CALL FOR ARTISTS – MAYFEST 2009

BRISTOL-BASED ARTIST SHOWCASE AND MAYFEST MARKET
3 ¬– 4 MAY 2009


Next year's Mayfest is now planned for the 1st – 16th May, and to jump-start the festival we are planning to take over Bristol Old Vic with a jam-packed two-day local artist showcase.
This is a platform event designed to present a broad programme of work which celebrates and promotes the richness and variety of Bristol's performance community in a high-profile and playful context.

There are a number of different spaces available, and we are happy to consider work at various stages of development from early ideas to finished pieces, although production and tech time will be limited, so please bear this in mind when proposing work.

Alongside the live programme, we are also planning to hold a 'Mayfest Market'. Whether you're performing at the showcase or not, we want as many artists and companies as possible to pitch stalls in the foyer of Bristol Old Vic (harking back many years to when the building was a fruit-and-veg market!). You can decorate your stall, promote your work, shamelessly plug future events and generally introduce new audiences, promoters and producers to your work. In fact, you can use your stall for whatever you want, as long as it's imaginative and legal. And once the showcase is done, we'd love you to leave your stalls in situ throughout the festival. It'll be like Albert Square – only without Pat Butcher.

So if you're interested in being involved in the showcase, please send a brief proposal (500 words max) with an overview of your creative practice and an idea of what sort of tech support/space you would need to info@mayfestbristol.co.uk. If you are proposing a performance, please also indicate if you would be interested in having a pitch at the market, and any ideas of what you would like to do with your stall. There will be setting-up time on Saturday 2nd May during the day, so please make sure you are available over this time.

We are also interested to hear from people who are not proposing a performance but who would like to be involved in the event either by having a stall or through some other ingenious way which you're welcome to propose to us.

It is our intention to be as inclusive as possible for this showcase event but unfortunately there is limited space and so we cannot guarantee to accommodate everyone. Please note this is an unpaid opportunity.

PLUS
There are also a couple of potential slots for more full-scale finished work. So if you are a theatre-maker currently based in Bristol or the South West and you have a finished show you would like to propose for the Mayfest programme, please email Kate Yedigaroff on kate@mayfestbristol.co.uk. Please note that priority will be given to work that has not been seen in Bristol before.

Deadline 5pm Monday 22 December.

Mayfest is produced in collaboration with Bristol Old Vic.
www.mayfestbristol.co.uk