After a long flight from Tehran Hamid Poorazari and his two assistants (and students) Sahar Gholami and Saeed Zarei touched down in London to begin a week of research and exploration. The purpose of the week was to try to understand London through the eyes of the different communities that live here. We had arranged a packed schedule of visits for them, mainly focusing on getting to know the Farsi speaking community in London. Before the week got in to full swing Hamid, Sahar, Saeed and the LIFT team headed out to China Town for a 4 course gastronomic odyssey.

Unperturbed by the amount of Chinese food we tried to feed them, the week got off to a great start with an introductory meeting in which LIFT and Hamid shared examples of their work. Key to Hamid’s work are the principles of audience participation and playfulness.  It was fascinating to watch the different ways in which he has created performances that involve the audience in a way that ultimately leaves them with the decision of how much they participate. In U-turn, a surreal performance staged in an abandoned 3 storey car park, the audience were given the option to create a performance of their own or distance themselves entirely and remain as an invisible spectator. The performance began in a backstreet in the suburbs of Tehran. The audience were instructed to purchase tickets from a woman waiting in a white car. They were then loaded on to two minibuses and driven to the cark park. Once in the car park the audience were divided into different ‘narrative pathways’, some were driven in cars, others led upstairs or underground. What soon became clear for the audience was that it was impossible to distinguish between who was a performer and who wasn’t. This anonymity gave them the option to create their own narratives and play with the props given to them, such as cars, masks and bikes, resulting in a wonderful chaos.

We also watched clips from Hamid’s adaptation of The Caucasian Chalk Circle in which the audience were seated on two portable, 8 ton seating platforms. This enabled the audience to move with the action of the play and be transported from scene to scene. Hamid talked to us about his rehearsal process and how creating a bond of trust between all the actors and bringing out their self confidence is key to the delivery of his work. In order to do this he and the cast of Chalk rehearsed together for 7 months. The bond between all 85 members of the cast and the commitment that they had to every moment of the performance was testimony to the benefits of working in this way.

A large part of the week was spent visiting Iranian and Afghan communities and organisations. Conversations were mainly conducted in Farsi with Saeed acting as translator. From the conversations we had we discovered that every member of the communities had a different story to tell about their journey to the UK and what their life is like in London now. Such stories are seldomly told and it was wonderful to hear from communities that seem to remain hidden in London. Much tea was drunk, numerous biscuits consumed and many laughs were had.

One of the main aims of Hamid’s initial visit was to view and decide upon a potential site for the performance. By the end of the week he had decided that an outdoor location in Croydon was where he would most like to work. This decision came after two fruitful days spent there, meeting with groups that work with refugees and running a drama workshop with 15 young refugees from a range of backgrounds. It is fair to say that Croydon has never had the best PR. However we found ourselves captivated by the activity of the town and drawn to the people we met there. In recent months Croydon has suffered a 100% cut in its local arts budget, a massive blow causing 40 redundancies and the closure of the Clocktower Theatre which now sits unused. Despite this massive knock, it was inspiring to meet individuals who are endeavouring to keep the arts alive in this area despite there being a black hole where funding used to be.

In terms of migration Croydon is a fascinating area. This is because it is where the Home Office is located, thus making it the town that all asylum seekers will have to pass through upon arrival in the UK. A large proportion of the asylum seeking population in Croydon are unaccompanied minors, often trafficked to the UK with promises of employment and a better quality of life. What they encounter is a stark contrast; no possibility of employment and an option of a detention centre or a foster home until their 18th birthday, when they will be sent back to their country of origin.

To conclude his week long visit, Hamid ran a drama workshop with a group of 15 young refugees. In one room we had Portugese, Urdu, Swahili, Farsi, Polish and English speakers so Hamid encouraged everyone to speak in their own language. The participants created an impromptu performance based on the sentence ‘My light is breaking down’. Once again, focusing on encouraging a sense of play, Hamid put on some classical music, gave the group their title and let them act out whatever felt natural to them for 45 minutes.

 

Olivia Furber, 2011