News Story
Roll back to autumn 2022. News of our partnership with Unlimited was out. An award designed to give disabled artists an opportunity to create extraordinary new work.
We invited expressions of interest from artists keen to collaborate with us to develop live performance work, with a £30,000 award to help realise their ideas. Four artists made it to our shortlist, all with brilliant ideas.
We’re chuffed to share that a panel of external and internal decision-makers have selected Krystal S. Lowe to develop her one-woman dance show: Interwoven with us.
This contemporary circus meets dance theatre will centre around access and the enjoyment of a neurodiverse audience.
Krystal will animate a series of biographical and autobiographical short stories and poems from around Wales through contemporary dance and ballet while exploring the storytelling opportunities surrounding Black beauty.
In Interwoven, Black hair culture is woven into an analogy for the human experience while celebrating Black care and intimacy.
Over the next year, Krystal will work alongside us, a dramaturg and Unlimited. So far, our plans include:
- Gathering stories
- Developing the script
- Looking at set design
- Testing out sound and movement
- Exploring relaxed performances with neurodiverse audiences in mind
This will lead towards a public sharing next spring, so keep your eyes peeled to see the journey unfold. In the meantime, take part in her research by sharing stories about your hair.
We want to shake things up and bring people together to inspire change. But this won’t happen if we uphold a culture and ways of doing things that exclude disabled people. It matters to us that theatre is for everyone. This new partnership with Unlimited will give Krystal the opportunity to indulge her imagination, be bold and ambitious. We’re excited to share her story.
Lorne, NTWs' Artistic Director
We are really excited to be working with Unlimited for the first time. Unlimited's mission is to commission extraordinary work from disabled artists until the whole of the cultural sector does. This work will change and challenge the world. Their biannual Partner Awards are funded by Arts Council England, Arts Council of Wales, Creative Scotland and 13 partner organisations from across the UK, including NTW.
Interwoven wholly aligns with our change-making mission, and we hope these ideas continue to breed positive change in the Welsh arts far into the future.