Dumfries and Galloway Arts Festival are delighted to announce that they have commissioned two inspiring pieces of performance art from emerging and established local artists from across the region of Dumfries & Galloway for their year-round Arts Live performing arts programme.
The team at the Dumfries & Galloway Arts Festival are currently working on a plan for their year-round Arts Live programme providing support to artists, venues, promoters and creatives over the next year to guarantee the future of performing arts within the region. The talent within D&G has always been outstanding and the team are delighted to be able to support two groups of artists in this way.
The invitation for commissions was sent out back in March to allow artists to develop a piece of work that would be performed across the region of Dumfries & Galloway later this year. The response was exceptional especially considering the circumstances that everyone is now facing.
The two works that were chosen to be taken forward both highlight the immense talent that the region has to offer; the two winning commissions are The Village and The Road, by Tom Pow with the Galloway Agreement and Unsupervised Adulting by the Performance Collective of Stranraer.
The Village and The Road is a traditional piece which began as a collaboration of words from celebrated writer Tom Pow documenting the loss of our villages, and original music from The Galloway Agreement which is a quartet of well-known local traditional musicians; Wendy Stewart on harp and vocals, Ruth Morris on the nyckelharpa, Gavin Marwick on fiddle and Stuart Macpherson on double bass.
Unsupervised Adulting by the Performance Collective in Stranraer is a modern and energetic non-verbal physical performance that is accompanied by a continuous soundtrack of radio favourites; the production sees 4 average workers go about their daily business throughout a working week with the high and lows of mundane office temping. A diverse cast of young performers delivering an athletic, comedic performance – delicately nuanced and physically demanding, presented with a simplistic multi-purpose set.
Ken Gouge, Chair of the Dumfries & Galloway Arts Festival stated:
“The extraordinary amount of responses that we received for this commission made our job very difficult, the talent on offer in our region is exceptional. Both pieces of work that we choose, are very different, however it was felt that both of the works excel in showcasing the fantastic breadth of talent that this region has to offer.
From our young emerging performing artists creating an exciting piece of energetic theatre that we can all relate to in some way and the next from our traditional music and spoken word collaborative showcasing the fantastic classical talent on offer; both testament to the strength of the creative industry that we hold within our region and we are proud to be able to support them to realise their visions for these shows.
The funding support will be a provision towards developing the show, marketing support, a three-date tour of the region and venue/tech support in kind on top of the commissioning award.
Although we may not be able to showcase these pieces of work straight away, we hope that it will give our region something to look forward to when this is all over.”
Both of these pieces of work have been commissioned while the team have been in lockdown and although the team cannot give a date as to when these performances will take place the commissions have been secured to ensure that the Dumfries & Galloway Arts Festival is able to support artists within the region during this difficult time with the view that when this is all over – there will be something exciting for the region to look forward too.
Although the team may not be in the office, they are still working hard helping the industry to survive this pandemic and to come back bigger and better than ever when this is all over and urge anyone struggling in the industry to get in touch if they are struggling to find out what support is available to them.
