OPEN Road has received funding support from the National Lottery in the latest round of Creative Scotland’s Open Project Fund awards.
The Aberdeen-based theatre company has received funding to research and develop What Country Friend is This?, a performance and community engagement project that focuses on a visit by the King’s Players to Aberdeen in 1601.
The project centres around a script in hand performance combining Shakespeare’s texts with contemporary verbatim testimonies of arrival and emigration to north-east Scotland.
The project also accommodates a series of creative writing workshops with the city’s Polish community and links with the European wide Start the Change project which empowers young people around migration and UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Open Road will also take the opportunity of this project to bring a trainee producer on board and in doing so directly contribute towards bringing producing skills and experience to north east Scotland.
Lesley Anne Rose, Open Road, said: “What Country Friends is This? has a talented, cross-sector team on board. We are excited about the potential of this project to create a piece of place based theatre rooted in north east Scotland, but with a global outlook and resonance. It’s particularly exciting to be training a new generation of producers in Aberdeen who can gain the skills, knowledge and experience to make work of their own.”
Iain Munro, acting CEO at Creative Scotland, said: “With funding from the National Lottery, we are delighted to support Open Road and the development of this exciting new project and the company’s commitment to enhancing the skills and experience of the area through their trainee producer programme.”
ENDS
Notes for editors:
A full breakdown of July’s Open Project Funds awards, can be found here.
Open Project Funding is available to a wide range of organisations and individuals working across Scotland in the arts, screen and creative industries. It supports a broad spectrum of activity including creative and professional development, research and development, production, small capital requirements, touring and collaborations, festivals, arts programming, audience development, etc. Support is available for projects of different scale and duration with the maximum period of award being set at two years. Awards are made in the range £1,000 to £100,000 (or up to £150,000 by exception). Application guidance and forms can be found here.
Creative Scotland is the public body that supports the arts, screen and creative industries across all parts of Scotland on behalf of everyone who lives, works or visits here. We enable people and organisations to work in and experience the arts, screen and creative industries in Scotland by helping others to develop great ideas and bring them to life. We distribute funding provided by the Scottish Government and the National Lottery. Further information at www.creativescotland.com.
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