WHAT WE DO
Murmuration Arts is a participatory arts organisation with over 14 years experience delivering community engagement projects.
We focus on projects which adopt a co-creation approach – we create collaboratively with communities.
We connect with and build community through street theatre, site-responsive performance, participatory dance, music, reminiscence sessions, intergenerational workshops, cooking together, sharing stories, oral history projects and craft activities… and we love playing games!
We facilitate friendships and nurture an inclusive, safe space for women through gentle, fun games, and self-care activities, including singing, breathing and writing workshops.
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Nightlight Lullabies connects audiences through the universal experience of soothing a baby to sleep across the passage of time. A sound, light and performance installation inspired by research and creative workshops with local parents.
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Murmuration Arts’ new show The Owl & The Pussycat is available to tour now as an outdoor street show, walkabout or even in a pea-green boat!
Come and meet like-minded Mothers at our Mothers Circle held in Crawley.
Our space is for mothers to sit around a fire, have a chat, connect with other mums, nature and your own creativity. We invite you to make, read, sing, discuss, laugh, cry, eat and play, or whatever you want/need that day. There is always a warm cup of tea and welcome. During the colder months or if the activity demands it we sometimes move inside. Recently we met in a hut by Tilgate woods to write a Spoken Word piece, we have also made podcasts, written two Lullabies, made nature mobiles, cooked on the fire and walked in the woods together.
We are currently securing funding for our circle – watch this space for updates.
Funded by Arts Council England, Awards For All and Crawley Borough Council
Murmuration Social Distancing Club
Marion, Matthew and Laura host the Murmuration Social Distancing Club – sip a cup of tea, enjoy a slice of cake and we’ll play a few tunes to get you moving.
Matthew and Marion will choose a few of their favourite jazz tracks & teach a few simple steps, put the kettle on and we’ll all dance together. Featuring live music – a little ditty or two – from Laura and her miniature piano and guest dance slots from around the country.
Funding from the Coronavirus Community Support Fund, distributed by The National Lottery Community Fund, has helped us to light up your silver screens with music, dance and singing. Thanks to the Government for making this possible.
OUR VALUES
We are passionate about widening opportunities for people to engage in the arts. Our creative process involves in-depth research with communities, focusing on building & maintaining relationships. Each project we work on aims to create a unique shared experience, connecting communities & giving people a voice & platform on which to tell their stories.
The people we meet are the experts of their lives,
we start by listening to them.
We believe that by instilling a sense of ownership, by increasing confidence, social ties & social cohesion, communities feel a greater investment in their future. By sharing agency and the decision making process Murmuration Arts can empower individuals to develop their own artistic expression. As artists, we in turn seek to learn from the people we work with. Through social interaction and active participation we aim to improve the health and wellbeing for everyone involved.
Marion Duggan
Artistic Director
marion@murmurationarts.co.uk
Marion is the Artistic Director of Murmuration Arts. She believes that the communities we inhabit, the experiences we are exposed to and opportunities available to us shape and define who we are. Marion facilitates the creation of new networks to help connect individuals as they transition through stages of life. She works with existing communities to widen opportunities for people to engage in the arts. Often her work will involve in-depth research, focusing on building and maintaining relationships.
Read more...Matthew Black
Director
matthew@murmurationarts.co.uk
Matthew trained as an actor graduating from East 15 Acting School in 2002. Since then he has worked in television, film and theatre. He has held the position of director for The Ragroof Players, performed as part of a comedy dance duo ‘The Gentlemen Friends’ and run theatre and dance workshops in schools, community settings, residential care homes, yoga retreats, fitness expos and for corporate and private events.
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Polly Barker
Producer for Nightlight Lullabies Crawley
polly@murmurationarts.co.uk
Polly has been producing live events in outdoor locations and unconventional spaces for over 15 years. She supports and facilitates creative thinking with robust and innovative solutions to production challenges. She produced the outdoor programme for Brighton Festival for 5 years, has a long background in music festival production including Glastonbury and End of the Road Festival, and other events such as Hyde Park’s Winter Wonderland. Polly has worked with Murmuration Arts on several recent projects including NightLight Lullabies and The Owl and The Pussycat.
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Parveen Khan
Community Liaison – Nightlight Lullabies Crawley
info@murmurationarts.co.uk
Parveen Khan is a community activist in Crawley. Working across various organisations; Creative Crawley, Wordfest, Talk Broadfield, SWS Sudhan Welfare Society, Crawley Museum and previously Diverse Crawley. Parveen has undertaken various projects with local mosques including drugs awareness.
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Martin Glover
Artist and Access Advisor
Martin, a deaf architect and art facilitator, has always had an appreciation of the Arts which has led to him facilitating guided tours and workshops of all sorts nationally for Deaf sign language users.
He currently manages Digitspace project, centring around ‘Visual Arts through British Sign Language’, a collaboration with Arts curators as well as a pilot training programme; to mentor deaf people to become BSL guides in the North East region.
Syeda Nudrat
Data Manager – Nightlight Lullabies Crawley
With experience in social and community activism and performing arts, Syeda believes keenly in the arts’ ability to bring social justice issues to life.
From her experience with Young and Talented Theatre Company, she went on to form performing arts group – Hull platform No.1. Bringing diverse, ethnic and wider communities together through performance, storytelling and interactive sessions.
Associate Artists
Marshall Mandiangu
Marshall currently plays The Pussycat in The Owl & The Pussycat. Marshall is a 2 x award-nominated music artist, actor, astrologer, and model. Former BIMM Brighton graduate, a member of AudioActive and collaborated with Windmill Young Actors playing the “Musical Narrator” in Romeo & Juliet (2019 & 2022) for The Brighton Festival.
Miranda Mufema
Miranda is an actor, singer and director trained professionally by Windmill Young Actors since 2017. Her credits include Romeo and Juliet, 2019 (Juliet), Macbeth, Pandora and has recently worked on a R&D alongside Kneehigh’s Mike Sheppard.
Faye Houston
Born into a musical family, Faye Houston has been a professional singer, writer and performer for over 20 years. She has travelled throughout the UK and abroad, collaborating with musicians and artists crossing various styles and genres to create expressive, heartfelt and powerful music.
Kimberley Kotin
Kimberley currently plays The Owl in The Owl & The Pussycat. Kimberley began performing with the National Youth Theatre, which is where her interest in ensemble and devised work began. She then gained a Ba(hons) in Acting at The Court Theatre Training Company before studying at French physical theatre school Jacques Lecoq. Productions include Cyrano de Bergerac, The Government Inspector and Electra. Kimberley continues to develop her own work and writing alongside her clowning and tap.
Cate Ferris
Cate Ferris: A one woman symphony of lush textures, electronic beats and soulful harmonies. Cate is a captivating singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from Brighton in the UK. An acclaimed and accomplished singer/songwriter, composer and producer who has also performed and collaborated with a host of talented artists and bands.
China Fish
China Blue Fish is a queer artist, actor, activist, singer and mother committed to shining a light on injustice and elevating imagination through music, comedy and theatre.
Thor McIntyre-Burnie
Thor McIntyre-Burnie is an Artist, Sound Designer and director of transformative public arts company Aswarm. An early pioneer of sound as a medium for public art, Thor’s internationally award-winning work, is largely site-responsive and immersive and as a result most of it happens outside art galleries.
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Lee Payne
My name is Lee Payne and I make music with my feet. My passion for performing art motivates everything I do. I knew I wanted to be a tap dancer since the age of 4.
Today I am a professional performer and creative artist with a wide range of skills and talents. My repertoire includes dancing, choreography, acting, hosting and directing.
Tomorrow… the creative world is my oyster.
Mercedes Kemp
Mercedes Kemp is a writer and founding member of WildWorks Theatre Company. She has recently retired after thirty years as Senior Lecturer in Fine Art at Falmouth University. Mercedes was born and grew up in Southern Spain.
Lucy Bradridge
Lucy Bradridge studied English Literature at The University of Leeds and then Theatre Design at the Central School of Speech and Drama. Since 1998 her work as a set props and costume designer has been mainly focused on devised comedy arising from a long and fruitful relationship with director Cal McCrystal and the physical clown company Spymonkey.
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Will Hood
Will Hood composed the original songs for The Owl and The Pussycat. Will usually spends his time writing music for film and TV or touring the world with his band @theswingninjas.
Will has performed at Glastonbury festival (UK) Moulin Rouge (Paris) Mandalay (Hamburg) Herräng (Sweden) and the Chill Out Festival (Istanbul). But he has never before performed as a Seafaring Cat…
Laura Wright
Laura performs as the Mother as part of the Nightlight Lullabies installation and at Murmuration’s regular Social dance events. Previously working for Murmuration as Producer, Laura now works with the company as a touring artist. Laura is also the Artistic Director of performance company Brass Bathtub, and was awarded a DYCP grant in 2021 to make experimental improvised music in nature.
“I have always admired the work of Marion and Matthew, they have constantly proved to be exemplary practitioners working with and for communities who are regularly forgotten by the main stream.
They work hard, have strong ethics, a lovely creative energy and I’m very exciting to see how there new company develops.”
Kerry Kyriacos Michael MBE
Artistic Director & Chief Executive of Theatre Royal Stratford East (TRSE) from 2004 to 2017
“Joan Littlewood would have loved this show for many reasons. Firstly, because it is based on interviews with real people…She transferred this way of telling the stories of working class people into the theatre where she added dance and movement in ways British theatre had never seen before. Bridges y Puentes does this too…Joan would have loved the fact that the show is performed in an extremely unlikely place, Stratford Multi-storey Carpark. Joan loved street entertainment interacting with passers-by, so it was a real pleasure to see this show rehearsing on the streets near the theatre.”
Philip Hedley
Artistic Director at Theatre Royal Stratford East (TRSE) from 1979 to 2004 on Bridges y Puentes, directed and produced by Marion for The Ragroof Players. See the full article.
“It is an absolute pleasure working with Matthew and Marion on South East Dance’s The Welcome Project. The level of commitment and focus that they give to the regular sessions with older adults is outstanding as is the care and attention that they give to each individual who attends. The sessions are always fun and inclusive, suitable for all abilities and confidences, Matthew’s genuine awareness of the group and individual needs and his ability to respond to these on a week by week basis is incredible and makes for a joyful dancing and social experience for all. We will be hoping to continue working with both Matthew and Marion again through Murmuration Arts as they bring a unique and very special gift to all their activities and events.”
Emily James-Farley
Creative Communities Manager, South East Dance
“I have worked with Marion for many years and have always been a supporter of her work, particularly her rigor and commitment when it comes to working with participatory practice and the sensitivity and care she has when working to reflect people’s true stories.
Over the last few years particularly I have seen her technique and passion for creating meaningful projects which truly empower the participants and the collaborators involved whilst managing to create theatrical productions which really affect the audience on a deeper level and allow a powerful understanding of other’s experiences.”
Mikey Martins
Artistic Director and Joint Chief Executive Freedom Festival Hull
CONTACT
Marion Duggan // Artistic Director // Marion@MurmurationArts.co.uk 0044 7736 834 057
Matthew Black // Director // Matthew@MurmurationArts.co.uk
Georgina Huguenet // Finance Manager // Finance@MurmurationArts.co.uk
OFFICE // Murmuration Arts CIC, Stanford Avenue Methodist Church, Stanford Avenue, Brighton BN1 6FD
Info@MurmurationArts.co.uk
Images courtesy of The Ragroof Players. Photos by Rosie Powell, Dik Ng & Ray Gibson
