Operation New Normal
Written by Grace Ng-Ralph
As I am writing this on 1 May 2020, Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) Leo Varadkar announced that the COVID-19 restrictions would continue for another two weeks until 18 May but eased somewhat from Tuesday 5 May for seniors cocooning to now be able to leave their homes to exercise or for a drive within a 5km radius. He mentions that the new normal will start from 18 May and well into August happening in 5 phases with 3 weeks in between to monitor the situation before moving up, or even down a phase.
He talked about a “tapestry of struggle, sacrifice and sorrow” weaved together by stories of individual actions motivated by moral and civic responsibility within society, albeit dramatically transformed, in order to help keep and save lives.
Starting on 28 April and ending timely on the day of The Taoiseach’s announcement of the roadmap to re-open society and business, Abbey Theatre launched its DEAR IRELAND project: a collection of four visual postcards containing monologues written by 50 writers and performed by 50 actors asking questions of what our new normal would look like:
What do we want to be to one another?
What do we want our society to look like?
What are we not paying enough attention to?
Where do we want to go next?
Not just a day before the Taoiseach’s address, on 30 April, Artistic Director/CEO of Graeae Theatre, Jenny Sealey, together with an international community of researchers, artists, practitioners, politicians and activists published The Living Declaration of Disability, Equity and Resilience. This declaration was put together with the purpose of “seizing this moment of crisis to REIMAGINE our unequal and uneven healthcare and social structures… and seeking to “catalyse collective dialogue and action – across communities, cultures and continents”.
The earlier questions of “what do we want to be to one another?” and “what (who) are we not paying enough attention to?” is even more relevant to the consideration of healthcare and equity in every level of our society from individuals, to private, governance and public sectors – especially in the context of a global health crisis such as this.
The 2003 SARS epidemic changed my country, Singapore, dramatically. “The lessons learnt have proven to be crucial in the changes of the healthcare infrastructure framework within Singapore and assisted in planning for an influenza pandemic.” (Chan & Koh, International Maritime Health, Vol 57, No. 1-4, 2006). It’s most important transformation after emerging from the chrysalis of an unprecedented time, was in its harnessing of technology to provide quality healthcare for her elderly and D/deaf and disabled citizens.
New Normal: Digital Transformation
Shall we consider this together? Singapore’s whole of-nation transformation in response to digital disruption, called Smart Nation Singapore uses technology to “unite rather than divide, and how society as a whole can be more resilient and adaptable to change.”
“Technology also has the power to be a social leveller. Hence, we need to dedicate resources to ensure that all Singaporeans, including the vulnerable, such as the elderly, low-income and persons with disabilities, are able to seize the opportunities offered by digital technologies.” (Smart Nation: The Way Forward, page 25)
One of the exciting benefits from such a transformation includes is Smart Nation’s TeleHealth initiative that delivers quality health care directly and immediately to patients. By attaching wearable sensors and video conferencing, rehabilitation therapists can remotely monitor progress. For the purposes of independent living, developments in assistive technology and robotics can provide help with simple tasks, or help in the learning and communication experiences of the visually impaired, or wirelessly send a distress call for help in the event of a fall via the Wireless Alert Alarm System.
Source: Smart Nation Singapore. Smart, Tangible Benefits for Citizens and Businesses infographic.
Consider this then. Bringing all of this back to our passion of the performing arts, we know that the starting point of our creative processes i.e. design of set, sound, light and even the draft of a piece of new writing or movement concept, can start off from a digital point; and with collaborative virtual or cloud platforms now part of the creative team’s necessary tool in the new normal – could we reimagine our creative process by harnessing digital technology to transform the way we make work accessible from the point of creation?
Right off the bat with artists publishing their performances online, could we perhaps spare a little more time by adding captions to the video or learn from practitioners like Extant on their methods of adding audio description to online platforms that wonderful breakers of access barriers such as travel or need to self-isolate due to low immunity regardless of a pandemic?
Could we advocate for designers to work together with directors, playwrights, dramaturgs and performers to use technology such as projection mapping to think about creative captions where the action is?
Could we advocate for the use of technology to work if not more effectively and efficiently with disabled creatives, makers, artists, performers who bring to the process an increased layer of the world’s experiences and expertise?
Why if on the same spectrum of creativity, where tech-entrepreneurs are natural co-devisors and follow the devising creative process of problem solving that might not be too dissimilar to the way playwrights/directors/performers/designers experiment or shoebox together – could we not harness the potential of technology to be a social leveller in the new normal and start un-learning some of our ways of hierarchical power dynamics in the creation and rehearsal process?
I don’t have the answers how but am very excited to start the conversation! So let’s consider the basis and our inherent perceptions towards access thinking.
The Basis Of Access Thinking
Let me put forward, nervously but assuredly, my open declaration of the basis of access thinking.
The definition of love, from my Christian faith, is: the intelligent willingness to do what’s best for another. Love is described in the bible’s book of 1 Corinthians, chapter 13 as an active state of being: of patience, of kindness, not boastful, not irritable, that “never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance”.
Love compels us to do what’s best for our neighbours— the second greatest commandment is to love our neighbours as ourselves.
The greatest example of this is Love personified in Jesus Christ who by active willingness and choice, accomplished God’s mission on earth to grant unfettered divine access - motivated by the passion of Christ. The four biblical records of Jesus’s ministry on earth in the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are four – to borrow a photography term – portrait angles to capture the full narrative of what Jesus did and said focused on loving the underrepresented, the sick and commending women as important members of the community of followers – all as acts of love.
I believe that the basis of access thinking is essentially a simple act of love – the intelligent willingness of members of society, both disabled and non-disabled, to do what is best for another.
Understanding what the Social Model of Disability is saying in that “disability is caused by the way society is organised, rather than by a person’s impairment or difference. It looks at ways of removing barriers that restrict life choices for disabled people. When barriers are removed, disabled people can be independent and equal in society, with choice and control over their own lives.” – SCOPE
That intelligent willingness then, to do what’s best for another, is now two-ways:
For me then as a non-disabled person, it is my act of active intelligent willingness to do everything within my power and sphere of influence at work or personally, to remove barriers that disable someone with an impairment – both visible and invisible.
For a disabled person, they are then called to intelligently act in ways that deal only with their impairment (visible or invisible) and share every inch of their wonderful personality, creativity and talent as important contributions with the rest of society.
Then to apply this to the arts sector, it means non-disabled people removing the barriers for a D/deaf person/child to enjoy a performance with full captions where the action is happening, rather than looking from left to right; or ensure access requirements are met so everyone can experience theatre together when we reopen our doors.
Following from my previous blog titled “Our Season of Cocooning”, I would like to continue on the metaphor that during this difficult and trying period of cocooning, that this is an important transformation moment in the chrysalis. As we are forced to slow down and reflect – that this is the time for Operation New Normal Transformation, starting with our perspectives, attitudes, and priorities towards disability and ethnic representation in the arts industry.
Let’s start by debunking the myths that prevent us from making accessible theatre as part of our creative practice.
Debunking Myths
The following would have been from an excerpt of the welcome address of Making Accessible Theatre day on Wednesday 25 March 2020 at The Lowry, but was postponed during the UK’s country-wide shut down on 16 March 2020.
“We’re so pleased to welcome everybody to our very first Making Accessible Theatre day. This day has come about from artists who have asked us to share more around best practice, as well as practical skills and knowledge in creating accessible theatre.
Today has also come about as our collective response to the creative case for diversity and our subscribing to the social model of disability.
In a day such as today, we hope that the artists here with us, or joining us online via livestream (wave hi to camera) will end the day being equipped with the necessary tools, knowledge and skills to integrate accessible practice within their creative process, and/or work confidently with disabled artists and theatre makers.
Today, we hope is a day that will debunk myths, and replace those assumptions with knowledge. We’ve curated a day with some very passionate theatre makers across as wide a range of accessible practice as we possibly can include in eight hours, hoping that some of the discoveries we make are useful or help lead us towards debunking the following five myths:
We’ve curated a day with some very passionate theatre makers across as wide a range of accessible practice as we possibly can include in eight hours, hoping that some of the discoveries we make are useful or help lead us towards debunking the following five myths:
Myth No. 1: Not everyone can make shows accessible.
To borrow Jenny Sealy’s words (she’s artistic director of Graeae Theatre) from The Guardian article, she has been able “work with all creative teams to embed captioning, signing and audio description into the heart and design of all productions so that deaf and disabled audience members can enjoy any show they like rather than just on the “access night”. Graeae has been making every show accessible for more than 20 years and we are a small company. If we can do it, everyone can. Access is a human right – not a tag-on.”
It is clearly evident that our three morning speakers, five insights presenters and two HOW TO demonstrators in the afternoon can all debunk this myth and say instead, that everyone can indeed make shows accessible.
Myth No. 2: Relaxed Performances impede artistic quality
What would happen if we simply relaxed the rules and conventions (mostly unwritten but definitely dominant) about how people behave in arts spaces? That’s what Battersea Arts Centre has considered and is now the world’s first fully relaxed venue.
Our first morning speaker, Zoo Co have toured with a ‘Relaxed Performance as Standard’ model since 2014, and passionately believe that when it comes to theatre, it’s only good if everybody is invited. In their article written for Edinburgh Festival Fringe, they urged emerging and mid-career companies to “consider what assumptions they might have on what makes a ‘good enough’ relaxed performance, and reconsider – are you worried about your tech? Your need for complete silence? Your loud soundtrack? Un-dig what’s stopping you and address it.”
Zoo Co will be sharing more on the guidelines and considerations, but how by touring relaxed performance as a standard, they have found that they literally perform better, their audiences (neurodiverse or neurotypical) have responded better and it felt like they were actually doing something that’s live.
Myth No. 3: Access is costly and complicated.
University of Nottingham’s Mixed Reality Lab and Department of Drama and Creative Writing, together with Red Earth Theatre, have developed a prototype projection mapping software that allows for an inclusive immersive theatre for D/deaf audiences, integrated in terms of both access and aesthetics from the beginning of the creative process.
Amanda Wilde, co-director of Red Earth Theatre has found that using the projection mapping software for captioning can be a “much more creative, playful and immersive process”. The prototype projection mapping software, that works together with QLAB for ease of the sound technician or stage manager to operate together with sound and light cues, has equipped small-to-mid scale touring company such as Red Earth Theatre with a cheap, flexible and robustly tested software that works on tour regardless of the tour venue’s stage dimensions.
We are delighted that Red Earth Theatre will be our second morning speaker sharing their techniques for accessible storytelling, and Dr Paul Tennent of University of Nottingham is also here to demonstrate the possibilities of creative captioning through projection mapping in the afternoon, which is an open source initiative and only needs designers, makers and technicians to co-create and leverage on.
Myth No. 4: Working with D/deaf and disabled performers is tough and costly.
Amit Sharma, deputy artistic director of Birmingham Rep is passionate about representation, particularly those voices who have been marginalised historically and believes that “the next generation of D/deaf and disabled artists need to feel like there are opportunities for them to act, write, direct, design and produce just like their non-disabled counterparts”.
Our third morning speaker, Extant have pioneered theatre practice with the express inclusion of visually impaired performers and audiences. The company was formed 23 years ago with the aim of redressing the invisibility of blind and partially sighted artists and to explore new creative territories. Since then it has become a dynamic, political space to articulate and celebrate what visual impairment brings to the performing arts.
They will also share alternative affordable, low-fi ways to support your work with a form of access that is tested to work for visually impaired audiences.
Myth No. 5: Sign language interpreted theatre work is the same as sign language interpretation.
We’re delighted that Dr Siobhán Rocks will be running a collaborative session in the afternoon that aims to dispel myths surrounding the sign language interpreted performance and the Deaf audience member’s relationship with it. Based on current PhD research findings and using film of BSL-English interpreters at work in theatre, we will discuss the work of the interpreter, how the construction of the signed translation is influenced by the performance itself, and how theatre practitioners and interpreters may collaborate and share knowledge in order to better achieve the engagement of D/deaf audiences.
Operation New Normal - A Pilot
At time of writing, I have been assigned to be on furlough in order to protect jobs and the sustainability of the theatre. Once furlough is lifted, I can’t wait to pilot, in my professional capacity, a Hackathon for the creative sector. This idea was borrowed from the entrepreneur’s world in the form of a solutions-driven activity observed from my previous life of programming youth arts and entrepreneurship in Singapore’s youth hub. It would be a week of R&D and skills matchmaking for performers/theatre makers with project ideas form groups with designers (set/light/sound); learn accessible theatre digital skills and practice; and present informal sharing of possible accessible applications to enhance the project idea and be embedded in the creative process moving forward!
Not sure how much I can say but I hope the pilot would later enable artist development practitioners to play a role in facilitating virtual collaboration and meaningful connections between designers and theatre makers seeking to continue to R&D and make during isolation – and be a catalyst for rethinking creative collaboration with accessible practice at the heart of it.
Further Reading
Smart Nation: The Way Forward Strategy Paper - PDF download https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/docs/default-source/default-document-library/smart-nation-strategy_nov2018.pdf?sfvrsn=3f5c2af8_2
Reviewing lessons learnt of SARS in Singapore during planning for influenza pandemic, by Gregory C. Chan, D. Koh https://journals.viamedica.pl/international_maritime_health/article/view/26325
WATCH Abbey Theatre Production, Dear Ireland - Full Performance Playlist on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2z1O2VioKplw05TdCnBSA4lLAyjQp4W5