Tim Etchells

is an artist and writer based in the UK whose work shifts between performance, visual art and fiction. He is also the leader of the world-renowned performance group Forced Entertainment. In recent years he has exhibited widely in the context of visual art and his first novel The Broken World was published by Heinemann in 2008.

Andy Field

is a theater-maker, curator, and co-director of Forest Fringe. He has created and toured his own contemporary performance work across the UK, Europe, and the US. Field also writes regularly on performance for a number of publications and in 2012 completed a Ph.D with the University of Exeter, exploring the relationship between contemporary performance practice and the New York avant-garde of the 1960s and 1970s.

Richard Demonenici

makes work that is social and playful and has performed in twenty-two countries. He has been artist-in-residence at festivals and institutions including TPAM in Yokohama, Akademie der Kunst in Berlin, NSCAD in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Transquartier in Vienna. He has been shortlisted for the Arts Foundation Fellowship, nominated for the Jerwood Trust Moving Image Prize, and was an Oxford Samuel Beckett Theatre Trust Award Finalist.

Neil Callaghan & Simone Kenyon

Neil Callaghan and Simone Kenyon have been a partnership since 2005. They make work that moves between dance, experimental performance/ theatre and visual/ sonic art. Their work crosses contexts and has been shown in traditional theatre settings as well as outdoor sites and as journeys through landscapes. At its heart their work has a deep interest in the physical body, the physical experience of the audience and the environment. Neil and Simone’s work is heavily influenced by spending time in the outdoors. They have both undertaken Mountain Leader training. Outside of the body of work they create together, Neil and Simone have a history of collaborating with some of the leading theatre and dance artists in the UK and internationally.

Abigail Conway

is a creator of live art performance. Abigail works with material objects and craft to create site-specific installation and immersive experiences for audiences. She is founder and director of Subject to_change, a live art company. She is currently associated with Forest Fringe and supported BAC.

Hunt & Darton

are a live art collaboration between Jenny Hunt and Holly Darton. They have both practiced art since graduating from Central Saint Martins in 2003. Approaching live art from a fine art background they work across mediums with a sculptural approach to performance, choreographing words and movement in a sensory way and setting up alternative spaces—often creating installations in which to perform. Their work derives from their shared celebrations and anxieties surrounding life choices as women in Britain now. Their work has been described as deadpan and absurd, often collapsing into humor, and has been embracing awkward moments, risk taking, and constantly trying to close the gap between performer and viewer opting for a raw, underdone, conversational aesthetic. Hunt and Darton are also experienced in the the catering industry, having worked at the managerial level of high-end restaurants.

Tim Etchells: Remote Collaboration

Tim Etchells has worked extensively with Forest Fringe since 2009, creating a series of installation-based projects responding to various cities in which Forest Fringe have created events, both in the UK and internationally.

Andy Field: Incidental Plays

Incidental Plays is an ongoing project creating short written performance texts to be performed by ordinary people in public spaces. Deliberately low-key and unspectacular, these events are intended not to draw attention to the performer, but instead to disappear almost unnoticed into the everyday activity of the city. By turns mundane, humorous, improbable, and fantastical, the project is an attempt to create a gently subversive intervention in the business of our cities. An intervention that is perhaps both real and imagined.

Richard DeDomenici: The Redux Project

Site-specific, participatory, street theatre—The Redux Project could be defined in many ways. Richard DeDomenici has travelled the globe recreating some of the cinema’s most iconic moments. He teams up with local volunteers to star in his remakes—shot and edited on a fast and furious schedule. This project is really composed almost no-budget, hilarious cinematic appropriations of Hollywood conventions. DeDomenici hopes that by making fake versions of things that are themselves inherently fake, we’ll somehow arrive at a greater truth.

The Redux Project is a joyous attempt at making the cinematic as democratic as humanly possible. For those lucky enough to take part, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance to taste fame; for those who simply watch, it’s a remarkable re-imagining of our beloved celluloid fables.

Coming to China is an unprecedented challenge for DeDomenici. He will have to shoot redux in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou without field research in advance. Less than two days are available for him to get the preparation, shooting, and editing done, and he intends to present the process and final results in a sincere and interesting way.

Neil Callaghan & Simone Kenyon: Someone Something Someone

The world is in a constant state of flux. Two bodies engage in delicate physical activity, striving to become something other than a body: material, force, a single organism. Colliding, pushing, mingling, uniting. A sculptural and minimal performance that seeks to entice the viewer into the details of micro movement.

Neil Callaghan and Simone Kenyon have been a partnership since 2005. They make work that moves between dance, experimental performance/ theatre and visual/ sonic art. Their work crosses contexts and has been shown in traditional theatre settings as well as outdoor sites and as journeys through landscapes. At its heart their work has a deep interest in the physical body, the physical experience of the audience and the environment. Neil and Simone’s work is heavily influenced by spending time in the outdoors. They have both undertaken Mountain Leader training. Outside of the body of work they create together, Neil and Simone have a history of collaborating with some of the leading theatre and dance artists in the UK and internationally.

Abigail Conway: Time Lab

Time Lab is a workshop performance inviting audiences to deconstruct a piece of time by dismantling their own unused or broken wristwatch or small clock. Once dismantled participants reconstruct the pieces to form an item of jewellery or sculpture that is theirs to take away and enjoy at the end of their stay in the laboratory. Each individual’s handmade item of jewellery or sculpture is then photographed and presented in a co-authored Time Lab book. This book serves as a reflective snapshot of where the installation has travelled but also the diversity and rhythm of each city and its inhabitants. Participants get away from the everyday hustle and bustle of their busy lives and enjoy the pleasure of creating and up-cycling their timepieces into something new.

Hunt & Darton: Hunt & Darton Cafe

The cafe is an iconic social environment where countless creative ideas and communications take place. This project is an homage to the cafe.

Hunt & Darton Cafe is a fully functioning cafe that blends art with the everyday, a social and artistic hub where spontaneity and performance meet great food and drink. Could you possibly tell, in the sharing of food and conversation, which acts are natural, which are performance?

Hunt & Darton Cafe provides refreshments and interesting participatory experiences. Welcome

Forest Fringe

British Council

2015 sees the first ever UK-China Year of Cultural Exchange – showcasing the very best of UK culture in China and Chinese culture in the UK.

A unique opportunity to further deepen and strengthen the UK’s existing relationship with China across the arts and creative industries, the 2015 UK-China Year of Cultural Exchange will build on our long and shared rich cultural histories, and seek to inspire what this creative partnership means in the 21st Century.

The Year comprises of two ‘seasons’ of culture – a UK season in China in the first half of 2015 and a China season in the UK in the second half of 2015.

The UK season in China sees a contemporary, adventurous, multi-disciplinary and innovative programme of around 30 projects across China. Through these projects, and supporting dialogues and visits between professionals, the Year showcases the diversity and excitement of the UK’s creative, cultural sector and of our many fine artists. This is supported by a significant digital offering, including on social media and a new digital arts platform, for showcasing and for connecting all those interested in two cultures, and how the UK and China work together.