Celebrating the convergence of live art, activism and performance, SPILL Festival of Performance in Ipswich showcases the work of contemporary artists from across the world. Opening on 26 October, the international festival will host over 100 events in 22 venues across Ipswich, Suffolk, in this, its eighth edition. Running until 30 October, this year’s programme focuses on the theme En Masse, investigating the idea of being together, as a group, all at once.

Part of the 2016 line-up is Spill Commissions: a programme of new works produced especially for the festival. Featured artists include Mem Morrison, Mike Challis, Shabnam Shabazi, Shaun Caton, and Martin O’Brien working with Sheree Rose. The UK & Ireland wide Spill National Platform returns with 35 works from emerging practitioners, while the annual Spill Symposium marks the beginning of the festival on 26 October. Taking place at the University of Suffolk, the event invites a whole host of discussions concerning the radical, activist and politicised qualities of today’s performance landscape.

Jude Kelly, Artistic Director, Southbank Centre, will lead the first keynote, opening the floor for various conversations and sessions such as: whose institutions? How can we reimagine and reassign cultural power structures?; please, after you … New models of stewardship; free radicals – New models of community practice; I Have a Dream – Models and tools for the future. Notable speakers include John McGrath (Artistic Director, Manchester International Festival), Nancy Groves (Commissioning editor, culture, The Guardian), Roger Wright (CEO, Aldeburgh Music), and Lois Keidan (Co-director, Live Art Development Agency).

Spill Festival of Performance, 26-30 October, Ipswich, Suffolk.

For more, visit www.spillfestival.com.

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Credits
1. Image Vivian Chinasa Ezugha, photo by Rosie Cooper.