It's been an incredibly busy few months for the Young Vic's outreach team, Taking Part. We've shared the playful, non-verbal production The Marbleous Route Home with SEND schools and young people over two weeks of performances, our YV Young Associates created an installation for Refugee Week, Something to Declare and Intro to Theatre, our week long programme of free workshops for young people interested in a career in theatre was attended by hundreds who enjoyed the talents and advice of some incredibly exciting artists.
The Marbleous Route Home
Our playful, non-verbal production, The Marbleous Route Home was our new Young Vic Taking Part production created as an original response to Fun Home aimed at children and young people who attend special schools.
Conceived by Natasha Nixon and Kirsty Harris, and devised by the company, Natasha Nixon's production received some beautiful and excited reactions from audiences throughout our two weeks of performances set in our open and relaxed performance environment.
Intro to Theatre
Our week long programme of workshops for Young People got even bigger in May 2018. We hosted hundreds of Young People across 26 workshops held by exciting artists including directors Roy Alexander Weise, performers Yolanda Mercy, Serafina Bey, London Hughes and Michael Balogun, writer Luke Barnes and photographer Helen Murray as well as our very own Kwame Kwei-Armah and Nadia Latif.
If you're interested in finding out more about the next Intro to Theatre then send an email to youngpeople@youngvic.org and they'll let you know how you can sign up.
Something to Declare
The Young Vic Young Associates are local young people from Southwark who work at the YV, each joining a different department for 9 months of the year. Towards the end of their time at the YV they are given the opportunity to come up with some work on a theme of their choosing. This year's team of Lanikai, Sandra and Patrick chose to create some work in response to the refugee crisis during Refugee Week.
Their installation, Something To Declare was developed through a series of interviews and workshops with LGBTQI+ refugees. Visitors were invited to listen to different narratives on headphones while inside the installation room, composed from interviews with workshop participants about their experiences in their home countries and in the UK. The second room offered a chill out space with music, films and food, and later featured moving performances from poets Belinda Zhawi and Tamara McFarlane. It was a great evening and we had a fantastic response from our audiences – big thanks to everyone who contributed to the project and to all of those who came.
All photos © Leon Puplett
