A person sat on the floor wearing a dirty pair of trousers. They are holding a bundle of moss in their hands.

Joe Bauer

A person sat on the floor wearing a dirty pair of trousers. They are holding a bundle of moss in their hands.

Joe Bauer

“Inseparably Connected to Art” – Accessibility and Physical Theatre

Introducing The Theatre Company Sticky Fragments

Since the founding of their company, the members of Sticky Fragments have been exploring the potential of audio description to make their plays accessible to blind, visually impaired and sighted audiences. Driven by the idea of writing their own works for the theatre and bringing them to the stage through collaborative, interdisciplinary approaches, they will perform their new play ‘PowerStrangers – Touching the not yet’ at Zollverein on 4, 5 and 6 September.

The company members live and work in the Ruhr, where they always conduct their research in collaborative teams. Valentin Schwerdfeger, Charlie Wyrsch, Meret König and Fine Kroke work, among others, together with access dramaturge Sabine Kuxdorf, musician Katrin Meier, Joe Bauer (costumes and set design) and dramaturge Annika Jakobs. In their work they strive to apply the concept of an aesthetics of access. This means that they think about how barriers to and in the theatre can be broken down even during the artistic process – with creative, integrated audio description. Accessibility thus functions as ‘an integral part of the story, inseparably connected to art,’ according to Valentin Schwerdfeger. The fact that the play is then equally enjoyable for sighted, visually impaired and blind audiences ultimately has real ‘added value for art.’

A collage made up of different computer-generated scenes. Rubbish and other finds alongside industrial spaces populate the image.

Joe Bauer

The group has made it their goal to promote diversity. To this end, they involve people with different perceptual experiences from the outset and work with them to reflect on movements, images and sound. Whether actors or video designers, everyone involved in the project also contributes to writing the play. According to Valentin, the ensemble therefore does not aim for perfection, but rather wants to collect ‘set pieces and fragments’ from conversations, experiences and places in order to create new meaning with them. That is why Sticky Fragments uses costumes and sets on stage that are literally made up of fragments or other finds that the ensemble members collected in the Ruhr when preparing for their next project.

It is particularly important for Sticky Fragments that they situate their work in the Ruhr because of the systemic problem that identity loss (e.g. of working-class culture) poses for regional identity. With this in mind, the group works with various institutions, such as the Zollverein Foundation and the Theater im Depot Dortmund, which also enables them to reach the local population. Not for nothing does Valentin describe their upcoming work as an ‘ode to the Ruhr’.

In keeping with their inclusive approach, the members of Sticky Fragments do not just think about the audience during the performance; a chaperon service starting at train stations or bus stops is available for visually impaired and blind audience members before the performances. Alongside an email distribution list, audio advertising and going to regular get-togethers for visually impaired and blind people, this service is part of a holistic, target group-oriented marketing concept that is focused on participation.

A person wearing a bright top. Pieces of stained fabric are stuck to their arm.

Joe Bauer

With their new play ‘PowerStrangers’ the company aims to give a voice to the Ruhr and its ‘liminal places’, to lend these once vibrant and now ‘forgotten, deserted’ industrial spaces a new purpose. According to Valentin, the new play was written for and with the old, present and future Ruhr region, so quotes heard at the train station or in bars and rubbish or other objects found nearby can be experienced as part of the costumes and digital worlds on stage. Why? The Sticky Fragments want to expand what is happening on stage with a transdisciplinary, multimedia and accessible performance. Anyone interested in going along for the journey can experience PowerStrangers on 5 and 6 September at 7 p.m. at Zollverein! (Tickets can be purchased at zollverein.de/besuch-planen/tickets/.)

But this is far from the end of the road for the Sticky Fragments ensemble the Aesthetics of Access for them means a longing for new, bigger, more diverse collaborations, formats, venues and audiences. The aim is to incorporate more perceptual experiences into their future projects and to reach other target groups.

It all kicks off on 4 September with an open rehearsal of the new work; the ensemble asks: ‘Who will we have been? What will remain of us? Who do we want to have been? What utopias of community will we find?’

Further performances on 17 and 18 October at the Theater im Depot, Dortmund.

PowerStrangers is a production by Sticky Fragments. Funded by the Ministerium für Kultur und Wissenschaft Nordrhein-Westfalen as part of the Neue Künste Ruhr (NKR), the Kulturamt der Stadt Essen, RAG-Stiftung, Gesellschaft der Freunde und Förderer der Stiftung Zollverein e.V. & die Karin und Uwe Hollweg Stiftung. In cooperation with Koproduktionslabor Dortmund, Physical Theatre Netzwerk Essen, Stiftung Zollverein in Essen and the Theater im Depot Dortmund.