Conference
LOOKING NORTH: What does North mean in the 21st Century?
Friday 23 April and 24 April, Stage 2, Northern Stage
That bright, and fierce, and fickle is the South,
And dark, and true, and tender is the North
Tennyson, The Princess
Audiences joined us for two days of debate and discussion on the subject of Northernness. Distinguished writers, commentators and artists were invited to offer a series of provocations to challenge them and enable a lively conversation about the North.
As Northern Stage turns 40 we asked: what defines a northern stage? Is northernness an attitude, a state of mind, or simply an accident of geography? Does encountering northerners from around the world offer us insights into our own preconceptions, reveal a romance and a landscape to be celebrated, or simply reassure us that we are not alone?
Single session ticket £6 full price / £5 conc
Full Conference ticket (excl. lunch) £15 full price / £12 conc
Full Conference ticket (incl. lunch on Sat 24) £21 full price / £18 conc
Friday 23 April, 14:00 – 17:00
How has the idea of ‘the north’ changed in the North of England in the last 40 years? Is there a new north?
Speakers include: Jim Tough – Area Executive Director, North at Arts Council England; Paul Younger – Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Engagement) at Newcastle University; Michael Chaplin - writer; and Ellen Phethean - poet, novelist, playwright and editor.
Saturday 24 April, 10:30 – 13:00
Being Northern: an identity to be celebrated, resisted or challenged?
Speakers include: Martin Wainwright – northern editor of the Guardian, and author of True North; Peter Flannery – acclaimed playwright and screenwriter; Radio 4’s Kate Fox – poet, comedian and performance facilitator; Graeme Rigby – writer and member of Amber Film and Photography Collective.
Saturday 24 April, 14:00 – 16:00
A conversation about the international north, and the influence of northerliness on creative practice
Speakers include: Nazli Tabatabai-Khatambakhsh – artistic director of ZENDEH, creator of Paper Dolls; Fernando Jose Pereira – founder and co-director of Virose, lecturer at University of Oporto, and creator of short film permafrost; Jon Nygaard – professor of theatre studies at the Centre of Ibsen Studies, University of Oslo; Sean Burn – writer, performer and outsider artist; and Magnús Geir Þórðarson - director, Reykjavic City Theatre.
Sean Burn was writer in residence for the a66 in 2003 - a project examining northern identity. Current work includes a third full-length collection of his writing – Wings Are Giving Out – and his play Next Swan Down the River Might be Black (shortlisted for a Dadafest Disability Arts Award 2009) which tours nationally in 2011. "Sean Burn is one of this country's foremost experimental writers." Jeremy Hilton - Fire www.skrevpress.com
Michael Chaplin was born in Co. Durham and brought up in Newcastle, the son of the novelist Sid Chaplin. He spent 15 years as a newspaper and television journalist and documentary-maker, before beginning to write drama for the theatre, radio and television, for which he has many credits. After spending nearly 30 years away from the North-East, Michael Chaplin now lives again in Newcastle. He is currently writing his first novel.
Peter Flannery is a British playwright and screenwriter, born in the north east of England. Renowned for his work whilst a resident playwright at the Royal Shakespeare Company in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Notable plays during his tenure include: Savage Amusement (1978), Awful Knawful (1978), and Our Friends in the North (1982). Known to a broad audience for his highly-acclaimed television adaptation of Our Friends in the North, produced by the BBC and screened on BBC2 in 1996. At the 1997 British Academy Television Awards, he was given the honorary Dennis Potter Award for outstanding achievement in television writing.
Kate Fox is a poet, comedian and writer. She was born in Bradford and has lived in Newcastle for most of the last ten years since coming here to work as a radio journalist. She's now a poet in residence on Radio 4's Saturday Live, has produced satirical poems for BBC2's Daily Politics show and will soon be touring her stand up poetry show Fox News to the Edinburgh Festival and nationally. www.katefox.co.uk
Jon Nygaard is a professor of theatre studies at the Centre for Ibsen Studies, University of Oslo. His main fields of research and publication have been Ibsen and the drama of modernity; theatre history; the origin of theatre with special emphasis on rocks and rock art in Alta, northernmost Norway; the theatre system of Norway and the Nordic countries; and theatre as an expression of culture and identity of the indigenous peoples in the Arctic region.
Fernando José Pereira is an artist living and working in Oporto, Portugal. His academic background is in Fine Arts, completing a PhD in Fine Arts at the Vigo University, Spain. Pereira is founder (1997) and co-director of Virose, an interdisciplinary non-profit organisation dedicated to art and media technology, as well as a teacher in the Painting Department of the Fine Arts School at the University of Oporto. www.virose.pt
Ellen Phethean is a poet, novelist, playwright and editor. She co-founded Diamond Twig press with Julia Darling. She wrote Wall, Smokestack Books 2007, a teen novel in poems. Her first full collection of poetry is Breath, 2009 Flambard. She is currently co-writing Cain and Abel with her son Fred Phethean, in Hip Hop style, for the Durham Mysteries Cycle, May 2010.
Magnús Geir Þórðarson is the artistic director of Reykjavik City Theatre. He studied directing at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, has an MA in Theatre Studies from the University of Wales, Aberystwyth and an MBA from Reykjavik University. He has directed a number of productions in Iceland and abroad. His productions vary from new provocative plays to large scale musicals and operas. Before taking over the Reykjavik City Theatre he was the artistic director of the municipal theatre of Akureyri, the largest town outside of capital of Reykjavik. The Reykjavik City Theatre is a leading theatre company in Iceland with up to 15 own productions a year and receiving approx 210.000 guests annually. The theatre has three stages of various sizes, a company of 22 contracted actors and a staff of 150.
Graeme Rigby is a member of Amber film & photography collective, the operations of which include Amber Films, Side Gallery & Cinema and most recently SideTV. He has written for film, theatre, jazz/poetry performance and documentary photography projects, as well as having had two books of poetry and one novel published. In his spare time he is trying to write An Encyclopedia of the Herring. www.amber-online.com
Nazli Tabatabai-Khatambakhsh is Artistic Director of ZENDEH, which creates multi art form performance work and laboratories, engaging collaboratively with intercultural and international practice, with a special interest in contemporary Iranian arts. Nazli is a member of the Middle Eastern Producers Network hosted by Visiting Arts, Lead of the International Subcommittee for Sustained Theatre, Panel Chair of the Artists Taking the Lead in the North East, and is also involved with Urban Alchemy a Generation 2012 North East project for Young People www.zendeh.com
Jim Tough is the newly appointed Area Executive Director, North at Arts Council England. Jim is currently Chief Executive of the Scottish Arts Council (SAC), where he has made a significant contribution to the change management programme that will result in the formation of Creative Scotland. Jim has more than 25 years experience in the public and voluntary sectors, in community education and youth work and the arts. During his time at SAC, his strategic review of funding relationships resulted in a £7M uplift in SAC’s government grant.
Martin Wainwright is from Leeds, trained in Bath and Bradford and joined the London Evening Standard in 1975, moving to the Guardian a year later. He became Northern Editor in 1995 and broadcasts regularly on radio and TV. Books include biography of Alfred Wainwright (no relation), guide to the Coast-to-Coast Walk and, most recently, True North. This aims to squash the Grim Up North brigade for ever and calls on all Northerners to rejoice.
Paul L Younger is Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Engagement at Newcastle University. His background is in geology and environmental engineering, and he is particularly renowned for collaborative work with grassroots communities (in the UK and developing countries) to empower them to tackle issues of post-industrial pollution and the provision of clean water. A gifted communicator, Paul currently serves as Public Orator for the University. He has extensive experience in community-based development projects in Latin America. Paul is Director of three companies, engaged in the groundwater control and geothermal energy sectors, and is author of 250 items in the international literature. He serves on the public engagement panel of the Royal Academy of Engineering, and the Societal Issues Panel of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. Paul is a member of the Board of Live Theatre and Chair of the Board of the Great North Museum.
