We’re pleased to announce that a plethora of School of Arts’ students and alumni are performing at this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Every year thousands of performers take to hundreds of stages all over Edinburgh to present shows for every taste. From big names in the world of entertainment to unknown artists looking to build their careers, the festival caters for everyone and includes theatre, comedy, dance, physical theatre, circus, cabaret, children’s shows, musicals, opera, music, spoken word, exhibitions, and events. The Festival runs from Friday 2 August to Monday 26 August 2019.

Performances by School of Arts’ students and alumni include:

• Birth, by Theatre Re, features BA (Hons) Drama and Theatre (2015) alumna Claudia Marciano.

Following a sell-out run at London International Mime Festival 2019, Theatre Re presents a powerful, poignant and uplifting visual theatre piece with live music exploring the bond between three generations of women, their shared loss and the strength they discover in each other. Emily is eight months pregnant when she reads her grandmother’s journal. As she delves into her family history, her sense of reality shifts, unveiling a legacy of unspoken tragedies and unconditional love.

Birth will run from Thursday 1 to Sunday 25 August at Pleasance Courtyard. Tickets for the show can be found here.

• Bismillah! An ISIS Tragicomedy, by Wound Up Theatre, features MDrama (2015) alumnus Elliot Liburd.

Radicalisation, disenfranchisement and the rock band Queen. Dean joined the army, ‘Danny’ joined ISIS. One’s from London; the other, Leeds. Bismillah! is their hour together in an Iraqi cell. Discussing Islamophobia, Wetherspoons and the increasing price of a standard meal deal, which circles an awful truth – they just want to go home. Fresh from a national tour, Pleasance run and sell-out 2018 VAULT Festival run, the Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award-shortlisted show returns, with its hilarious and compassionate look at modern Britain.

Bismillah! An ISIS Tragicomedy will run from Thursday 1 to Sunday 25 August at Underbelly, Cowgate. Tickets for the show can be found here.

• Boulder, by Half a String, is directed and designed by MDrama (2013) alumnus Peter Morton.

In this reimagining of the Greek myth, a beautiful mechanical puppet is doomed with the hopeless task of pushing a colossal stone up a hill. Trapped in an endless cycle, the man wrestles with his pointless existence, cursing the futility of life. Award-winning Half a String fuse transforming sets, puppetry and hand-drawn animation, all accompanied by live cello, atmospheric voices and original music.

Boulder will run from Thursday 1 to Saturday 17 August at Pleasance Courtyard – Forth. Tickets for the show can be found here.

• Genesis: The Mary Shelley Play, by Artists Collective Theatre, features BA (Hons) Drama and Film (2016) alumnus Luke Harding.

Lake Geneva, early summer, 1816. Genesis takes place in the living room of Diodati, Lord Byron’s villa, and the bedroom of Mary and Percy Bysshe Shelley’s villa. It stunningly portrays the nights of intrigue and titillation that inspired Mary Shelley to produce Frankenstein, exploring social stigmas that maintain a chokehold over human desires, even amongst the libertine upper classes. Genesis has a dark intensity that builds to a hair-raising finale and has received critical acclaim across Canada. The Edinburgh Fringe is its UK debut.

Genesis: The Mary Shelley Play will run from Thursday 1 to Monday 26 August 2019 at C Cubed. Tickets for the show can be found here.

• Gut Buddies, by Bacterial Factory, features Theatre Making alumnus Niall Fallon.

Come and join Brian and Karl in the intestines for a ridiculous physical comedy. Pick your side between the white blood cell and the parasitic worm, in their cartoonish fight for their habitat.

Gut Buddies will run from Friday 2 to Sunday 25 August 2019 at Sweet Novotel. Tickets for the show are available here.

• Knee Jerk is a new show from MDrama alumna Laura Lexx.

Star of Live at the Apollo, Laura Lexx is a ‘bouncy, bubbly stand up star’ (Telegraph) shining a hilarious light on how hard it is to be a good person these days. Can you change the world without offending anyone? Her sell-out 2018 show Trying was ‘a masterpiece’ (VoiceMag.uk) and earned her a prestigious Comedian’s Choice Award. Now, Lexx takes on society’s big issues… but come for jokes, not answers. It’s sure to be ‘stomach-achingly funny’ (Entertainment-Focus.com) and ‘another skilfully-constructed hour from an underrated performer’ (Fest).

Knee Jerk runs from Thursday 1 to Sunday 25 August 2019 at Gilded Balloon Teviot. Tickets for the show are available here.

• Talk, by Parrot Theatre Company, is directed by PhD in Drama by Research student Kasia Senyszyn.

Bethlem Royal Hospital, 1854. The criminal wing for the insane. Two doctors set out to reform patient treatment. They prefer conversation over punishment; they offer care, rather than restraint. But the Commission for Lunacy has other ideas. Two patients get caught in the crossfire as their radical plans unravel. Based on the life of Richard Dadd, this thought-provoking and stylish performance asks whether talk can provide a cure? Following a sell-out run at Marlowe Theatre, Parrot Theatre Company brings you an accessible production, captioned for those with hearing loss.

Talk runs from Sunday 11 to Saturday 17 August 2019 at C Cubed. Tickets for the show are available here.

• That’s What I Go to School For is a stand-up show by MDrama (2008) alumnus Tom Houghton.

Tom was sent to all-boys boarding school at age six. A world where ‘day kids’ are shunned and girls? None existent. But when in his second last year the school decided to go co-ed, everything was to change. The total Fringe sell-out, star of Comedy Central’s Roast Battle and ultra-privileged Tower of London resident, Tom Houghton lifts the controversial lid on the incubators responsible for producing many of our country’s leaders. With a little help from 00s pop sensation Busted.

That’s What I Go to School For runs from Thursday 1 to Sunday 25 August 2019 at Pleasance Dome. Tickets for the show are available here.

• The Noise Next Door have two shows at the festival this year: The Noise Next Door’s Really, Really Good Afternoon Show…Through Time and The Noise Next Door’s Comedy Lock-In. The group is made up of alumni Tom Livingstone (MA Contemporary Performance Practice, 2008), Sam Pacelli (MA Stand-Up Comedy, 2008), and Robin Hatcher (MA Stand-Up Comedy, 2013), with filmmaker Matt Grant (BA (Hons) in Film, 2003).

The Noise Next Door’s Comedy Lock-In takes places from Thursday 1 to Sunday 25 August 2019 at Pleasance Courtyard. Tickets for the show are available here.

The Noise Next Door’s Really Really Good Afternoon Show Through Time! takes places from Thursday 1 to Sunday 25 August 2019 at Gilded Balloon Teviot. Tickets for the show are available here.

• Brace of Spades is a cabaret and variety show by BA (Hons) Drama and Theatre (2015) alumnus Tom Brace.

Following a sold-out run at last years Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Tom Brace returns with a brand-new magic show for the whole family! Featuring Tom’s unique blend of comedy and magic, the show promises to have a little something for everybody.

Brace of Spades runs from Thursday 1 to Monday 26 August 2019 at Pleasance Dome. Tickets for the show are available here.

We wish all our student and alumni performers the best of luck with their shows.

Following another hugely successful and sold out Pint of Science Festival last month, the Kent Pint of Science Team are now hosting a talk by astronaut Tony Antonelli at 7.30pm on Wednesday 3rd July in the Sibson building on the Canterbury Campus.

Book your ticket now, and share Tony’s experiences of ‘piloting a NASA Space Shuttle into space’!

And of course do tell your friends, family and any partner organisations whose members might be interested.

Advance tickets only from pintofscience.co.uk

See you there!

Students from the MA in Curating, run by the Department of Art History, will open a new exhibition entitled ‘Catching Flies’, on Friday 7 June 2019 at the Studio 3 Gallery at the University of Kent.

‘Catching Flies’ will be an immersive exhibition exploring the theme of distractions. It will raise the questions; what are the consequences of being constantly distracted?  Can we function efficiently whilst simultaneously being distracted? How much does the omnipresent internet have to do with this and is a lot of what we see on the subject scaremongering? How great of an escape do distractions provide? And, is it even possible to find respite in such frenzy?

Each artwork in the exhibition explores different narratives surrounding the theme of distractions, whether it is in regards to the distractions we face through social media, the use of art as a distraction from reality or simply a musician being distracted from his practice.

Vanessa Giorgo, who is studying on the MA in Curating, explained the background: ‘This exhibition is the result of the collaborative and team effort of four Curating students, each one coming from completely different backgrounds, who managed to raise the issues regarding technology and aesthetics, and how habitual these have become within our collective consciousness.’

Elaborating on the theme of the exhibition, she said: ‘The invention of the Internet has been the one of the epochal shifts of late modernity. Its social, cultural and economic advantages? Immense. Children born after the new millennium cannot even imagine their life without it. Everything is made so easy, just with the touch of a keyboard and the hidden search algorithm. However, the Internet can also be something frustrating, distracting, something dark. Being part of the last generation which experienced the initial stages of our lives without the Internet, all four of us as a group have observed the differences of lives lived before and after.’

The artists featured in the exhibition will include: Alexander Benjamin, Maria Bogatyreva, Megan Boyle, Flora Bradwell, Benedict Drew, Martyna Pisorkz, Cristián Fernández Ocampo, Michal Raz, Connor Sansby, Ross Sinclair, Orfeo Taguiri and Magdalena Zoledz. The resulting collection will include an array of artworks from historic prints to video art, mixed media canvases and Social Media art.

‘This exhibition would not have been possible without the invaluable contribution of our artists,’ said Vanessa.

The exhibition will be open on Mondays-Fridays, 9am to 5pm, and will run until 31 July 2019.

There is an Instagram page for the exhibition here

We are delighted to announce the Gulbenkian Picks from our Drama and Theatre students’ summer festival of student work, to be performed in the Gulbenkian theatre on Tuesday 4 June 2019.

Two performances have been chosen, one representing the Stage 1 students taking DR339: Making Performance 2, and one from the Stage 3 students as the culmination of the module DR678: Creative Project.

Adam’s Birthday Party, by The Bald Sopranos, is the first chosen performance from our Stage 1 students. The ensemble have been experimenting with various performance practices and plays chosen from different moments in the 20th Century (including Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, Susan Glaspell’s The Verge, Eugene Ionesco’s The Bald Soprano and Caryl Churchill’s Cloud Nine).

From Stage 3, the Gulbenkian has chosen the show Toxxicc, by ensemble Britney’s Peers. Having graduated from University, Ally, Em, Shan and Josie reunite in their hometown. After getting kicked out of a party for drunken behaviour, the girls plonk themselves on a bus stop bench. In 40 minutes, the girls tackle sex, body image, infidelity, and last, and definitely least, BOYS!

The Gulbenkian is open to the public and seats 340. The show will be free, beginning at 7.30pm. For further details, please see the page here.