EVENTS
EVENTS
Taste of SLAP
York's pay what you can performance festival SLAP presented a tasty assortment of theatre and performance from award winning artists.
Taste of SLAP was an alternative Valentine's Day treat, with an entire day and evening of bite sized performances. Expect cabaret, theatre, dinner dating, tea drinking, canapé art and more in-between.
With the likes of the acclaimed Levantes Dance Theatre, ZU-UK and DRYHUMP alongside local and regional artists; Taste of SLAP was our final feast before the world changed forever.
The Performances
I Am Mixed - Saira Illing-Ahmed
A ‘Cefill’ a mixture of Celtic Cèilidh and Indian Mafill, with an intimate storytelling experience.
Tea & Tolerance
A roaming tea trolley that delivers piping hot topics not tea, and dishes out dialogue rather than digestives.
Binaural Dinner Date - ZU-UK
A voice in your ear guides you through the perfect date. Come with your own date, or we can find one for you.
Canapé Art - Levantes Dance Theatre
A delightful duo serve up a glittery and unexpected twist on hors d'oeuvres.
Messy Eaters - Aisling Lally
A delightful duo serve up a glittery and unexpected twist on hors d'oeuvres.
DRYHUMP
A sumptuous feast of Queer Cabaret Delights, with small plates of performance, porky party games and delicious dancing.
SLAP Festival 2019
SLAP presents a pay-what-you-can contemporary performance festival taking place across 5 venues in the City of York
Flaunting a bold assortment of dance, theatre, live art and cabaret performances from a cohort of distinguished local, national and international artists. SLAP performances will occur in 5 locations across the city and will journey through themes of queerness, zombies, millennials and their predecessors, masculinity, connection and more.
We believe income should not be a barrier to accessing performance and therefore SLAP are making all events as part of the festival either free or pay-what-you-can.
SLAP is supported using public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England with further support from York Theatre Royal, York St John University and York Dance Space.
Festival Reviews
Slap festival review – ecstasy, rage and intimate confessions - The Guardian
Review: Fat Girl Singing at York Theatre Royal - Exeunt
Unknown Magazine
SLAP collaborated with York based Unknown Magazine working with younger writers to review a range of performances.
Review: SLAP Festival: Looks Like God
Review: SLAP Festival: Softcore Boundaries
Review: SLAP Festival: The Mesmerist
SLAP Festival: The Faun Project
SLAP Festival: The Ballad of Isosceles
The Events
SLAP Scratch
A scratch night testing a variety of ideas for performance from the MA Theatre and Performance practitioners of York St John University.
Spoken Word Workshop
Open to anyone, this workshop explored playing with writing, words and performance. Led by poet Henry Raby.
Fat Girl Singing - Emma Geraghty
A funny, uplifting and compelling solo show for those who have ever felt that their body is up for debate.
SOFTCORE BOUNDARIES - Antonio Branco and Riccardo T.
An immersive Live Art performance exploring the politics of the queer body.
Pink Suits Workshop
A resistance to gender roles in partner dance. Participants developed a non-gendered improvisational language that informed how we dance with one another.
The Faun Project - Beth Cassani & Joseph Mercier
The FAUN Project - a brand new contemporary dance performance. The choreographic process is a conversation between millennials and their predecessors.
LOOKS LIKE GOD - Samir Kennedy
A visceral performance installation, that appropriates the zombie body in all of its abject and grotesque glory.
The Mesmerist - Northern Rascals
A family friendly contemporary dance work that explores the importance of friendship.
Gods Own Country (Albion) - Ben Mills
Live performance work for one audience member at a time, that explores masculine intimacy and insecurity.
The Ballad of Isosceles - Ali Matthews
An intimate performance for two audience members, a Lynchian love story to voyeurism.
Unseen Beings - Tamar and Jo
An outdoor performance work that will happen at different locations around the city centre.
Theseus Beefcake - Panic Lab
Dance theatre work that journeys into the dark labyrinth of masculinity. An unforgettable duet exploring masculine excess, fantasy, friendship and competition.
DRYHUMP - Live Art Bistro
Queer Cabaret. Dryhump is the perfect blend of amusement, carnage and lots of dancing. Showcasing a range of performance acts, music and games.
SLAPchat
Let’s talk about live arts in York...
It’s not you, it’s not me, it’s us, and it’s about time we took some time out to discuss the state of the creative industries in this city. What are we getting absolutely right, what’s happening under the radar, what could we be doing better and how can we do more to promote this city and its kaleidoscopic cohort of brilliant native creative people?
SLAPchat is an event working to facilitate a dialogue between artists, venues, companies and creatives working and based in the Yorkshire region. Whether you’re a performer, a promoter, a journalist, a gallerist, curator, arts lover, production worker or just about anything else, we’d like to invite you along to SLAPchat, a live arts and creative industries forum event that’s taking place at the YSJ SPARK community theatre on the evening of December the 8th.
We hope that the event will provide creative people from York and the surrounding areas with an opportunity to meet and discuss pressing issues within the current artistic scene, and to offer advice to those freshly embarking upon or considering a career in the arts.
We’re not here to create a manifesto, a clique or even a network. This is about freely exchanging ideas in the hope that we can learn something valuable to the future of our own endeavours and to the culture of York as a whole.
All of the topics that we spoke about on the evening were suggested by the attendees. Throughout the evening we split into groups so that everyone had a chance to talk about what is important to them.
Notes from conversations:
SPACE/VENUES
Is there a spreadsheet? Is it more practical to have a list of what’s available across the city?
Influences can get venues
How do you find new spaces?
Can we share space as a creative community?
Venues/shops/spaces closing down all the time- can we find a way to access them? Empty spaces means reduced bills
East Street Arts Organisation (rents unused spaces to artists/small businesses)
Some ‘work’ can happen ANYWHERE.
Pop up temporary structures
York Open studios- (Gallery spaces sometimes using peoples houses)
York has a lot of churches (sometimes means no alcohol allowed)
Look at what spaces festivals in the city use
LISTS TO MAKE- Venue spaces/ co-working spaces/ café spaces/ accessibility information/ indi York network and event listings.
ACCESSIBILITY
What does ‘Fully accessible’ actually mean?- perhaps it can’t be done?
Is it expected that unless stated- it will not be accessible?
Accessibility shouldn’t be an ‘add on’ but implemented from the ground up
Contacting other regional groups
York student network has a database- are the documents up to date? A shared resource for all
BSL or Captioning- depending on specific need
More relaxed performances?
Being clear/ clear descriptions
Steps/stairs- is it one step? Multiple steps?- depends on specific needs
Bing aware of sensory overload potential/ content warnings
Staff training or having people on board who have training
Let people contact you for more information, in multiple ways.
HEALTHY COLLABORATION
Building a community- encourage York to be a safe space to take risks
Season Ticket- discount cross events
Artist development- Funding/mentoring
Pairing groups with similar interests
Facilitating conversations- Vlogs/blogs/podcasts/meetups/events
‘Indie York’ Style- cross promotion
York City website- Volunteers/resources/events/venues/workspace
SATURATION
What is a night out? What nights work best to stage events? Does payday/specific times of the month factor in?
Quality vs London ( huge amounts of things happening on any given night)
York isn’t big enough to have similar events/festivals etc happening
Arts fatigue for audiences and artists
Finding slots for the content
Complex ecology
Massive amount of festivals happening across the city- where are the planning meetings etc to be part of the conversations?
Audiences- do we know our audiences? Certain language distances and alienates the public
Visibility and profile
FREELANCE LIFE
Doing work that you believe in!
Getting a seat at the table
“Proving yourself”
Online resources for- Invoicing/GDPR/policy/administration support
Be nice to people!
Find moments to be creative
Work overload and saying NO!
Knowing your worth
The line between competitiveness and healthy competition
Feeling like a lone ranger- opportunities to co-work/’souping’/productivity
YORK ECONOMY
Age demographics
What audiences want to pay for might not be what ground level artists want to produce
Cultural fragmentation
Ecology
More models than fixed ticket prices
Are we lumping all market segments together when we talk about cultural production?
Does pay what you feel work? Anonymity
Further conversations with the York
VISIBILITY
The story of York- fighting the history/heritage bias
Student/Resident divide
External marketing
Cost/venue/audience size
Pairing groups- Mentors?
Creating a hub/source of information- (events/list of available spaces and venues/equipment/billboards) Curator responsible to update.
FUNDING
Fundraising
Awards For All
Ticket prices
‘Pay what you feel’/ ‘Pay what you can’ (models for ticket pricing )
Using venues outside of the city walls- Unusual venues/accessible venues/familiar venues- brings with it own ‘audience’
Taking your work/art to the people and making it happen.
Community interests
Stop recreating what’s already happening, what’s your niche? Unique selling point?
Who is your audience?
Sponsorship from venues
Joseph Rowntree Foundation
A SLAP Odyssey
From the fringes of artistic performance to the fore, York’s leading performance art collective invite you to an immersive experience at York Medical Society.
A SLAP Odyssey is a multi-sensory voyage into the unknown. Enter with an open mind as you explore and interact with the artwork formed for the SLAPover creative laboratory – an intensive week-long residency for collaboration, developing and devising new performances in partnership, that took place during summer 2018. Aaron Howell, Ali Matthews, Fran Bundey, Minyung Im and Roderick Morgan, along with SLAP’s Sophie Unwin and Lydia Cottrell, will guide you through their alternative visions for tomorrow taking in experimental performance, live art, installation and sound.
The evening will also include a specially-commissioned interactive theatre gaming experience by Closed Forum, probing the intersection of dreams, games, reality and anxiety.
A SLAP Odyssey is supported using public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England. With further support from York Mediale and York St John University.
The Artists
Aaron Howell - Interlude
Experience the ethereal and disjointed landscapes created by live VJ animation. Exploring concepts of presence, evolution and memory, you will be exposed to a fragmented vision of the body moving through time. Choose to listen to the audio in the installation space or through the headphones as the visuals respond to the rhythms and soundscapes. The drawn animation itself is inspired by contrasts between the digital age and primal physicality’s of movement, intimacy and expression.
Ali Matthews - Litany of Lasts (Auction Chant)
Litany of Lasts (Auction Chant)is an interactive performance in the form of an estate sale; the future has been cancelled until the past has been auctioned off first. Audience members will put on headphones, be provided with bid paddles and preview the bid list on display before the auctioneer begins her chant – after that, (fake) money talks.
* Please note that the performer will be outside the bay windows of the lecture room and you will interact with her through the windows. Audience members wishing to take part in the auction should position themselves by the windows with headphones at the appointed time if they wish to participate or merely watch the auction. Watching is okay too.
Fran Bundey
Hi there, I am your DJ for this special night, I’m going to take care of you. I am here to help you let go of those tunes that are plaguing you, the ones you can’t help but return to. Let go of this stagnant and tired music and you will feel a weight lifted from your shoulders. You will be cleansed.
What do you want to hear one last time? What songs do you want to say goodbye to? Just make a request to me and I’ll stick it on for you. If you want to say some special words about the song just let me know, or I can pass on the message for you. Whatever you feel most comfortable with.
Soon we will be unstuck.
Minyung Im - Ghost Tour
York can feel like a museum-city, surrounded by medieval walls, riddled with historic snickleways and the towering minster standing at the centre of it all. The streets are clean and ready for tourists, filled with hotels, airbnbs, souvenir shops, and chain restaurants. Most of the late twentieth-century architecture has been erased or sanitised so as to not disrupt the ambience of the ancient architecture. The homeless have been cleared from the city centre.
During the SLAPover residency, I filmed a performance called “Ghost Tour”. Rolling a shopping trolley overspilling with loose toilet rolls through the busy city centre, I felt like an alien carrying this unglamorous, practical load through town. But why? Why should York only be about the past? Why must the realities of the present be hidden? Does history stop now?
Roderick Morgan - Tāctus
When we recycle the past to imagine the future the two become undisguisable. Here the past, the present and the future collapse down into a single moment of touch in this interactive digital installation and durational performance piece. Nine chapters, each expressed through a combination of sound, visuals and intimate performance, deconstructs the character of York and its place in the modern world. The installation is activated when someone makes contact with the performer and the exchange between the performer, the participant and the wider audience combines to construct the meaning of the work.
Closed Forum
The evening also included a specially-commissioned interactive theatre gaming experience by Closed Forum, probing the intersection of dreams, games, reality and anxiety.
The Dispensary
Have you been feeling a little absinthe minded recently? Are you thinking about renewing your gin membership? Is your relationship with whiskey on the rocks? Or does beer cure what ales you?
The Dispensary is the bar of the future. Pull up a stool, settle in and let us assess your needs. You choose your poison, we’ll check your blood pressure and serve up your recommended daily unit intake.
Share your feelings don’t drink your feelings.
It’s worth a shot... To health!
SLAPover
SLAPover at York Mediale
Monday 13th - Friday 17th August
A week long creative slumber party for artists to live, eat, work and collaborate.
SLAPover is a 1-week creative residency for artists to collaborate and create new live performance work, developing and testing ideas together. They will be exploring how technology and performance can be combined, creating brand new experiences for audiences. ‘What does the future look like?’ will be the artists main brief and line of enquiry during the week.
The aim of SLAPover is to create a safe space for artists and performers to experiment and share skills in a collaborative atmosphere. The SLAPover residency will run from the 13th to the 17th of August 2018 and the public sharing of work created will be on the 5th October 2018, forming part of York Mediale’s programme.
After holding a nationwide open call we have now selected 5 artists to take part in the process.
SLAPover is supported using public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England. With further support from York Mediale and York St John University.
The Artists
Aaron Howell
Aaron is a visual artist from Manchester and graduate of Leeds Arts University. Aaron’s moving image work has won awards on the film festival circuit and has exhibited at multiple live art events and venues across the country. Founded in 2014, Aaron’s creative brand ‘Howl Creative’ has received commission funding from Random Acts in association with Channel 4, Light Night Leeds 2017, LightWaves Festival 2017 and HOME Theatre Mcr. With a strong interest in escapist environments and primal physicality’s, Aaron’s work aims to present worlds of ethereal reality and immerse his audiences into an experiential sense of place, presence and intimacy. Aaron is excited to bring a digital edge to SLAPover and explore visual illusion through live animation and performance installation.
Ali Matthews
Ali is a performance maker, singer and researcher. She makes work across a range of forms including one-to-one, cabaret and devised theatre and has presented at venues including Contact Theatre, Chelsea Theatre, Arnolfini, CPT, Project Arts Centre (Dublin) and Ausland (Berlin). She is interested in exchange, proximity, alienation and betrayal. She is currently working on two projects - a performance for two people at a time called The Ballad of Isosceles and a DIY rock opera about a teenage witch, created with Leo Burtin. Her practice also currently explores labour, desire, and the creative potential of witchcraft.
Fran Bundey
Fran is a Leeds based vocal looping musician and sound artist who aims to inhabit the grey space between music and art. Currently, she’s investigating the authenticity of sound in a post-truth society. Fran’s sonic experiments involve using live manipulation of sounds to re-frame spaces and question their concreteness. Since leaving full time work Fran has also been working on more commercial electronic music. Her first single ‘Mine Yourself’ was launched at The Wardrobe in Leeds in May 2018 and has been played on BBC Introducing West Yorkshire. Fran intends to challenge the status quo, act as an innovative sonic explorer and add a female human element to electronic music.
Minyung Im
Minyung was born in Seoul in South Korea in 1987. After studying photography in Chung-ang university, she received the Mirae award from the Geonhi art foundation and Canon Korea. Since then she has worked with photography, video and performance, exhibiting and distributing in galleries, public spaces, film festivals and internet channels. In her work, social intervention is very important. She has always looked for ways to impact people’s daily experiences through artworks. Minyung is based in the UK, and her recent work focuses on understanding and individualising North Korean exiles as they build new lives in the UK.
Roderick Morgan
Roderick is a theatre director, producer and budding programmer who has been a key creator in thirteen independent productions, ranging from a large promenade performance spread over a two-storey warehouse with a cast of twenty-five, to a two-hander performed in an east London bedroom. He currently makes digital performance work as part of Trajectory Theatre, focusing on creating intimacy and connection through VR and AR technologies. He is also an assistant digital producer at the National Theatre’s Immersive Storytelling Studio.
DOGMATIC @ York Festival of Ideas
Jamal used to be dogmatic. Well, he still slightly is. But now he is more open to hearing different opinions. Exploring free speech, Facebook debates, police brutality, privilege and self-reflection, DOGMATIC focuses on what happened when Jamal became more aware of racial inequality and how he allowed this to consume him.
A combination of storytelling, performance lecture, audience discussion and protest, DOGMATIC, presented by SLAP, examines the concept that all views should be expressed and challenged and asks: is no idea above scrutiny?
A Theatre in the Mill commission, DOGMATIC is supported using public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England with further support from Theatre Delicatessen Sheffield, Cast, Live Art Bistro, Home Live Art and Live Art UK through Diverse Actions.
Suitable for ages 16+.
About the Artist
Jamal Gerald is an artist based in Leeds. His work is conversational, socially conscious, a celebration of individuality and focuses on identity and lived experiences. He has made work for poetry slams, films, parties, cafes and theatres. Jamal started off his career with Leeds Young Authors, a creative writing and performance group for the ages of 13-19. His work has been shown at SPILL Festival of Performance, West Yorkshire Playhouse, Homotopia, Queer Contact and Battersea Arts Centre.
SLAP presents DOGMATIC as part of York Festival of Ideas and is supported using public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England with further support from York University.
SLAPmoves
SLAPmoves is all about emerging performance from the next generation of pioneering talent.
SLAP has invited recent graduates and final year students of theatre and dance to present new work.
Each company will be competing to win a prize package that includes cash, rehearsal space and performance opportunities. The winner will be chosen by you, the audience and a panel of industry professional judges.
SLAPmoves was supported by The York and North Yorkshire Dance Hub, Yorkshire Dance, York Dance Space, York Theatre Royal and York St John University.
Judges Prize Winners - Northern Rascals
Audience Prize Winner - Maya Sherpa
The Artists
Charlotte Mclean - And
And began as a text message Charlotte sent to her friend.
And became a dance solo Charlotte performed.
And will become.
James Whittle - Belt Up
If masculinity is a wardrobe, what do the belts and ties represent?
Combining theatre, movement, live music and some gentle audience participation, Belt Up explores the oppressive effects of detachment on a performer and his cello to take a humorous, sober look at masculinity and mental health.
Maya Sherpa - Coexistence
In 2016, the worst bleaching event on record caused the whole northern section of the Great Barrier Reef to bleach. The largest living space on Earth is fast deteriorating. Maya may have an insight into the causality of this…
Northern Rascals - Like Rumours of Hushed Thunder
Meet Alfred. His work is going well thank you, only two more months and she’ll be done. Her and Him. 9125 days. A pleasure, he says.
Meet Helena. Re-assigned. Day 41. Request for wings alleviation submitted for the third time. It’s difficult, she says.
The 52 - From Now On I Write The History Books
We want to celebrate badgers, Pussy Riot and being ‘nasty women’. Two women stand on stage with bags on their heads. Because if Shia LaBeouf can, then why can’t they? You don’t need to see their faces because it isn’t about just us, it’s about all of us.
SLAP Weekender
Three days of performance.
Showcasing regional and nationally acclaimed artists whose work is bold, touching, personal and political.
Performances that are asking who and how do we own identity and what is cultural presence, who is seen, heard and who gets to speak.
Including one to one performance, dance, theatre, live art and cabaret.
If you like to laugh, to be moved, inspired and surprised; the SLAP weekender is the alternative performance event for you.
SLAP presents 3 days of distinctive performance and dance in an eclectic range of venues across York. Events taking place from 21st-23rd of September include a selection of artists creating fearless performance for and with older women with a public exhibition in the streets of York; a series of unique dance and theatre works at the York Theatre Royal and York St John University; a performance on a public bench; and bold queer cabaret performances at The Crescent community venue.
The Artists
Old wives’ tales -
GRACE
GRACE will lead ten women who (like us) identify as being older through a process resulting in a piece which will address question of power and visibility, with a focus on perceptions of gender and age.
As a collective of women who identify as older, and who perform ageing and feminism, it is important to GRACE to initiate wider networks throughout the country, to redefine social perceptions of being an older woman: experiencing our power and daring as amplified through collective exploits.
600 People - Third Angel
Somewhere between stand-up comedy and an astrophysics lecture, Third Angel brings you a simple show about huge ideas: the story of how a three-hour conversation with an astrophysicist changed the way Alex understands the way the Universe works.
600 People explores how we think about evolution and intelligence, belief and invention, communication and space travel. A show that explores the stories we tell in order to understand our place in the cosmos. A show that asks if there are extra terrestrials in our galaxy. A show that asks what it means to be human.
What if I Told You? -
Pauline Mayers
Throughout Pauline’s life, people have made assumptions about her based on her gender, background and race. She’s defied these expectations at every turn, tearing up the narrative that society tried to impose on her.
Now, Pauline is finally ready to tell the world her story.
Carefully balancing dance and theatre, What If I Told You immerses us in Pauline’s world as she invites us to pause, breathe and reconsider the stories we tell about our past and the history on which we build our futures.
DRYHUMP -
Live Art Bistro
Live Art Bistro gyrates its way to York for one night only of dancing shamelessly and in irregular angles topped to the brim with queer performance, grimy games and gratuitous dry humping.
Your bodies are welcome and your sprits will be wrangled sexily into the night.
We gonn slam, slap, pound and pump… Forget the heritage. This is YORK GODAMIT.
Learning How to Die -
Luca Rutherford
This is a show about death. It’s not a show about being sad. Or about grief. Or pity. This is a show about the actuality of dying and how an acceptance of mortality can drive a passion for life.
Learning How To Die asks what scares us about dying, and how can we use that fear to drive our living actions. Can we stop being scared of talking about dying?
Join Luca in Learning How to Die and it might just change the way you live
Non Existent Activity -
Hamish MacPherson with Paul Hughes
Doors open every 30 minutes welcoming each person for an hour long stay, hovering between a hangout, a one-to-one performance, and the last place on earth.
Guests becomes hosts, for guests who become hosts, in a three hour chain of holding and caring.Nothing needs to happen. But something certainly will.
The work involves lying (or sitting if this is not possible), stillness and touch. Participants will be encouraged to remain in control of their experience including levels of contact.
The venue is wheelchair accessible and there are accessible toilets on site.
Everything You Ever Wanted to Say But Didn’t - Part 1 -
Rhiannon Armstrong
Ever had a moment in your life when you wanted to say something, but didn’t?
The International Archive of Things Left Unsaid is an evolving collection of anonymous testimonies gathered from members of the public.
You are invited to experience one of these testimonies in this short, intimate performance.
In The Shadow Of The Penis -
Christopher Owen
In The Shadow Of The Penis is a live performance looking at the male relationship to the penis and the impact of this relationship on mental health and the wider male experience.
Using movement and voice to initiate candid and honest interactions between men, the work aims to depict male genitalia outside of power and humilation narratives.
Castle Rock -
Massive Owl
As flashing neon lights descend upon the tracks, a boxing-gloved boy with a death wish comes head to head with a white suited locomotive and a deer in black patent stilettos.
Castle Rock is a new story inspired by three of the voiceless characters in Stephen King’s novella The Body and its 1986 cult film adaptation, Stand By Me.
Expect distorted sound, movement and projection as Massive Owl contort the book’s characters and twist the film’s soundtrack into a reimagined story about loss and acceptance.
Welcome to Castle Rock…