TravCast - Fleur Darkin

TravCast is the Writer's Podcast from the Traverse, Scotland’s New Writing Theatre. Associate Director, Hamish Pirie, interviews well known playwrights, artists and theatre makers whose work features in the year round programme at the Traverse. In this episode, Hamish speaks to Fleur Darkin, Artistic Director of Scottish Dance Theatre, as their latest tour, Yama/Kingdom, comes to the Traverse stage. Fleur’s work made under her own company Hotel (2005), Augustine (2007), Low Fidelity (2009) and DisGo (2009) toured to more than 100 venues in the UK alone. Internationally, her artistic practice has been commissioned by partners including Junges Hundes (Germany), P.A.R.T.S. (Belgium) and Bolzano Danz (Italy). Fleur is a prolific collaborator and her theatre work includes Roam (Grid Iron), Playtime (West Yorkshire Playhouse), You Tell Us What Was (National Theatre of Scotland), Bint Jbeil (Grid Iron/National Theatre of Scotland), The Three Musketeers (Traverse/Belgrade), Virgins (Company of Angels) and various productions for venues including Birmingham Rep, Dundee Rep, Bristol Old Vic, Liverpool's Everyman, Edinburgh Lyceum and Battersea Arts Centre. Darkin’s large-scale projects include three Glastonbury Festivals, choreographing the world’s first ever science musical, Dr Tatiana, (Channel 4/Discovery) and the 2006 commission Parabolic, which played to a live audience of 25,000. Circus productions include Helter Skelter (Tramway/Brewhouse), War and Peace (Giffords Circus) and her aerial choreography for Threesixty's Peter Pan - "best of all" Benedict Nightingale (The Times) - was seen by audiences of over 300,000 on its two year global tour. She is a passionate advocate of innovative dance education and was at the helm of The Collaboratory - the UK's first peer-lead choreographic laboratory in 2012. Darkin has choreographed in castles, universities, prisons, schools and nightclubs and written for publications including The Guardian, Icon and The Observer. Darkin is passionate that dance is a powerful means of self-transformation and has worked with participants in schools, pupil referral units and mental health charities. Darkin is currently developing partnerships with the V&A at Dundee and various festivals and venues in India and Brazil for forthcoming projects. Fleur joined Scottish Dance Theatre as Artistic Director in 2012. Original music by James Iremonger www.jamesiremonger.co.uk Produced and engineered by Cian O Siochain *Please note, this episode contains language some people may find offensive*