Free Time

Peterborough Arts Festival 2015  

It’s back – the combined arts outdoor production bringing visual and performing arts in a large-scale, immersive Festival, presented over two days and two evenings. Peterborough Arts Festival brings An array of ingenious, awe-inspiring and plain crazy acts to the city’s streets, all with one common goal: to keep you entertained!  

Hunt & Darton Café

Hunt & Darton

Hunt & Darton

A fully functioning cafe that blends art with the everyday, creating a social and artistic hub where spontaneity and performance meet great food and drink. Jenny Hunt and Holly Darton expose the inner workings of their business by presenting everything as art – from the food served, the people serving, the décor and public display of their bank balance to the lovingly handpicked charity shop crockery. Hunt & Darton Café encourages playful participation and meaningful social encounters through its alternative service, from its hosts in their iconic fruit or veggie attire, to comic interaction through their ‘set menu’ performances and themed days, such as ‘You do-it Day’ and ‘Community Day’. ‘At Hunt & Darton Café,’ they say, ‘we are proud to satisfy appetites in more ways than one!’ Hunt & Darton is a live art collaboration between Jenny Hunt and Holly Darton. They have both practiced art since graduating from Central Saint Martins in 2003 and have been working together for eight years. Approaching live art from a fine art background, they have a persistent fetish within their practice to consistently re-assess the relationship with the audience, embracing awkward moments, risk taking and constantly trying to close the gap between performer and viewer, often opting for interactive performance in public places. Hunt & Darton are associate artists at Artsadmin and Cambridge Junction.

Magnetic Events: Enchanted City
For two nights, the city centre will be illuminated and turned into a kaleidoscope of light and kick start a weekend of projection, performance, installation, sound and illumination. The multimedia spectacular of light and sound sculptures will transform historical buildings such as the Guildhall into temporary artworks, telling stories, presenting cultures and enabling audiences to share experiences and a new exploration of the city so they see it (literally!) in a completely different light. Peterborough Enchanted City is an innovative outdoor programme co-created with community groups working with the artistic teams from Magnetic Events and The Projection Studio who will curate the programme. Magnetic Events is a company with an international reputation who has worked on projects such as lighting Buckingham Palace for the Queen’s Jubilee and the Houses of Parliament for the London Olympics.
Magnetic Events will be projecting on the Friday and Saturday nights, between about 8pm and 10.30pm  

No Fit State Circus: Open House
On Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 September, the city centre will be a riot of colour and high-energy performances as No Fit State Circus reveal their carnival of fun, Open House. Flowing through the town from Cathedral Square there will be an explosion of deckchairs, flags and umbrellas as a swarm of musicians, acrobats and aerialists fly out of caravans to create a joyous menagerie of circus chaos! This year audiences will also be invited to try their hand at circus skills as well as watch, laugh and be amazed by this free weekend of skilled circus performance.

Lemming Theatre

Lemming Theatre

Lemming Theatre: King Kong
The Grand Theatre of Lemmings have pioneered street theatre for over 30 years and their latest venture, an epic, larger than life production of King Kong has just returned from Tamil Nadu in India, where according to the local press it ‘mesmerised’ the audiences. It all takes place in the smallest theatre in the world ‘Seeing is believing’!

Trash Dollies: Cape Alley
Enter Cape Alley, a netherworld of beautiful dereliction where a ragtag band of outlaws dance to their own strange tune. Blending dance and theatre forms to create visually striking and captivating work, Trash Dollys are expressive and dynamic performers who forge fantastical storytelling with striking physicality. Cape Alley was developed at Sadlers Wells as part of the Breakin Conventions Back to The Lab. Commissioned by Bristol City Council and Pavillion Dance South West, co-produced by Restaged and Swindon Dance.

Trash Dollies

Trash Dollies

Acrojou: The Wheelhouse
Blending acrobatics, hand-built structures and sublime visuals, Acrojou create unique contemporary circus productions for events worldwide; performance crafted from circus, theatre, story and soul. Acrojou was formed in 2006 by company co-founders Jeni Barnard and Barney White. With backgrounds in dance, theatre and visual arts, they met whilst studying at the National Centre for Circus Arts, London. Their first performance together gained them a commission for the Trafalgar Square Festival and Acrojou was born. Their work has so far toured to 14 countries, and been broadcast on national television in the UK and Israel.

The Bruce Airhead Show
The metamorphosis of a man and a six-foot balloon. Bruce Airhead, with a volunteer, uses a voice-activated vacuum cleaner to inflate a six foot balloon. Then to the crowd’s disbelief, wearing only brightly coloured lycra shorts and choreographed to music, Bruce slides his toned Australian physique completely inside the balloon. First his head, then his torso until finally the last leg slowly disappears from sight. Once inside, Bruce dances the balloon to a fast changing sequence of music. The crowd finds this hilarious. Watch out for the explosive finish!

Stickleback Plasticus: Cats Choir
Using comedy, puppetry, song and improvisation, these furry felines will bring catnip joy to all audiences. From oversized rubbish bins, our mischievous cats reflect on their lives, mice, milkmen, food, and the death of Fat Bob. Nothing, and no-one, passes these mischievous cats by without comment…

Balloonatic
This wonderful balloon-art street act helps transform every event into a carnival, party atmosphere. Decorating people with incredible hats, giant costumes and hilarious balloon toys gets everyone laughing and they will even amaze passers-by with their astonishing models. They are undisputedly the UK’s most extravagant balloon artists.

Whalley Range All Stars: PIG
A short show full of surprises inside a surprisingly long pig. PIG is an ever popular, eye-catching installation and show, featuring a 30-foot long sleeping sow in a pen. You can see her snuffling, opening and closing her eyes, and hear her snoring. A farm-hand invites ten people at a time into the pen to take a peek at a 10-minute long, unexpected piece of theatre inside her belly. PIG has captured the imagination of audiences all over the world. It always attracts crowds curious to discover what’s going on inside, and TV crews have flown from as far afield as Seoul and Miami to film the show. Designed as a family show; suitable for ages four and above.

Peterborough Sings!

Peterborough Sings!

Peterborough Sings! Classical Spectacular
Peterborough Sings welcomes the 60-piece Royal Philharmonic Orchestra to the Broadway Theatre for ‘Classical Spectacular’. They will accompany the city’s award-winning Peterborough Male Voice Choir, Peterborough Voices and Peterborough Youth Choir in this fabulous celebration of popular classics: O Fortuna from Carmina Burana, The Blue Danube, Hallelujah Chorus from Handel’s Messiah, Candide Overture, Flower Duet from Lakme, Pomp and Circumstance March, Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves and many more! There will also be the regional premiere of a newly commissioned, Peterborough-inspired piece Hawks and Horses, by composer Errolyn Wallen. Errolyn is best known for her works Principia and Spirit in Motion, which featured in the London 2012 Paralympics Opening Ceremony.
Classical Spectacular is at the Broadway Theatre at 7.30pm on Sunday 6 September. Tickets from £14 at Peterborough Visitor Information Centre, call 0333 666 3366 or visit www. peterboroughmvchoir.org.uk

Metal Events
Pop-up Harvest Bakery
Bread-making workshops and café Saturday 5 September, 12-4pm Metal, Chauffeurs Cottage, 1 St Peters Rd (behind the town hall), Peterborough, PE1 1YX Peterborough and the surrounding Fens are often referred to as the breadbasket of England. Most of us have a breadof- choice, an age-old favourite recipe passed down the family or simply love sampling different breads from around the world. It’s a staple food that we love to share with family and friends. In preparation for their Harvest Festival (19 and 20 September) arts organisation Metal are inviting expert bakers novice bread-makers alike to their pop-up Harvest Bakery to have a go at baking bread and sharing recipes. You can book onto a free hour-long workshop to bake your own loaf or just drop in and have a go at loaves that are already on the go, whilst sampling the tea and cake. So, if you feel the ‘knead’ for a break from festival frolics, then pop into our Harvest Bakery and reconnect with your rural self!
To book onto a workshop or for more information about the Harvest Festival visit www.metalculture.com

Discover and explore Peterborough afresh with a new mobile App
Play Peterborough Now Or Never! is a playful new free App for mobile devices that takes people on an interactive ‘live art’ journey of discovery around the city to experience and engage with its public spaces in a fresh, imaginative and fun way. It will be launched at the Peterborough Festival with a special celebratory large-scale public event in Cathedral Square at 1pm on 5 September – everyone is welcome! The App is the brainchild of artists Helen Stratford and Idit Nathan who are concerned about the ways in which our cities and landscapes are becoming increasingly regulated and taken away from common use as they constantly undergo redevelopment. Play Peterborough Now Or Never! lets us reclaim our public spaces in playful and imaginative ways. The artists were aided by Peterborough residents who took part in a series of public walks and research events earlier this year. Their memories, experiences and ideas have helped shape the finished version, enabling it to give a voice to alternative stories and interpretations of the city as well as representing the people that live here. Whereas most Apps focus on interaction with the device itself and tend to make people less aware of their surroundings – causing people to walk around gazing at their mobile phones totally unaware of what is happening around them – Play Peterborough Now Or Never! does the opposite and encourages people to really look at the physical landscape around them, to interact with it and play in it. It uses innovative geo-mapping techniques alongside visual and audio prompts, suggesting specific actions or tasks. Players are encouraged to actively look, listen, think and interact with other people, with the result that they will see a familiar environment in a whole new light.
Play Peterborough Now Or Never! Has been developed in partnership with METAL, an artistic laboratory in Peterborough with bases in Southend and Liverpool. It is supported using public funding by Arts Council England, METAL and Peterborough Presents, Peterborough’s Creative People & Places programme. www.playthecitynowornever.com

Peterborough Arts Festival 2015  
Across the city centre, 5 & 6 September

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