedback)
Hump Day Treat! All full-price tickets are reduced to £8.50 on Wednesday 15th June!
There will be a post-show discussion on Thursday 16th June.
Reviews
Supported by
Beyond the Mask and Other Stories
Séverine A. Raynaud (1985, France) is a Fine Art portrait photographer.
With a conceptual and symbolic approach, she asks question about the artist's place in the modern society, and challenges the viewer to think about his own.
Influenced by folklore (Celtic, Native American, Asian) and movies (Tim Burton, Hayao Miyazaki) she places her lonely characters (often masked) in enchanted surreal backgrounds and situations. Despite looking dark and moody her artworks are talking about hope, and how finding light in darkness.
"Storytellers transported me as a child into dangerous and enchanted worlds, I remember how I was wondering about how often a nobody could become a hero. There were my favorite stories. I would like to establish the same kind of connection with the viewers through my photography."
Séverine A. Raynaud is currently working and living in London.
The exhibition is open is open to the public before and after our shows and by appointment Mondays to Fridays.
Blue Cloud Scratch
Blue Cloud Scratch is an exciting new dance scratch night curated by Blue Elephant Theatre and Cloud Dance Festival. Blue Cloud Scratch aims to encourage and provide emerging dance artists with opportunities to present their works in progress and receive feedback from audiences and peers.
This is the second Blue Cloud Scratch following our first successful night in March.
For more about the Blue Cloud Scratch and Cloud Dance Festival, click here.
The running time of Blue Cloud Scratch is approxiamtely 2 hours, including an interval and Q&As with the choreographers.
Oom-pah Oom-pah
Oom-pah oom-pah is a duet born out of experimentation with two dance genres; contemporary and Argentine tango. The two have very different, quite opposite concepts of femininity: tango with its idiosyncratic idea of sensuality, and contemporary dance with its unisex, androgynous approach to movement. Sometimes these concepts or norms get taken to extremes and become cliched. Masha Gurina and Savina Casarin were curious to see what happens if you relax certain rules present in both genres and let go of our own idea of how we (the performers) should come across.
Choreographer: Masha Gurina
Performers: Savina Casarin and Masha Gurina
With thanks to Debora Di Centa and Chloe Aliyanni
CON-TACTO
CON-TACTO is a work in progress investigating the intimacy of touch. This is a conversation of movement between two performers, who listen, respond and propose through the perception of the others touch. This relationship starts from tentative beginnings, but finds organic flow, weight and rhythm for a true dialogue to emerge. The touch is longed for yet feared at the same time, creating moments of tension and release.
Choreographer: Piedad Albarracin Seiquer
Performers: Piedad Albarracin Seiquer and Thomas Hands
Composer: Felipe Escalada
Piedad is a Contemporary Dance Artist and through her many years of training and performance, she is now focusing on her own practice. Influenced by her time working with such artists as Jose Adugdo, Estela Merlos and Saorin, Piedad has a articulate and highly energetic vocabulary. Her Spanish playful rhythms are entwined with grounded floor work and Risk taking partner work. Piedad’s non- narrative stories, from the work of poet Julio Cortazar, shows an insight into human connections, with strong imagery colouring the process
LonDOoM
LonDOoM is a manifesto for Generation Rent. It is a gripping comedy about housing conditions in the biggest European city. This performance describes the biggest nightmare of every Londoner - hunting for property to rent.
is a manifesto of the ‘generation rent’. It is a gripping comedy about housing condition in the largest European city. This performance describes the biggest nightmare of every Londoner – hunting for property to rent.
In this piece, the audience assists the heroine in her journey. She is a newcomer to the city, and she believes that London will make her dreams come true. All she needs to do to make the world her oyster is to find the room to rent. Nothing could be easier, right?
Bee Dance Company is the collective of artists created in 2015 by Zuzanna Pilat. Our main motivation is to create works that make people wonder. Our aim is to produce interdisciplinary art pieces that brings contemporary dance to a new realm.
Dancer - Inês Zinho Pinheiro
Choreographer/ Dancer – Zuzanna Pilat
Voice Actress – Susan Hoffman
Sisyphus's Wife
Sisyphus's Wife premiered on 29.01.2016 at The Place as part of Resolution 2016.
Maria Ines Sousa and Adrian Look perform a duet telling a story of despair, purpose, choice and acceptance of fate; inspired by the 19th century Rückert poems about "Weltschmerz" and "The Myth of Sisyphus" by Albert Camus.
Dancers: Maria Ines Sousa and Adrian Look
Choreographer Adrian Look is a freelance dance artist and lecturer for Tanztheater. He is also the artistic director and choreographer of London based T a n z t h e a t e r Adrian Look, founded in 2014.
Immovable - Gleich Dances
Moving towards weight, the dance is engaged with taking up space and posturing, with building up and taking down. Dancers are angles and directions, masculine and feminine versions of themselves. Rough hewn geometries contrast with precise intersections of pointed feet and elbows. This dance for 3 women on pointe is approximately 10 minutes with soundscape including the voice of Donald Trump. It queries some of our ideas about what it means to make ballet.
Choreographer: Julia K Gleich
Dancers: Michelle Buckley, Eloise Hymas, Karianne Andreasson
Costumes: Manrutt Wongkaew
What it was when it happened
This is a work in progress which explores the ways in which dance can convey moments of forgetting or absence. We have been working with a sound artist who pieced together eight monologues focusing on the moments of confusion and non-expression, where the individuals were struggling to find the right words to explain their exact feelings at a moment of change in their lives. The dancers follow the rhythm of the words, creating an irregular pattern, moving between repetition, confusion and perhaps moments of clarity, thus embodying the experience of forgetting.
Dancers and choreographers: Camille Jetzer and Fran Mangiacasale
Sound artist: Gemma Riggs
DisConnect is a start-up contemporary dance group which currently explores the concept of forgetting through movement, as well as the ways in which dance can bridge the gap between different art forms and means of communication in order to convey that which is absent or forgotten.
Reviews
Tempest in a Teacup
An enchanted island in the middle of the ocean and the storm to end all storms, The Tempest in a Teacup re-imagines Shakespeare’s fantastical play for a young audience. We open Prospero’s spell book and out fly the most marvellous creatures. This is a story where fairies are conjured from thin air and books fly like butterflies around the room. Follow the play’s magical characters as they explore the island and find out what happens when strangers are washed onto their land.
This is a playful and interactive adventure using puppetry and storytelling, transporting the audience to this magical island in the middle of the ocean where wondrous things can happen.
Perfect for ages 5+
Strawberry Starburst
I close my eyes and think back to the days when I used to stuff my face with mum’s spaghetti bolognese and I loved it, tomato juice dripping all down my chin.
OK.
Challenge accepted.
Shez is passionate about strawberry starbursts, her mum’s cooking and her boyfriend’s prickly face.
But when her life seems to slip out of control, she finds herself choosing between the food she loves and the people she cares about, never suspecting that this will become a matter of life and death.
Strawberry Starburst is a heartfelt and poignant new drama about one girl’s battle with her demons…and the lengths she’ll go to fight them.
"The playwright Bram Davidovich has taken extraordinary steps to carry out extensive research into the characters of this play [and] put the utmost effort into ensuring the extreme, raw, emotional rollercoaster of experiencing Anorexia Nervosa is portrayed"
Dr Jessica McClelland and Samantha Rennalls, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London
Recommended for ages 14+ as there is strong content. Contact the theatre on 02077010100 if you would like further details.
There will be a post show discussion on Friday, 20th May.
Reviews
Supported by
PENGUINPIG
“Whilst browsing on the Internet, I found a penguinpig. A creature you could not forget, with a nose that’s just so big…”“
Phoebe reads about an exciting creature called a Penguinpig on the Internet. Filled with delight and intrigue, she sets off on an adventure to find a Penguinpig of her very own. Carefully, she follows the instructions from the website all the way to the zoo – but what will she find inside?
A fun-filled show about the Internet for 3-8 year olds and their grown ups, based on the best-selling picture book by Lincolnshire author Stuart Spendlow, illustrated by Amy Bradley.
Told with beautiful puppetry, catchy songs and accompanied by an original music score, PENGUINPIG is a funny, imaginative and magical experience for families.
“Brilliant story and great illustrations with an important safety message as well - 10/10!!! Every school and family needs a copy!”
BBC’s Claude Littner
“PENGUINPIG is a splendid book. A warning to the world and not just les enfants.”
Ian Whybrow (Children's Author)
Penguinpig was developed with support from Little Angel Theatre and the eCadets, with public funding from Arts Council England, Magna Vitae and Northumberland County Council.
The Bacchae
A wanderer returns, driving the people of the city into a ferocious and liberating frenzy. His actions excite, his message thrills, but his mission is revenge.
Euripides’ hedonistic and uncompromising final play comes to the stage in an all-new devised ensemble production. Through the use of spoken word, movement and music this thrilling production examines belief, sexuality and liberation.
A man is just a man, unless that man is God.
The production marks our return to the Blue Elephant after our sell-out production of Shakespeare’s Richard III in 2014.
The Bacchae marks the ninth Greek play in the Lazarus repertoire after Medea 2007, Elektra 2008, Hecuba 2010, Orestes 2011, Electra 2011, The Women of Troy 2012, Iphigenia in Aulis 2012 and Oedipus 2013.
Reviews
Press
Attitude Magazine on Oedipus
A Working Title (Work in Progress Performance)
It's about living in The City in a generation of renters, tinder swipers, never-left-the-nesters, budget shoppers, internshipers, over-the-recommended-daily-allowance-drinkers, minimum wage workers, sofa surfers and day dreamers.
It's about how disappointed your spotty sixteen year old self would be by their future life, dominated by Netflix, no money and sharing a shower with eight strangers.
It's about turning 25 and not having your shit together.
It's about people. Six people, and the little snippets that make up a day in their lives. Explored with a jaunty live soundtrack, poetry, dancing and silly voices.
A Working Title is presented as a work in progress and is recommended for ages 14+
25 Stories
Alex Watts worked in bookshops for years. This left him broken, embittered and incurably addicted to books, stories and words. Come to see him tell his own strange and dreadful stories, from the extremely short, to the really unbelievably brief. Where did Shakespeare go when he died? Why did that horse walk into pub? Where does punctuation come from, and is yours free range? Angry, inventive, and with at least one genuine attempt to bring about total world peace, 25 Stories was written just for you.
Press
Blue Cloud Scratch
Blue Cloud Scratch is an exciting new dance scratch night curated by Blue Elephant Theatre and Cloud Dance Festival. Blue Cloud Scratch aims to encourage and provide emerging dance artists with opportunities to present their works in progress and receive feedback from audiences and peers.
The scratch nights are a proactive response to Cloud Dance Festival's open space event in January on gender and equality in dance, to address the need identified then for scratch nights and feedback sessions.
For more about the Blue Cloud Scratch and Cloud Dance Festival, click here.
Be My Home by Konstantina Skalionta
An intimate solo performance inspired by poetic images and metaphors of the houses we live in. Exploring the notion and meaning of home it reflects on the primary human need to inhabit places and seek other kind of shelters, to inhabit new homes that mark different life stages. Choreographer Konstantina Skalionta collaborates with fine artist and prop maker Laura Elias to explore the notion and meaning of ‘home’ and whether the ‘body’ can be seen as our only lifelong ‘home’.
Konstantina is a London-based choreographer, contemporary dancer and dance teacher. She trained at Central School of Ballet and then undertook postgraduate studies at the London Contemporary Dance School, graduating in July 2012. Her choreographic work reflects upon personal experiences and aspires to explore the human behaviour and interaction.
She has been collaborating with various artists towards bringing dance and visual arts together in her performances. Be My Home, is her first collaboration with the artist Laura Elias, and it was first performed at Resolution! 2016, in January.
Signs by MonixArts
Signs is a 10-minute contemporary dance piece, fusing contemporary dance with British Sign Language. This exciting and intricate duet, performed by two female dancers, takes inspiration from Colin Thompson's poem 'If I told you I was deaf would you turn away'. Accompanied by an originally composed music score, it is a highly physical performance that explores the importance of body language in British Sign Language, and the barriers of a deaf person trying to communicate in a hearing world.
Composer: Zory Burner
Dancers: Erena Bordon Sanchez, Daniella Sellwood
Choreographer: Monica Nicolaides
MonixArts is the body of work of Monica Nicolaides, a contemporary dance choreographer based in London. Monica was resident artist at Clarence Mews Studios and her work has been presented at Resolution! The Place, Lost Theatre, Edinburgh Fringe, the Riley Theatre, Edinburgh Zoo, amongst others. Choreographic credits include commissions by the University of Cumbria, Marylebone Ballet School and the British Medical Association. Monica's work combines contemporary dance with other movement languages, exploring human behaviour and body language in everyday situations. Her work has been supported by IdeasTap and Hiive.
The Art of Exposure by Bridget Lappin
“It seems almost magical, this art of night stealth that enables you to make yourself invisible in the black of night.”*
She lives in the shadows where she can thrive. She creates her own darkness and exists within it. She cultivates disguises, a ninja, a woman, a body; all deceptions in an act of self-preservation against her environment. And yet, it is in this act of hiding that she exposes herself… What will you see in her? What are you left with?
*Quotation from the Shoninki, translated by Antony Cummins and Yoshie Minami
“… beautifully staged… teasing us with her ability to materialize out of the dark and leave an indelible image… It is the art of exposure by stealth and suggestion and it is remarkably persuasive.”– Nicholas Minn
Bridget Lappin studied at London Contemporary Dance School where she graduated with a First-class BA (Hons) degree. She has performed with the Richard Alston Dance Company, Bern Ballett under the direction of Cathy Marston, and several independent choreographers and companies based in Canada and in London, including A(r)CT and Joanna Kalm (ES). Bridget has presented her own choreographic work internationally, most recently at Resolution 2016 at the Place. Having recently completed her Masters from LCDS, she is continuing to establish her presence as a solo artist, creating work grounded in improvisation, philosophy, feminism and pop culture.
Hoarding Memory by Charlotte Jarvis
Dance artist & choreographer Charlotte Jarvis, performs an impromptu movement study.
A response to past memories, released in an immediate moment of dance.
With tendency to live in the past – our identity & liberation limited.
Confused & lost in the hoards of eternal memories,
Restricting us from fully being in the present moment.
What happens when we let go, & try to forget, can we forget?
Hoarding Memories
Trapped as sculpture, nature paused
A war against time.
Performer/Choreographer: Charlotte Jarvis
Music: Lemuria Soudscape
The Girl and the Box
'The Girl and The Box’ follows the journey of our Hero, after she meets a mysterious stranger who offers to take away all of her bad feelings.
Over the years she realises that without sadness, she doesn’t know what it means to be truly happy. Without fear, how can she know how to be brave?
Fabletop Theatre tells the story of Hero’s discovery that it’s the good things as well as the difficult things that make us who we are, and her adventure to become whole again. Along the way she encounters many weird and wonderful creatures, some of whom are more helpful than others...
Fabletop Theatre are a fresh and innovative new company who explore fables through storytelling, physical theatre, live music and puppetry.
RUNNING TIME: 60 minutes
Supported by
The Little Match Girl
A magical and mischievous twist on this well-known tale, complete with puppetry, Christmas carols and audience interaction.
It is Christmas Eve, snow litters the ground and the little girl is alone. She is desperate to get warm so she lights the matches that she has been selling. With each match she is transported by its warmth into the scenes behind the glass. She becomes a part of the festivities, meeting father Christmas, playing in the snow and eating the most delicious feast but with the light of each match they fade and are just beyond reach.
Using their unique combination of visual storytelling, live music and object work, Moon On A Stick transform the stage into a stunning snowy spectacle. This beautiful, playful production is suitable for ages 3+ providing a perfect Christmas show for a younger audience and a joyful retelling of a winter classic.
The performance on December 13th will be a relaxed performance.
PLEASE NOTE: The Little Match Girl is now fully booked
School matinees
15/12 11.00am - FULLY BOOKED
15/12 1.45pm - FULLY BOOKED
16/12 11.00am - FULLY BOOKED
16/12 1.45pm - FULLY BOOKED
Reviews
Supported by
Last Orders (Rehearsed Readings)
On the anniversary of his death, a decade after the event that stole their last Christmas together, three friends meet to commemorate the life of the one they lost.
Trying to overcome the distance that life has put between them Dan, Sally and Dave attempt to piece together the relationships they thought they’d left behind. They soon realise that their memories are only one version of the past and that one of the hardest decisions is choosing between who you are and who you once were.
Last Orders explores the loyalty of childhood friendships and how, with life's experiences, we all grow up to be something we weren't.
Last Orders is a new play by Lucy Laing and there will be a post-show discussion after each rehearsed reading.
Tickets are FREE but must be booked in advance to guarantee availability. Please call 020 7701 0100 or email boxoffice@blueelephanttheatre.co.uk to book your tickets.