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THEATRE
COMPANY BACKGROUND
Northern6 are a theatre company based in York compromised of six artists from around the north of England. Using Oral history as a starting point, Northern6 aims to tell stories from the past in interesting ways whilst paying homage and respect to the source material. Using strategies such as rule bound play and task based strategies they are then able to convert the stories and the events into a fragment of performance material. Coming from six distinct backgrounds in theatre, the company pools all of their talent and enthusiasm for making performance in order to create something truly unique using aspects as wide ranging from scenography to song. Their maiden project will focus around the soldiers who landed at sword beach as part of the D-Day landings in Normandy and will create work with this as a stimulus.
ABOUT US
Ashley Marshall - Ashley Marshall is a Theatre maker based in York but originally from Scarborough.
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Ashley's work focuses upon the deconstruction of narrative theory telling stories, through the post dramatic form. His work often involves a great deal of personal narrative and reflection on his own life bringing a working class drive to his work. Exploring the relationship between text and performance, Ashley creates work that is often writerly in form allowing his audience to reflect and be a part of the performance moment.
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Collaboration is at the heart of Ashley's practice, and he sees this as a way to drive performance material into new territories that solo performance just can't achieve. Working with his collaborative partner Joshua Thompson they create work that responds to their own life experiences.
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Ashley takes influences from companies such as Forced Entertainment, Gob Squad, Frantic Assembly and Reckless Sleepers, creating work that is stenographically pleasing.
Billy Marston - Billy Marston is a York based theatre make who's roots and interests lie in pushing physical boundaries and capitalising on the mechanical beauty of the human body.
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Billy has been involved in theatre making since around the age of 12, and since then has performed all over the UK with a youth theatre company who predominantly focused on story telling and play style performances. However, Billy's personal engagement within theatre has progressed into the exploration of aesthetics through motion and direct physical contact.
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Billy was born and raised in West Yorkshire, and in his spare time enjoys living a healthy and active lifestyle - including the gathering influence from the vast countryside and natural valleys which surround his family home.
James Wardlaw - James Wardlaw a York based theatre maker and performance artist. Originally from Newcastle, his work is focused on the relationship between locations and time and how they can tell unconventional stories. He explores locations such as Train Stations and monuments and how their individual spaces are interacted with and what narratives come from this. James' work and research also focuses on time and whether anything is permanent in today's world and is explored ethnographically through mediums such as time lapse film making. A great deal of James' work is influenced by people he has met in his life as well as his own personal narrative. His work is inspired by artists such as Pina Bausch and Joseph Beuys. As well as his practice James is also interested in performing and writing text as a response to locations or people he has met.
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James creates work using techniques such as ritual, time based improvisation and task based strategies. Once the material is created he then contextualises the work in relation to practice. After this James puts rules in place and plays around with his material in order to perfect and play with the work. As well as his own practice James is also a keen director of musical theatre and a facilitator in school and community settings.
Joshua Thompson - Joshua is a 22 year old theatre maker and performer from Bradford, West Yorkshire. He is keen on primarily applying reflection of his personal life, stories and events into his practice. He thrives to bring a fearless and bold style into his practice. He uses slapstick and clowning within his work as devices to bring out the tenderness and innocence within themes he works with. Beginning with a theme, event or story he is eager to create work that predominantly focuses on an agenda that provokes social reflection. He uses pastiche as a tool during his devising process of experimentation, making leaps, trying and failing and writing his work. Joshua is playful when making work and is ambitious to progress and remain committed to create empowering and bold theatre.
Events and memories in Joshua's life have definitely shaped the way he works. From growing up in Bradford before moving to York to study his degree in theatre, the city he was raised in has come under a lot of scrutiny but he see's the best in where he comes from and reflects the place and people into his work. He applies the countryside near where he lives, his football team, his family and favourite places into his practice so he is always reminded of the place that made him the person he is today.
Lana Cowings - Lana Cowings is a performer artist and theatre maker originally from Manchester, but now based in York. She is passionate about scenography and theatrical aesthetic and how a space can be transformed into something that it's not. She has confidence in creating unique and innovative ways in which to portray messages to an audience. Poetry, song and performance writing are also prominent features throughout her creation of work.She is influenced by artists such as Hollie McNish and Bryony Kimmings and draws from her own experiences and the experiences around her. Throughout her work she aims to express fragments of fact, feeling and emotion, through the use of the body and by being her authentic self.
Thomas Gardner - Thomas is a practitioner, designer, technician and facilitator from Doncaster, South Yorkshire. His primary interests are in the scenographic elements of a performance whether that be performance imagery or the scenic design of the piece. In his solo practice he aims to bring movement into his work to explore the body as a tool to express emotion and action alike. Outside of the company Thomas is a freelance designer working with numerous companies and theatres in and around York. His work also focuses on the visual and he is currently exploring the relationship between projection and performance bringing footage from historic events into his work.
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He allows his personal history into his work to influence his thinking around subjects in his most recent work 'Home Is' he explored the relationships in his life that he felt were important in what made him, through movement and physical theatre allowing the use of language to become redundant in the performance.
CURRENT PROJECTS
Project Sword
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Since September 2016 and through a commission with York St John University for the Create Festival 2017. Northern6 have been creating a show surrounding the events of D-Day, by exploring stories and events that unfolded on June 6 1944, Project Sword finds fictional characters built through ethnographic research. Educating and informing audiences on the events of D-Day, not only over seas on the beaches themselves but the impact on the home front and the families and loved ones soldiers left behind. Through focusing on the British war effort the company took the decision to focus their research on Sword Beach, allowing for more detailed and precise research into a smaller minute by minute fragment of the overall picture of D-Day. Through utilising the skills of the company the project aims to be scenographic, allowing audience to visualise the stories and connect more personally with the characters and their stories.