Locating stories: becoming, empathy and play in embodied experiences with theatre practitioners

Put on a pair of headphones, pick up an umbrella, strap a speaker to your ankle and take a step…out of the shell of a tortoise…onto unfamiliar floors…into the rain…through city streets. This workshop utilises simple and repeatable interactions with sounds, objects, stories and instructions to investigate playful ways to document, contain and share practice as research. It explores the possibilities of playful enactive spaces to enhance storytelling and build emotional and embodied connections with others - characters, animals, archetypes, and strangers. The workshop focuses on interactions with locative audio technology through a number of experimental structures intended to investigate new forms of performer training.

Each of the five stations comprises of a different prototype. Some are solo, some require co-participation. Some have a time duration, others can be dropped in and out of. The aim of the workshop is to observe use with non-theatre participants which will inform my own research as well as help the development of a ‘DIY tool kit’ for Migrant Steps (http://www.gocmenadimlar.com/en/) a theatre project created by Dr Göze Saner that engages Turkish-Kurdish migrant women living in London and other major cities in the UK and Europe.