clown teachers lab *applications now closed*
Join us for 3 days of workshops, discussions and big ideas as we explore the future of clowning
Hello! We are Holly Stoppit and Robyn Hambrook and we are looking for four established, UK-based clown teachers to join us in a 5-day clown teaching lab in February 2025.
The Clown Teachers Lab will take place from 17th-21st February 2025
We have an incredible opportunity to spend 5 days together in the countryside with a small group of established clown teachers at the exquisite Hawkwood Centre for Future Thinking near Stroud.
If you are a UK based clown teacher with a fair amount of experience of teaching clowning, then read on!
The Clown Teachers Lab will take place from 17th-21st February 2025
We have an incredible opportunity to spend 5 days together in the countryside with a small group of established clown teachers at the exquisite Hawkwood Centre for Future Thinking near Stroud.
If you are a UK based clown teacher with a fair amount of experience of teaching clowning, then read on!
the offer
Hawkwood have awarded us an artists’ residency to explore the following questions:
We are putting a group of diverse practitioners together who teach clowning in many different contexts. Holly is a clown-therapist, Robyn is an activist-clown, you might be a clown doctor or a humanitarian clown or you might be using clowning in another way…
We get a beautiful space to work in for 5 days, ridiculously delicious food ALL THE TIME, our own rooms and gorgeous grounds to roam and romp, all for FREE!
- What is the future of clowning in turbulent times?
- How can we use clowning to build community, empowerment, and resilience?
- How can we make our teaching methods more relevant, inclusive and accessible?
We are putting a group of diverse practitioners together who teach clowning in many different contexts. Holly is a clown-therapist, Robyn is an activist-clown, you might be a clown doctor or a humanitarian clown or you might be using clowning in another way…
We get a beautiful space to work in for 5 days, ridiculously delicious food ALL THE TIME, our own rooms and gorgeous grounds to roam and romp, all for FREE!
the plan
The plan is to spend the time together exploring our teaching practice through practical experimentation, play and discussion. We want the week to be nourishing and enlightening! We will create a spacious schedule with time to play, time to rest and time for each of us to bring an inquiry to the group. Maybe you have discovered something wonderful in your teaching practice that you'd like to share? Maybe you have a question you'd like support from the group to unpick?
It is so rare that we clown teachers get to gather in this way, behind closed doors. We want a space where we can be vulnerable, where we can play and learn, ask big and small questions and develop our skills and awareness as clown teachers in the modern age.
This could be the beginning of a new model of joined-up, collaborative peer support...
It is so rare that we clown teachers get to gather in this way, behind closed doors. We want a space where we can be vulnerable, where we can play and learn, ask big and small questions and develop our skills and awareness as clown teachers in the modern age.
This could be the beginning of a new model of joined-up, collaborative peer support...
money + eligibility
We have the Hawkwood residency confirmed - it is free for us all to attend - they will feed us and house us for those dates.
We don’t have any other money to cover travel expenses, so you would need to cover that, but there’s nothing more to pay once you’ve arrived.
To qualify for Hawkwood’s bursary, you need to be UK-based with a UK bank account and you need to be earning your living primarily as an artist.
We will be collectively documenting the week with photos, writing, film and artwork to share on with the wider clown community.
We don’t have any other money to cover travel expenses, so you would need to cover that, but there’s nothing more to pay once you’ve arrived.
To qualify for Hawkwood’s bursary, you need to be UK-based with a UK bank account and you need to be earning your living primarily as an artist.
We will be collectively documenting the week with photos, writing, film and artwork to share on with the wider clown community.
what happens next?
If you are available for the WHOLE TIME and up for it, email holly on [email protected] with a bit about you, your work and what draws you to this opportunity.
Image credit: Robyn and Holly in the good old days, during one of their Zoom Clown workshops
ABOUT ROBYN
Robyn is a Bristol-based director, teacher and performer. With over 20 years experience she is a passionate practitioner of clowning, physical theatre, circus and street arts. She has a MA in Circus Directing, a Diploma of Physical Theatre Practice and trained with a long line of inspiring teachers including Holly Stoppit, Peta Lily, Giovanni Fusetti, Bim Mason, Jon Davison, Zuma Puma, Lucy Hopkins and John Wright.
Over the past five years she has been exploring the meeting point of clowning and a deep desire to address the injustices in the world. This specialism has developed through her Masters Research ‘Small Circus Acts of Resistance’, on the streets and in protests with the Bristol Rebel Clowns and in research residencies with The Trickster Laboratory. Robyn’s Activist Clown research has led to collaborations with Jay Jordan (Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination, France), Clown Me In (Beirut), LM Bogad (US), Hilary Ramsden (Greece) and international Tricksters; ‘The Yes Men’ (US). During the pandemic in 2020, Robyn set up The Online Clown Academy with Holly Stoppit and developed a series of Zoom Clown Courses. Robyn’s research, started during her Masters, has been exploring the meeting point of clowning and activism, online, in the real world and with international collaborators. With this drive to explore political edges of her work she has also dived back into the world of the Bouffon; training with Jaime Mears, Bim Mason, Nathaniel Justiniano, Eric Davis, Tim Licata, Al Seed and the grand master Bouffon-himself; Philippe Gaulier. Keen to explore the intersection of clowning and politics, Robyn is driven to create collaborative, research spaces, testing and pushing the limits of the artform to create new knowledge and methodologies for her industry and strengthen partnerships for future work. Some of her most recent collaborations and teaching projects have included the Nomadic Rebel Clown Academy (5-day Activist Clown Training), The Laboratory of the Un-beautiful (Feminist Grotesque Bouffon Training for Womxn Theatre Makers) and the Clown Congress (annual gathering of clowns, activists & academics collectively exploring what it means to be a clown in this current era) |
Photo by HeardinLondon Photography
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