Horse and Bamboo Theatre
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Horse and Bamboo Theatre or Horse + Bamboo Theatre is a British theatre company founded in 1978 by the Artistic Director, Bob Frith. The company has a strong visual and music-based identity rather than being text-based, and uses distinctive full-head masks. It works internationally as well as from its Centre in Waterfoot, Rossendale, Lancashire, UK.
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[edit] Productions
Horse + Bamboo Theatre creates all of its own material, often in collaboration with other artists and writers, with the majority of its productions written by the core of artists including Bob Frith. Its hallmark is in creating sustained theatrical narratives without the use of dialogue, as well as the use of full-head masks and puppetry. Film and dance are often integrated within the company's productions.
[edit] Touring
The company tours its productions throughout the UK, and has also toured in Spain, the Netherlands, Germany, Slovakia, Belgium and Hungary. A co-production of Company of Angels toured the United States between 2003 and 2006.
Significant Horse + Bamboo Theatre touring productions include The Woodcarver Story (1982); Dance of White Darkness (1994), about Maya Deren in Haiti; Harvest of Ghosts (1999) created with Sam Ukala, the Nigerian playwright; as well as Company of Angels (2002) about the life of Charlotte Salomon. The company is currently developing an epic production Veil that contrasts the lives of two young women, one an Iraqi, the other brought up in Europe, and is set across two generations.
[edit] Community Theatre
Horse + Bamboo Theatre has a long history of producing community projects both in its home community of Rossendale, and beyond - for example the Good Friday Parade and Service at Westminster Abbey in 1994 and 1996. It runs a varied programme from the Horse + Bamboo Centre, and hosts the annual Rossendale Puppet Festival.
[edit] Guided Imagery
Horse + Bamboo has also been influential in its work with people who have special needs through its Guided Imagery programme. This programme, started in 1982, uses a large-scale built environment and performance space through which small and intimate groups journey, and interact with, a highly sensory environment. These 'performances' last several hours, and are notable in blurring the gap between performer and audience.
[edit] Futures programme
Horse + Bamboo uses its base at The Horse + Bamboo Centre as a centre for the development of visual theatre. Through the Futures programme it mentors new companies and artists, and the building and is used by other professionals and companies as a place to research and develop new work.
[edit] Name
The name derives from the use of horses to pull a caravan of vehicles when touring, although the company abandoned this practice in the late 1990's. It continues to tour theatres in a more conventional manner, but its roots in rural touring are maintained through the pPod, a specially designed and unique portable theatre that tours to festivals and community venues each summer.
