CCTA Plays Featured:

Pond Life

by Elyne Quan

Show Links

• Climate Change Theatre Action – https://www.climatechangetheatreaction.com/
• Prague Quadrennial (PQ) – https://pq.cz/
• Prague Quadrennial Symposium – https://pq.cz/pq2027/symposium-performing-exhibitions-curating-scenographies/
• Clémence Farrell – https://museomaniac.com/
• Dear Wendy – https://www.summerhallarts.co.uk/event/dear-wendy/2026-05-04/
• The Black Diamonds and the Blue Brazil – https://lyceum.org.uk/events/black-diamonds-and-the-blue-brazil
• Výstaviště/The Industrial Palace – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%BDstavi%C5%A1t%C4%9B_Praha

Transcript

IIan Hello and welcome back to podcast thirteen.

Vanesa I’m Ian and I’m Vanesa and we’re coming to you from Prague.

Ian This is episode eight. And we’ve just attended the Prague Quadrennial Symposium, performing exhibitions, curating scenographies which took place from the thirteenth to the fifteenth of April at Archa in Prague.

Vanesa seventy plus speakers, five thematic panels, seven flash talk series, and the whole thing was framed around the lead up to Pca’s sixtieth anniversary edition in twenty twenty seven.

Ian We gave a flash talk of our own. We caught an extraordinary keynote, and we also, well, we’ll get to that end up seeing a bit more of the Czech health system than we probably would have planned otherwise. I also got to spend some time doing a site visit, as I’m part of the curatorial teams for the US and Canada for the next edition of the PQ

Vanesa So let’s dive in. Right. For listeners who haven’t come across the Prague Quadrennial before, and I know that you are very familiar with it. Ian, can you give us a quick sentence or just a brief summary of what it actually is and why the symposium for next year matters so much?

Ian So the Prague Quadrennial or the PQ, is the world’s largest event dedicated to scenography and performance design. It is, as the name implies, hosted in Prague every four years. And twenty twenty seven is going to be the sixtieth anniversary edition. Bit of a milestone. The symposium is part of the Preprogramming building towards PQ twenty twenty seven. The theme for it is Performing Exhibitions, Curating Scenographies, and it sits right at the overlap of exhibition making and performance making. And because we’re a little over a year before we’ll get to the actual quadrennial itself, it’s a good time for the global scenography community to check in. It’s also an opportunity for those who will be curating for each of the different countries that are bringing work to the PQ works differently everywhere. But it’s the opportunity to do a site visit of the facilities where the exhibition will be taking place in twenty twenty seven, which is also worth noting. It’s a return to Výstaviště and the Industrial Palace, where it hasn’t been since twenty nineteen, and in twenty ten it had the PQ had to be moved for the twenty eleven one because there was a fire that burned down one of the wings, which is nearing the end of its restoration. We got to see it’s still under construction, but luckily the PQ won’t be the first event going into it. The symposium was held at ARCHA, one of a notable theater here in Prague, which is an iconic venue for experimental and international work in spending our time at the symposium. What were some of the threads that you noticed running through those three days that felt most alive?

Vanesa Yeah. So for me, this is quite new. And what I could gather was that there are lots of passionate people from various different organisations and departments. The it felt like there was a lot of buzz in the room. It was there was talk about sort of like working with with living like the living Archives, you know, scenography as something that is alive and, you know, more than just something that is like more like an admin job that you file away. There were some talks about lighting, there was some talk about sound, about some curated performances for next year that were involving sound, which were very exciting. New approaches to exhibition. There was a full keynote on immersion, which we’re going to get into in a minute. And then there were perspectives that moved beyond the human. So how scenography relates to the non-human actors, the ecologist, the environments. And this is where our flash talk was about, you know, how scenographic involvement, you know, goes beyond, you know, it takes part within the venue itself.

Ian Yeah. On Tuesday afternoon, we gave our flash talk. It’s just a ten minute talk, part of one of the seven series that ran through the symposium. Our talk is called The Venue as scenographic Apparatus, Curating Infrastructure Absence and Performance, where we were talking about how scenography isn’t the only thing that happens on stage. It’s it’s shaped by all this unseen infrastructure, which we as visually oriented show makers ourselves are thinking about all the time when we’re running a venue, who programs the venue, who funds it and who gets it, and who gets filtered out, are all parts of what you see there, and therefore also part of what that aesthetic, what that scenography ends up being, what that built environment ends up being. So we sort of see venue thirteen, and we’re talking about the venue as a case study and reframing venue making as a scenographic practice.

Vanesa So the concept of absence was something that we pointed out as well. Is that something that you would like to discuss a little bit more about how it is actually of benefit to be able to acknowledge and work with the concept of having absence within the venue.

Ian Yeah. Well, I think that, you know, absence isn’t a lack. It can often be a decision like to think about it. It’s not about what we don’t have, but what we’re taking away to allow us to be able to move ahead. It can reduce scale, which needs to requires the artist to think about necessity and what the specific choices are and what the core of the concept is that like, you know, just because something is a smaller scale or fringe scale, as we deal with a lot, it’s not a lack of ambition or failure of ambition. Right? I wonder if there are some of those points that also resonated with you coming out of that.

Vanesa So one of the points that we did in our presentation was that we have having control of the venue and having the. The design allows us to have slower tempos and resist the. The more faster, bigger, quicker pressure of the large festivals. To have the luxury to dictate your own pace is good both for the audience and also for the people that work within the venue. It encourages more appreciation, it gives a breather, it encourages time and space for mental mental health. So this is something that we would like our venue and more venues to start taking into consideration. And we are aware that in the world that we live in, we have to always have a really quick changeovers and just, you know, what’s the next show and what’s the next thing and what’s the next set. But if we do take that minute to slow down, we will be able to create a better, a better production, and the audience will actually feel it. I do believe that the experience of the venue and the experience of the show start way beyond the curtain rises.

Ian Yeah, I think it has impacts on sustainability you are extracting less. So there’s less waste. There’s less carbon. Just from a metrics point of view, all the points that you just mentioned in terms of, you know, people being people being just more humane as an apparatus, it matters for accessibility. Having that sort of pace in some smaller spaces that are physically like barrier free, but also offer a lot of support in terms of where people might need, you know, supports around not just those, those physical barriers, but also, you know, in terms of relaxed performance, that this, this slowing things down and thinking about how you’re setting up the systems to encourage these as well. And that this really opens up a more democratic festival that, you know, is primed for better global representation. Even though the Edinburgh Festival is the largest arts festival in the world, it sort of suffers from the fact that it there’s so much going on. The pace is so breakneck. It is so expensive. Trying to figure out how to do everything is so complicated that if you’re coming from far away, if you can’t invest that time, your own time in that, and no one’s going to make it apparent for you, it can really eliminate it as a possibility for a lot of people. And that’s something that we’re trying to work against so that that type of work can exist. So that that and that type of scenography that type of thoughtfulness can exist in that as well. How did people end up responding to the talk? I came back in conversations afterwards.

Vanesa So after the talk where we had a, you know, the whole there were other talks after me. And then we took this break. And in the break we had a few people approach me and they said that how what we are doing is very aligned with the PQ twenty twenty seven. We’ve had people with other venues that they actually run venues themselves, and they’re coming to me to say that they resonated with with our flash talks, because that’s how, you know, they see their venue and how these are changes that they want to implement into their lives. And then there were some interest from other organizations and artists, organizations that didn’t know that this is something that twenty thirteen can do outside of the venue itself. So there were some inquiries about some production and uncertain shows that they’re actually quite complex and they like that. Our point of view was very experimental and very enthusiastic. And there was this, this element of like, we enjoy the journey and the discovery. And then they came to me and they said they haven’t heard something or someone speak in that kind of enthusiastic tone. And they said, well, I have a show. It seems really complex. Would you mind having a chat with with us? So I believe that it was a really good opportunity as well to show that, you know, you have to get together with the people that resonate with your show and with your venue, just so that you can get the energy and, you know, get the shows created.

Ian One of the things that I know about the symposium, that they weren’t live streaming it, they were recording everything and they’re planning on making most, if not all, of the program available for people to view later, perhaps in preparation for them getting to the headspace of coming into the exhibition in twenty twenty seven. So once that’s out, we’ll make sure to share those things. And so you can see it even if you weren’t able to be with us in Prague this last week. That said, one of the things that really stood out was the keynote, which was Clémence Farrell talking about immersion. It the symposium opened on Monday morning with her keynote. She’s a French scenographer designer, exhibition architect. She’s based in Paris. And it was her first time presenting here in Czechia.

Vanesa So I did a little bit of research on her, and basically she trained in Paris, and she founded her studio in two thousand and eight. And she has had more than seventy exhibition projects, including the thirty six Saint Paulo Biennial and the twenty twenty four Biennial of Contemporary African Art in Dakar. She had her work shown at the Louvre, Abu Dhabi, the Grand Palais Versailles and many, many more prominent places. And in twenty sixteen, she won the award for a European educational program for Nature Detective at the Stuttgart Natural History Museum. Now, the keynote was called immersion in the Exhibition space. What does immersion actually mean in her practice, as opposed to how we throw the word around? In XR or in marketing contexts?

Ian Yeah, for for Pharrell, it’s not just a special effect. Immersion is a dynamic scenographic strategy. It’s really about how the space positions the audience physically, emotionally, and politically. So she’s drawing from these concrete projects across Descartes, the Louvre, and Abu Dhabi that show memorial work. It’s just showing that immersion is a way of shaping social and political engagement, not just dazzling people, not just creating, you know, a pleasant environment to be in. But it does have this like curatorial view of your thinking about how somebody’s engaging with that space and how they’re moving through that space actively for it. And this is, this is interesting. We’re going to be having some immersive work within the venue this year. And it’s something that we encourage people to come to us with because we like to solve that problem even in the limited space that we have. But that other sort of topic that we focus on about AI, we’re where. Vanesa, can you tell us where that entered the conversation? Because the symposium had a strong digital technologies thread running through it. How did you see AI coming across this conversation when we’re talking about performance and space?

Vanesa Yeah. So I believe that this is more of a summary of my personal view on AI, because I did not see AI itself as a topic. In contrast to the two previous conferences we’ve just been to, which was in Toronto and Malta, which were it was a prominent topic at the symposium. It didn’t feel like it was, and it felt like there were uses of digital technologies, but there wasn’t a strong mention of AI tools themselves. I think there was sort of like a silent mention of like, AI is allowing for things to happen, such as connection, bringing collaborations together. But it didn’t see a particular talk about, you know, this is what I’ve achieved with digital AI, but I do feel like the immersive concepts are increasingly, increasingly intersect with generative AI. So immersion risks becoming spectacle without the depth when tools outpace the intent. I believe that as an analogy, a feral framing gave us a useful counterweight. So the immersion was a curatorial decision. So instead of it being something technical, it’s something that the artists will have to. We have the power to decide how do to create that immersion and how. You know, basically, we did speak about this in episode seven, again, Malton, Toronto. So the same question came about, but without necessarily AI. So what is the intent outside of the tool that you’re using?

Ian Yeah. I think that that’s a really important thing to consider. Well, with any tool, but, you know, with AI becoming so prevalent. So what we’re seeing, one of the things that I noticed in, you know, we’ve done some testing of various platforms that are meant for artists. I’m actively involved in research that is looking at creating tools for artists that is, you know, using AI like to allow them to use it in a way that centers their voice as opposed to, you know, giving it a prompt and then just getting an output to sort of black box that we referred to before. And it’s interesting to see that it’s like, it can be really exciting to use a generative platform and just like, come up with a random prompt or to ask it even to prompt itself. And then you come up with something that feels very finished. But oftentimes there’s not like you’re saying, there’s not the intent, there’s not necessarily the soul behind it. You’re not trying to create something specific. And it actually is a really difficult tool to use when you’re trying to be specific. And trying to create something that is, you know, has integrity with your intent for it. And I think that’s a, that’s an interesting thing that we see sort of weaving through things as well is that it can help you get to some places, but it’s really hard to get it to. It can’t replace the artists. And it’s actually where I think a lot of the interesting controversy and the conversations happening around how people are, you know, on the business side of creative industries, like we’re going to replace a bunch of the artists that we have, quote unquote artists that we have quote unquote artists, but, you know, could be involved in the creative process at any step with generative AI, etc. and then we’ve heard tales of people being like, oh no, no, no, we have to hire them back because it didn’t actually do what we wanted to do. Because you need the artist’s hand. You need the like the human hand in thinking about that, especially when you’re, you know, making work for other humans as well. But yeah, on the subject of humans helping humans, should we tell them about our detour?

Vanesa I think, I think we should, Ian, because, you know, not everything went to plan on this trip.

Ian It’s true. You are lovely audience. Maybe you’re thinking these folks get around quite a bit, and this is a lot of the work that we’re doing together. I also travel for other projects on my own, and it caught up with me and more specifically, my ears. So the the ongoing cabin pressure adjustments, especially having recently had a cold time of year for that, ended up with a pretty bad ear infection on this trip. So while the symposium carried on, I got some bonus experiences with the Czech health system up close at the Motol University Hospital, which I have to say was fairly efficient. And I was impressed. I got very excellent care and it was very easy to come in there. They have an entire foreigners department. Once I was able to find it the first time, which was a little harder to do while suffering, but then it just became very familiar for it. So past me was glad that there was a sense that it was there. Thanks to Vanesa for helping orient me, especially in my encumbered state, before I started getting treated for it. And yeah, I walked away with a virtual pharmacy of antibiotics and.

Vanesa You got everything. I got one of everything.

Ian One of everything. And I shouldn’t have to worry about any infections for a little while as that clears my system. But I got cleared to travel a few days later. Had to extend the trip a little bit and, uh, But.

Vanesa But you’re better now.

Ian I’m better now. I’m good. Yes. Almost there. I think I’m nearly one hundred percent there, but good to travel.

Vanesa Good to fly.

Ian But while we’ve been in Prague, Edinburgh has kept going. So here’s a quick roundup of things that you can still catch. And, Vanesa, I hope that you’ll be able to tell us a little bit more about these, because you’re the one who’s going to be in town.

Vanesa Yes, I’m going to do my absolute best to catch a couple of these. So in Summerhall we have Dear Wendy by Cat Johnson. We that will happen on the third and fourth of May. So it’s an autobiographical piece written and performed. So it fits well with a kind of embodied personal storytelling that we always highlight in the podcast. And then we have the Black Diamonds and the Blue Brazil. That’s at the Royal Lyceum Theatre between the eighth and twenty third of May. I’m quite excited about this one. This is a world premiere stage adaptation by Gary McNair, with original music performed live by Rick Ross from Deacon Blue. The story of Sally returning to Cowdenbeath for the for her father’s funeral and then being drawn back into the world of the local football club. A nice reminder that Scottish theatre is making a lot of work right now about community, the memory and, you know, going back to the place.

Ian Yeah, I know that there’s a possibility that we might be able to do a little bit of work in Edinburgh in preparation for a campfire return. We’ve got some scanning to do and some development to do. So it’s there’s a possibility, if my ears allow me, that, I will get to see some of them. But I hope that you’ll be able to share some of that out, either here on the podcast or through your channels, through the arts.

Vanesa Absolutely. I will definitely there’s a few things that I have to say on the list, and I will report back.

Ian As always, we’re getting to the point in the podcast where we want you to join us for a reading from the climate change theater action.

Vanesa This short plays continue to bring together voices from around the world responding creatively to the climate crisis.

Ian For this episode’s CCTA reading, I’ve picked something that reminds me of the script that I used for a workshop at the twenty twenty three Prague Quadrennial. I don’t have access to that one right now, but it involved a tree that somebody was interacting with, and we had done a workshop around how to communicate with that tree, and the tree happened to be in a pond. So that’s how we got to this one. This selection is Pond Life by Elyne Quan She’s a Chinese Canadian writer, actor, dramaturg and director for theatre, TV Interactive media. She’s currently based in Toronto, Ontario. Her plays have been produced across Canada and internationally, including works for adult audiences as well as T theatre for young audiences. For those who don’t know. Her TV credits have been seen around the world. She received her MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU at the Tisch School of the Arts and her BA Honours in Drama from the University of Alberta. In commenting on Pondlife, she wrote. To write Pondlife, I pulled together research I had previously conducted for a web series about critical environmental issues and cast it with the humble frog, the quote unquote canary in the coal mine of sensitive habitats around the world. I wanted to explore not only the struggle of life under environmental threat, but how interconnected we are with our world and with each other. While these characters may seem powerless, they, like us, can find strength in community. There are two characters. There is Pat a frog, and Harper another frog. The setting is a small pond.

Vanesa Can I be Pat?

Ian You can be pet and I’ll be Harper.

Vanesa Okay. I will do the commentary as well.

Ian Okay.

Vanesa Lights up. Pat and Harper sit on a log staring at their pond. I mean, have you ever seen it like this?

Ian No, never.

Vanesa It’s a travesty, is what it is.

Ian You said it.

Vanesa A travesty.

Ian Look, you don’t have to convince me.

Vanesa I mean, look at it. There used to be water up to here, and it looked good. You know, not clear, but healthy. Not this sludge that it is now. I know the plans, the weeds. They’re choking everything out.

Ian Oh, I know.

Vanesa And they expect us to live here. Raise our young here in this swamp.

Ian The smell is the worst.

Vanesa That’s rot is what it is. All that algae.

Ian It gives me a rash.

Vanesa No kidding.

Ian Look, I developed a skin condition.

Vanesa Geez, that looks sore. They give you anything for that?

Ian That’s the point? We’re in the stuff every day. It’ll just come back.

Vanesa If that’s what’s happening to you on the outside. I don’t want to even know what’s happening to you on the inside.

Ian Did you hear what happened about. Did you? Did you hear about Pete?

Vanesa No. What happened?

Ian Tumors.

Vanesa Oh, jeez.

Ian Bad all over him. Nothing they can do.

Vanesa Jeez. He’s our age, you know. No, he had the same spring we had.

Ian Oh, I know.

Vanesa Pete can’t believe it used to be the thing that would kill one of one of us. Would, like, be birds or snakes or winter.

Ian Or abductions.

Vanesa Or abductions. Right now it’s tumors. Who knows what it’s going to be like for our kids or our kids? Kids? We’re already seeing weird stuff. No offense. You know, I know you love your kids.

Ian I do.

Vanesa But the extra limbs, the ambiguous sex organs.

Ian What is that got to do with the pond?

Vanesa Everything. Look around. Each year is warmer. Warmer water means more algae. More algae means less water. Less water means All the junk that is flowing into our pond is more concentrated each year. Our eggs hatch in that water. Next thing you know, the pond will be dry out completely and it will just be this dried husks baking in the sun.

Ian Take it easy.

Vanesa This is our home. We’ve been here for generations. Oh, this whole thing makes me so mad. It burns me up inside.

Ian Don’t get so worked up.

Vanesa Where would we go? How does this end? We’re dying here. Pats cheek starts to puff out.

Ian Hey, you all right? Slow down. You’re breathing too hard. Nice and easy. Come on.

Vanesa I just I I.

Ian Hang on. Breathe.

Vanesa Harper looks around, spots a fly. Kills it and gives it to Pat.

Ian Here.

Vanesa What? No!

Ian Come on, take it. It’ll make you feel better.

Vanesa You sure? Harper nods. Pat eats the fly. Thanks.

Ian No sweat.

Vanesa No, I mean it. Times like this, you know, used to be you knew what life had in store for you. You knew what the seasons would be like, what to do year round, what to expect out of life.

Ian Predictable.

Vanesa Yeah, predictable. Now it’s all a mess. It’s like I don’t know what to do. From one day to the next. It’s all too much.

Ian Listen, all we can do is what we can do.

Vanesa What do you mean?

Ian I know it seems overwhelming, but what we are going to do. Roll over and die. No, we’ve got to keep on going. You know, my five hundred and seventh born came up to me the other day. Scared about the future. I tell her, you know, this pond, our lives, it’s all we got. We need to do what we can to make things better while we’re here. Even if it’s small and feels insignificant. It’s better than doing nothing or sitting around croaking about it. We may be humble creatures, but that’s no reason to not try. How else are things going to change? Keep things clean. Don’t waste food. Stay away from plastic if you can.

Vanesa That’s a tall order these days. That stuff’s a menace.

Ian And if we don’t have anything good to offer, get out of the way of the folks who do.

Vanesa Don’t be a jerk, though.

Ian Exactly.

Vanesa That’s good advice.

Ian Well, we’ll see if she takes it.

Vanesa You’ve got good kids. I have high hopes for the coming generations. They know what’s at stake. Harper Hilton of the fly offers it to Pat. Nah. I’m good. You have it.

Ian You sure?

Vanesa Pat nods. They look out at the pond. You’re a good friend, you know that?

Ian You do?

Vanesa Yep.

Ian Yep. End of play. Well, I think that that was a good choice for reminding me of the very specific Scenographic exploration that I did with a group of workshop participants in twenty twenty three. So thanks for taking that trip with us. I think with this trip for this symposium has really underlined for us is that scenography isn’t just what happens inside the frame. It’s also the venue, the infrastructure, the health system that patches you up and all the various areas that we visit that have been hosting visitors for thousands of years. Prague has long been a meeting place here at the center of Europe. It’s one of the reasons that the peak is here. It’s one of the allowed meeting places that the communists would allow those from either side of the Iron Curtain to, to meet up with each other. All scenography away. All sets a scene.

Vanesa And as we head towards the peak twenty twenty seven and our own twenty twenty six season at venue thirteen, those questions about infrastructure, emotion and absence will keep shaping how we program.

Ian Thanks for listening.

Vanesa And we’ll see you next time.

Ian Thank you for listening to this episode of podcast thirteen. If you enjoyed our conversation, make sure to hit subscribe so that you never miss an update. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts. We’d love it if you could take a moment and leave us a review. It helps more people discover the podcast and join the community. As we are starting a campaign for our vegan food truck outside the venue. That’s especially useful to us so that we exist in this very specific niche as a hybrid vigor and climate theater producing venue in Edinburgh. We need to make all the friends that we can. If you’ve got thoughts, questions or ideas for future episodes, we’d love to hear from you. You can reach us at podcast at venue dot com. And of course, the socials at venue thirteen Fringe Hour back episodes and transcripts are on our website at venue thirteen dot com. The music you heard through the episode is by Dusty Decks, which we get through Epidemic Sound. We read Pondlife by Elyne Quan as this episode’s selection. Until next time. Thanks again for tuning in. We’ll be back with another episode soon.