projects with people with learning difficulties
Wolf + Water have worked with people with learning difficulties on performances ranging from a cast of 6 to a cast of 60. Some shows are devised in really fast residencies, starting work on a Monday and ending up with a show on the Friday, while others take months of painstaking preparation.
The rule with all performances Wolf + Water undertake is that they have to be professionally brilliant - artistically and technically - so that the audience go away saying “that was a brilliant show” and not “aah didn’t they do well!” The first response indicates that the audience has learnt something about the capabilities and talents of people with learning difficulties. The second response does not.
Wolf + Water’s extensive work with people with learning difficulties is divided into three main areas.
Performance
film
workshops
full list of work with people with learning difficulties
the strange & extraordinary case of the circus of dreams
[center]get changed theatre company in assosiation with wolf + water arts co
invite you to
“the strange & extraordinary case of the circus of dreams”
a circus tale of murder, intrigue & the brooding easy listening horror of daniel o’donnell & his schemes to take over the world
come & join us at the circus where your dreams…& your nightmares…really can come true
at
the octagon theatre, okehampton college, mill road, okehampton, devon
EX20 1PW
friday 22nd february at 7.30 pm
The Ballad of Boozo the clown
Barnstaple. Friday 21st December, 7.30 pm & Saturday 22nd December, 2pm
Wolf + Water & Many Directions theatre company present an unseasonal Parisian tale of violence, romance & conjuring tricks
The Big Meal
A three day training course on using music & drama with people with learning difficulties.
Many Directions Theatre Company - Barnstaple & Westward Ho!, Devon - Ongoing
Comprising of four groups of adults with learning difficulties that take place on a weekly basis across North Devon
“The VP Team” - 2003
During 2003 we were invited by a group of adults with learning difficulties to come & help them make a video about the government’s “Valuing People” white paper, which is the document which sets out how people with learning difficulties should be treated by the services that serve them & society in general.
Valuing People Training for Trainers Project – (Bideford, Devon)
Following on from our “Valuing People Team” film, this project has been training up 5 adults with learning difficulties to work with community organisations (such as the Police & Doctors) & businesses on awareness around the issues involved in the Valuing People Paper
Pathfield Special School - Barnstaple, Devon
Regular weekly sessions with two groups of children with profound & multiple disabilities, using a multi sensory approach to interactive drama work.
“Modig” Ottestad steinerskoken - Hamar, Norway – September 2006
A welcome return to this bunch of twenty 8 – 15 year olds with learning difficulties to combine them with a great group of twenty 9 year olds to create a huge outdoor multi media public performance on the theme of bravery involving giant puppets, dragons & …biscuits.
A test of strength
“The inspectors” & “The return of the inspectors” - Devon - March – September 2005
Devised with the bideford “chapter” of many directions theatre co., this was an interactive theatre show designed to help people with learning difficulties and service providers work together to improve access and inclusion in the community. it visited community resource centres & arts venues across devon & was also performed for the learning disability partnership board.
The "Allegory of Love"
(2001 - Highbridge House Community Resource Centre, Plough Arts Centre Adult Drama Group, Abbey Gateway Club Barnstaple, Marland School for Children with emotional & behavioural difficulties,& North Devon College)
This was one of our biggest productions to date. Inspired by seven large figurative paintings by Wolf + Water’s Peter Stiles depicting the arrival, miracles & subsequent departure of a North Devon saint, the show brought together over 30 performers to create two interpretations of the story that were performed to sell out audiences.
"The Waterbabies"
(2000 with The Old Rectory Centre and Edgehill College, Bideford)
“The Waterbabies” was a commissioned piece for the Westward Ho! Millenium Festival, that brought together artists from the UK, the Former Yugoslavia and Norway to work on a production finally performed in a big tent on the seafront.
“What I saw was a most uplifting & moving experience…I was in tears at the end”
Audience Member
British Institute of Learning Disabilities Annual Conference
(Blackpool, UK, 2000)
An integrated team of performers & artists with & without learning difficulties from Wolf & Water contributed to this 3 day national conference that took as it’s theme the “Past, Present & Future” for people with learning difficulties.
At the Gammaton Nurseries sessions
(1999 - 2000 Gammaton, North Devon)
Work centred on sensory experiences & drama & music activities designed to help the profoundly autistic adult males in this special unit inter relate.
Northam Lodge Sessions
(1999 -2000 Northam, North Devon)
A series of weekly sessions with adults with profound & multiple disabilities, all wheelchair users, all without speech. Sessions focussed very much on working with an excellent staff group on how to use multi sensory arts activities to work with this extremely “locked in” client group.
“We value your work enormously & admire its high standards & relevant content”
Manager, Northam Lodge
Silver Hill Lodge Special Care Group
(1994 - 1999)
an ongoing regular input into a fantastic group of adults with multiple & profound disabilities with sessions exploring such topics as communication, body awareness & coping with changing day centre as the whole group moved out of one building & into a new one.
Forest Hill Unit Anger Management
(1998)
A series of sessions using theatre one to one with a young woman with Downs Syndrome who was exhibiting often violent behaviour. Work focussed on exploring issues such as “not getting your own way” & impulse control work.
"Macbeth"
(1998 - Highbridge House CRU and Great Torrington School)
Macbeth was one of Wolf + Water’s biggest ever projects to produce, a full length 16mm film adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Scottish Play” made in Devon without the aid of kilts.
"Sleeping Beauty"
(1998 - with the Abbey Gateway Club, Barnstaple)
A magical retelling of the traditional fairy story, with various strange twists…
Beauty gets a telling off from her mother
The Gardener cuts a rose for Beauty
In "The Phantom Tollbooth"
(1994 - with Hawley CRU, Barnstaple),
an adaptation of the classic children’s book, Wolf + Water took over a disused factory and spent a month building an elaborate series of performance spaces that the audience of primary school children were led through as part of this fantastic adventure.
The Phantom Tollbooth
The Phantom Bell ringers
The Hawley Hostel Drama Group
(1989 - 1996)
The Hawley Hostel Drama Group were a great bunch of adults with learning difficulties who would meet weekly in their Barnstaple Hostel to use drama to do a whole variety of things. The group fed into a number of performances over the year, working in particular with a local youth theatre. They also produced street theatre, produced a limited edition hand made book written & photographed by the group on the life of Monet, & sometimes simply used theatre to explore the everyday tensions & problems in their lives.
"The Western Lands"
(1992 - with Highbridge House CRU and Great Torrington school)
was a complex piece of dance and physical theatre exploring themes of landscape and exploitation, and used over 300 projected images throughout the show.
”..a hugely ambitious piece …vulnerable, courageous, dangerous…”
Public Projects Co-ordinator, Dartington College of Arts
In "Gerald’s Restaurant"
(1991 - with Highbridge House CRU and Great Torrington School)
the audience was invited to partake in a five course meal cooked by the cast throughout the course of the show, while various strange happenings - the arrival of aliens, a raid by the Vegetable Liberation Front and the adoration of the humble onion made it a dinner date to remember.
Something’s not right in the kitchen