HOYO
2020 has seen one of our important moments for both bonding and security taken away for many, that simple and almost unconscious action of giving and receiving a hug. A moment of everyday interaction that for many in these COVID times has disappeared as we live now with the limited human interactions that form our lives. For many living alone throughout the long months of lockdown and beyond the impact of the loss has become well documented with new terms emerging to describe the sensations that losing the tactile part of us brings. ‘Skin Hunger’ is one such. It struck a particularly personally chord for me as over the last few years due to a shoulder injury, this once instinctive action had become both painful and just not the same, that along with a visit to see my mum during the first lockdown and no physical connection was hard.
HOYO is a collaboration to look at how that sense and magic of receiving a hug can be recreated in the realms of VR and Haptic technologies, ultimately a combined live location-based performance and virtual experience, using memories and stories of hugs gathered from two demographic groups living in Salford to form the basis of a 10-minute narrative through the magical form of theatre puppetry. Why puppets? I want the performance to be neutral so that everyone can transpose their own identity, age and physical abilities within the work. Thanks to funding from Arts Council England, Hoyo is about to embark into it’s R&D phase this January. Over the next few days I will add more about the project and share our developments.
The HOYO Team
Bringing a creative team together as part of the R&D for my project was a great pleasure , linking back up with both my LIPA Alumni and talented people I had worked with before COVID. Along with new contacts made only through life on zoom, new ways of meeting fellow creatives and techs,also the chance thanks to Bruntwood placing my call out on their ‘Write a Play’ Prize website finding a like minded soul to join us in developing the narrative. I am filling the last gap in the form of a Unity Developer Coder news afoot on this quest, along with the chance to include two current students from LIPA to be part as placements the team is here. Below a little more background for the HOYO project .
Puppet/Costume Shawl Designer Sascha Gilmour
Puppet & Costume/Shawl Designer
Sascha Gilmour is a designer, maker and puppeteer based in Manchester. She works on a variety of theatre, events, festivals and installations creating costumes, set and puppetry. Working collaboratively, pushing boundaries and a focus on sustainability is at the core of her creative process.
Companies/Artists that Sascha has collaborated with include: Paperwork Theatre, The Thelmas, Ugly Bucket Theatre, Goblin Theatre, Action Transport Theatre, Slung Low, Wild Rumpus, Heart of Glass, the vacuum cleaner, Emma Geraghty, Toni-Dee Paul, Katie Scott, Fabrication Studio, Bolton Octagon, Headstrung Puppets, VIP Puppets, 101 Outdoor Arts, Liverpool Lantern Company.
Soundscape Designer
Jovanna Backovic, Creating and developing the interactive pressure created soundscape. Jovana’s most recent work focused on theatre, ( Jamboree ( Oily Cart ) Pepper and Honey ( Notnow Collective ) How Long is a Piece of String ( Fully booked theatre ) As a performer, her current interest lies within the field of electroacoustic music and live improvisational performance – exploring the process of the creation and development of individual music identity through improvisation and the use of technology. generously supported by Arts Council of England's grants for the arts programme in 2013.Jovana has completed her PhD thesis at the University of East Anglia in 2014, with the subject ‘Between Two Words: Approaching Balkan oral tradition through the use of technology as compositional and performance medium’.
Writer
Crystal Stewart is a Manchester-based playwright and mother of two. Her first two plays, Garden of the Heart and Peacock Boy toured to North West venues with Boojum Theatre. She has developed work for/with Theatre by the Lake, Oldham's Open Space Festival, Exodus Onstage Festival, John Rylands’ Library and Action Transport Theatre Company. Crystal has also facilitated writing workshops for Oldham Libraries, Bury Met Arts Centre, the Mums Well-being Group and Manchester Playwrights Forum. The pandemic has led her back to her first loves, poetry and prose. She has recently had work published in journals that include visualverse.org, in parentheses, and Pure Slush.
Creative Technologist
Harrison Cooke, Harrison is a multidisciplined live events engineer with experience working in a wide variety of sectors throughout the world. His passion started at a young age when he realised that switching stage lights on and off was far more exciting than being on stage. After realising that academia wasn’t for him, he decided to go to college where he completed a BTEC ND in Technical Theatre. From there he went to London to study at Mountview Academy of theatre arts, gaining a BA (Hons) In Technical Theatre with a major in Lighting in 2008. Since then, Harrison has worked in almost every sector in many different roles covering multiple disciplines including lighting; video; networking; automation; rigging. He is the happiest when he’s learning new skills, being challenged, thinking outside the box, and pushing the boundaries. Having been diagnosed with Autism from a very young age, Harrison has been able to find a career that he is deeply passionate about and is able to utilise his traits to his advantage.
Binaural Sound Designer Findlay Claydon
Fin trained at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA), specialising in Theatre Sound Design. Whilst at LIPA he developed an interest in immersive audio technologies and experimenting with how they can be used to create new audience experiences. He is a founding member of Despite the Monkey and co-created Pavlov whilst in his 3rd year of studies. Since graduating, he has worked as a freelance Sound Designer working in venues including Chester Storyhouse, Manchester’s Hope Mill Theatre, and the Liverpool Playhouse.
Despite the Monkey
Originally founded as a theatre company in 2017, Despite the Monkey has cemented their reputation as innovators in the use of 3D sound and the creation of technology-enabled theatrical experiences. They now also provide a wide range of services to people and organisations looking to create innovative experiences for audiences of their own.
Notable work includes their binaural audio production of Debris by Dennis Kelly at the Liverpool Playhouse Studio, which went on to win the John Beecher Award (for original, challenging work with high production values) at Buxton Festival Fringe 2019.
LIPA Placement Students
Matthew Wane is in his 3rd year studying Theatre & Performance Technolgy with a focus on video
Eleanor Ferguson is currently in her second year studying Theatre & Performance Design, all things puppets
Searching for stories from Salford residents
Forming the narrative for HOYO is one of the biggest challenges, to make it more than just my personal memories and thoughts about hugs. Over the next few days, I will be sharing podcasts of just that to maybe trigger a memory or two out there.
HOYO’s First Experiences
What an amazing week we had together at the end of March,went beyond any of my initial expectations. As I type this today Monday 10th May 2021 we await news that we shall once more be allowed to hug each other, the brilliant Findlay from Despite The Monkey is finalising the immersive soundtrack for our 360 experiences. The invites have gone out for our sharing later this month, here is the first outing of HOYO with our designer Sascha Gilmour experiencing the haptic hug. All the final HOYO story films will be available on youtube at the end of May .
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