“I wish we didn’t have to suspend our disbelief so often”, says Francis Alexander, Artistic Director of Chelsea Theatre, who has overseen the development of performance platform Sacred from a month to a year-long season of work. Engaging with performance and live art through theatrical tropes is a rather unique mode of encountering this type of work, and Chelsea Theatre has been paving the way for such cultural discussions and formal developments that seek to bring seemingly disparate worlds together. So the question of suspension of disbelief is a rather playful pointer towards the ways in which Sacred might be relating to such work. The very title of the platform seeks to engage with expectations and assumptions surrounding performance practice, but also winks at the ways in which we think of cultural constitutions.

A year-long season of work means more infrastructure, curatorial scope and an ambitious engagement with locality. Since his directorship at the Theatre, Francis Alexander has attempted to not only build a local community surrounding risk-taking work, but also consider ways in which discussion might be stimulated and issues debated. Below we speak to him about his ambitions for this year’s Sacred, and the changes he has observed in performance and live art over the past few years.

Run Riot: Sacred first started as a season of live art and performance work, yet it’s returned as a year-long season of work. We wondered where the name of the platform originally came from, and how you see it fitting and evolving as an integral part of Chelsea Theatre’s programming.

Francis Alexander: I guess contemporary performance has the edge when it comes to reflecting the world as it is today, and that’s Chelsea’s role. We’re the Community Centre for the World’s End Estate and, I hope, always will be. Real people dealing with real issues.  “Performing the Real” was the title of a symposium we ran with Brut in Vienna a couple of years ago, and it still determines our agenda. Now more than ever the arts have the job of making their case with clarity and inspiration; Sacred carries on asking us all to reflect on the issues we hold dear. The move to year-long programming engages with stretched wallets that can’t afford to return several times in one pay packet.

Run Riot: Sacred’s programme engages with both emerging and contemporary artists. Last year the season presented work by artists such as Dominic Johnson (Departure: An Experiment in Human Salvage), Gerard Bell and Karen Christopher (So Below) as well as Sian Ni Mhuiri and Vicki Sutherland (Tattooing- The Smoke). This year you’ve got a strong mix of body based work, political practice and playful experimentation, from Peggy Shaw and Sheila Ghelani to Stacy Makishi and Natasha Davis. What are the curatorial imperatives behind the season? What kinds of work are you interested in programming and how do you approach this?

Francis Alexander: We love presenting and commissioning artists who make us challenge our view of the world and the way art can be made. Social engagement hits the headlines at Sacred this year with Richard Dedominici, Sheila Ghelani and Amy Sharrocks. They’re cutting edge artists who are making the work with local people. Under their rigorous eye everyone’s an artist. 

Run Riot: This year’s Sacred is particularly interested in examining process, in making it visible. How is this present across the programme?

Francis Alexander: Well I guess there’s no better way than to work with the artists like Amy, Richard and Sheila, who put equality and respect first. I hope you get to see the results of what will be three very different but fascinating processes.

Run Riot: Part of Sacred this year are a series of collaborations with non-professionals in the local area. What is the role of community within Sacred?

Francis Alexander: It’s key. We can’t be a community centre and hold our heads up high without it. And that means not compromising on the quality if it’s to be successful. Which with Richard, Sheila and Amy, it will be.

Run Riot: What do you think the role of risk is in contemporary performance? Do you feel this has been constantly re-appropriated and re-constituted culturally? And how do you see that across the programme?

Francis Alexander: Artists at Sacred re-invent the form of theatre every time they work here.  And that’s as it should be. I dread seeing another new play using the same old forms and processes. Theatre of value uses so much more these days than the same old tried and trusted routines. Shakespeare will always be a touchstone for me and many, but now I need more.  European, global theatre practices engage with risk so much more than some of our more megalithic/neolithic national institutions. I guess they feel they can’t afford to. Pity, and that’s where we come in. Theatres like Chelsea, and the Spill Festival [read our interview with artistic Director Robert Pacitti here], and CPT [Camden People's Theatre, read our interview with the co-Directors Jenny Paton and Brian Logan here] act as the research and development wing of theatre. Risk dominates – if you doubt this – come and see Amy Sharrock’s Invitation to Fall in Worlds End Place in June.  

Run Riot: In 2011 you hosted a symposium titled Being Seen, Being Heard, inviting artists, scholars and curators to consider their collaboration in shaping the contexts in which artistic work might be presented and understood. This year you’ve introduced Wishful Wednesdays, a platform that invites a range of artists to explore and discuss the potentialities of future practice, from Franko B to Lois Weaver, Mem Morrison and Rajni Shah. Can you talk a bit about Sacred’s involvement with discourse and consideration of cultural production of performance and live art?

Francis Alexander: We don’t do enough of it! I was excited by the first discussion - on his hopes and fears led by Franco - I knew it would be fiery and passionate. Other artists won’t be as political - but there'll still be fireworks! We need to regroup around what puts us in theatres in the first place, and allowing our audience to engage in debate is going to be a lot of very necessary fun.

Run Riot: How do you feel the position of live art has changed within the wider cultural network in London since Sacred first started? What do you think has shifted, and what status do you think it holds? How do you see Sacred fitting within this?

Francis Alexander: Well thanks to the work of Robert Pacitti, and others, the Barbican is leading the way for the big institutions to engage with these kinds of sublime risk- taking. But I’m still not seeing enough interdisciplinary work on stages still devoted to the craft of acting.  I wish we didn’t have to suspend our disbelief so often, and now in these not merely challenging, but frankly disturbing times. We need artists to take the artist-led movement by the short and curlies and yank it into the new century, creating new spaces and new ways of seeing work. Performance Space in Hackney Wick is an example, but it’s got to continue happening all around us, despite lack of funds. 

Interview with Artistic Director Francis Alexander

SACRED
A season of contemporary performance
Chelsea Theatre, 7 Worlds End Place, London SW10 0DR
27th March - July 6th
For more info and tickets chelseatheatre.org.uk
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