Artistic Statement
My journey as an artist started in immersive and physical theatre, using playful multimedia spaces to explore meaning and encourage audiences to question conventional frames of reference.
Using what I learnt through theatre making I began working on public engagement projects around ‘death positivity’ to help facilitate conversations around developing a healthy relationship with mortality through lectures and workshops, alongside using my experience as an artist to help members of the public process grief through creative means.
In the last several years I have began making autobiographical work, mainly through writing and spoken word. I have used my own personal experience as a cult survivor and yoga teacher to explore how art and movement can be used as an avenue to process trauma.
I am an associate artist with the theatre company ‘Brass Bathtub’, with collaborations including the ‘Tide Mills Heritage Project’ as a writer and performer and ‘100 Ways to Say Goodbye’ as an expert consultant and workshop designer.
Previous Work
2021-2026
100 Ways to Say Goodbye (lead artist/expert consultant/workshop facilitator)
I worked as the lead artist in a long term project with Brass Bathtub Theatre Company. The project focused on death positivity, memorialisation and community cohesion; using my expertise working in the funeral industry and as an artist to inform the project and practice. This included the Tide Mills Heritage Project, in which I wrote and performed a ritualised memorial of local history of the lost Tide Mills site and the people who lived there. I create several workshops around death & grief, including ‘Grieving Using All Five Senses’ and documented community stories around loss as a piece of local history/community archiving. During this project I began focusing on autobiographical work, exploring my own history of being raised in a death denying high-demand religion, culminating in recording the spoken work piece ‘Lily’.
2020
Goodbye Brighton, I Love You (writer/ritual arranger)
During COVID I wrote and performed outdoor, social distanced ritual performances focusing on community and connections to the local landscape. The aim of which was to create meaning in a potential traumatic time in a way that still safeguarded the community.
2013-2021 (Funeral arranger/artist in residence/community engagement co-ordinator)
Whilst working as a funeral arranger at The Modern Funeral funeral parlour I was also artist in residence, informing the funeral practice with my background in Performance Art to help facilitate and empower members of the public say goodbye to their loved ones using unconventional and creative means. The focus being to make funerals meaningful, in a way that is contemporary and relevant and with a ritual liveness. This would include, music, poetry, working with space and ritual.
I also spearheaded several community engagement events through this period, which included performing at Brighton Death Forum @ The Nightingale, (The Nightingale Theatre, Brighton) and creating a performance lecture Deconstructing the Causes of Death Denial in Western Culture, at Brighton Fringe Spiegel Gardens.
2015
Durational Live Art Interactive Performance: Glastonbury, The Rabbit Hole (performer / collaborator)
FoulPlay Fantastic Foxhunt, FoulPlay Productions, Shambala Festival (performer)
2014
HOGP Xmas Drag Event, Performed “The True Meaning of Xmas”
Timekeeping Moth, Happy Clap Trap, Spiegeltent Brighton Fringe
2013
Issues, Fedoro Bridges, Blackfriars London (writer, director, performer).
Fish Pie, Colossal Crumbs / Annie Brooks, Brighton Festival (puppeteer)
2012
Fish Pie, Colossal Crumbs / Annie Brooks, Punched Brighton (puppeteer)
Fish Pie, Colossal Crumbs / Annie Brooks, Secret Garden Party (puppeteer)
Be With Me, Therese Steele / Slant, Camden People’s Theatre (performer)
Be With Me, Therese Steele / Slant, Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club (performer)
2011
Tony Robinson’s Gods and Monsters, Channel 4 (Tv), (actor)
The Living & The Dead, FoulPlay Productions, London (performer / collaborator)
What I wanted, Therese Steele /Slant, The Cochrane Theatre, (performer / collaborator)
Colossal Crumbs, Colossal Crumbs / Annie Brooks, Battersea Arts Centre (puppeteer)
2010
Colossal Crumbs, Colossal Crumbs / Annie Brooks, CSSD London (puppeteer)
Colossal Crumbs, Colossal Crumbs / Annie Brooks, Secret Garden Party (puppeteer)
Sitting Bear and the Man In The Moon’s Reflection, Inconvenient Spoof, Basement Brighton, (puppeteer)
The Office of Correspondence FoulPlay Productions, Secret Garden Party (performer / collaborator)
2009
SHUNTanimo Bay of Pigs, London Leisure Pirates, SHUNT vaults. London (performer)
Ulysses Black Initiative : Live Art / Ritual Actions (performer / collaborator)
Public Enemies, Live Art intervention, FoulPlay Productions (performer / collaborator)
Epoch! FoulPlay Productions, brighton Fringe (performer / collaborator)
The Office of Correspondence FoulPlay Productions, Brighton Fringe (performer / collaborator)
2008
Live Art / Ritual Actions with Ulysses Black, Brighton Various (performer / collaborator)
The Office of Correspondence FoulPlay Productions, Brighton Beach Club (performer)
The Office of Correspondence @ SHUNT, FoulPlay Productions, SHUNT Vaults, London (performer)
2007
The Devil; Chess: A Burlesque! FoulPlay Productions, Edinburgh Fringe Festival (performative / collaborator)