‘‘Thank you for creating such an engaging
and inclusive experience. I have felt completely
comfortable, inspired and accepted.’’
Project Participant
Four of Swords Community Engagement
Education, Talent Development, Community Outreach
In addition to our public performance work (you can investigate our previous shows here), we have developed a rich and varied programme of community engagement and education work. For example, we created a bombastic spectacle on the beach as part of Exmouth Festival this year, with a fabulous cast of local volunteers!
We are proud and excited to be one of the leading companies in East Devon to be promoting the work of emerging artists and especially platforming up-and-coming Learning Disabled and Neurodiverse performers.
Current / Ongoing Projects
For young creatives
aged 12-18
Supported by East Devon District Council and Creative East Devon, IMMERSIVE THEATRE SCHOOL: SPECIALISTS runs at various venues throughout the year, spotlighting a range of different skills from writing to acting to design and making. All of this hard work culminates in IMMERSIVE THEATRE SCHOOL: SUMMER EDITION, where a cadre of dedicated and supremely talented young artists pull together a show from (almost) scratch in five days!
Last year (academic year 2023/4) the theme was Greek mythology, tying in nicely with our work at Exmouth Festival and concluding in a thrilling and bombastic subterranean ODYSSEUS & THE CYCLOPS at Beer Quarry Caves. We are currently finalising our programme of workshops and courses for 2024/5, themed around Anglo-Saxon and Viking myth. If you would like to get in touch to express an interest, please email phil@four-of-swords.com.
Working with artists with experience
of seeing & hearing things
This project has been keeping us busy for a few years and looks to be inching steadily closer to public exhibition. We are creating an extremely immersive (even for us) take on George Orwell’s ever pertinent, political retro-futurist masterpiece, informed by close collaboration with local creatives with lived experience of seeing and hearing things others can’t.
Essentially, we are interested in how structures of power, authority and technology “madden” us; how the citizens of Oceania are made to occupy a psychological space similar to what might have traditionally been labelled “psychosis”.
Funded by Arts Council England and the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health, with additional support from Maketank, the University of Exeter and the University of Edinburgh.
Open mic night for all,
especially performers from under-represented backgrounds
In 2022, we created MADAME THESPIA’S OPEN MIC CABARET with our friend and collaborator Isobel Jeffery, an up-and-coming neurodiverse actor from Exeter. The event is a semi-regular open mic night for all, especially designed to platform performers from under-represented backgrounds: neurodiverse, early and late career artists, global majority, LGBTQ+ and non-binary performers.
It has become is a place where anyone can come and try things out; so many people of all ages have come with a desire to take part, and saying that they’ve never performed before. That, of course, is immensely gratifying.
We’ve run six MADAME THESPIA events and are currently planning the seventh. The fourth event was a special immersive experience which took over the entirety of Exeter’s Barnfield Theatre. This project has been kindly supported by Libraries Unlimited, Exeter Phoenix and Exeter Northcott.
Acting and performance classes for neurodiverse adults and young adults aged 16+
We are delighted to be continuing our brand new acting group for neurodiverse performers! This is the third term of an ongoing series of lessons at Exeter Phoenix, and we are recruiting new participants.
Each term we will take on a different theme or story and work towards a spectacular showcase or performance, exploring different acting styles and theatre traditions. Participants will have the opportunity to work on both stage and screen acting techniques, depending on their preferences.
Book your place on the new term here or get in touch to arrange a taster session: phil@four-of-swords.com.
Previous Projects
In 2023 we masterminded the co-created show Team Gaia at Exeter Cathedral, bringing together five different community groups in a dazzling, sci-fi infused, one night only performance beneath Luke Jerram’s beautiful Planet Earth installation. We have also recently been working with the Wellcome Centre and a group with lived experience of seeing things and hearing voices on an innovative new adaptation of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four.
We design and deliver the course content for Creative Connections, a collaboration with Exeter Northcott and the Pelican Project, providing theatre training and opportunities for Learning Disabled and neurodivergent artists. We have also worked with Exeter Community Initiatives and the Ripple Recovery Group at Exeter Colab, supporting therapeutic theatre and storytelling work for vulnerable adults.
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If you have any queries or questions then please don’t hesitate to get in touch. Use the message form or email us directly…
For education, community engagement and multi-media enquiries
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