• Photo: Catherine Ashmore

  • Photo: Montage by Sophia Clist

  • Photo: Tom Martin

  • Photo: Justin Pipeger

Stretch

Sophia Clist with Nick Burge
UK

A blank canvas, an electro-acoustic harp, minimalist and symbolic in appearance, Stretch  is a screen made of hundreds of strands of fine, shearing elastic.

Stretched from wall to wall, miles of elastic create a permeable threshold or boundary that embraces the architecture of any space. A stand alone interactive installation, there are no instructions about what to do with Stretch, or how it should be treated. Play it as an instrument, climb it like a web – make your own multisensory journey outside in.

An ever-evolving installation, the early versions of Stretch  took often unlikely venues by surprise and by storm. It was conceived and designed by Sophia Clist in collaboration with Nick Burge as part of the Catch season at the Lyric Hammersmith in 2003. For NottDance International Dance Festival and The Public (West Bromwich) in 2004, the installation was at regular intervals animated by dancers and music, including by composer and musician Craig Vear, and proved a hit with people of all ages.

Past venues and festivals include: The Catch – Lyric Theatre Hammersmith; Lilian Baylis Theatre, Sadler’s Wells; Nottdance; Transit Dance festival, Marl; MILK International Festival of the Arts, Toronto; Chicago Humanities Festival; Illuminate – Birmingham Hippodrome / DanceXchange and most recently Awesome Festival of the Arts for Bright Young Things, Perth, Australia.

Available for touring indoor, outdoor and in site-specific locations.
Performances and workshops for all ages and abilities available on demand.

Press

  • 'Stretch... radically alters the architecture of the space it occupies as it is altered by the hands and bodies of those that press against it'

    Toronto Gateway

  • 'Stretch is a magical and engaging experience for children of all ages.'

    Stella Hall culture10, Juice Festival

  • ARTISTS BIOGRAPHIES

    Sophia Clist, lead artist conceived and designed Stretch.

    Sophia creates installations, sets and objects for performers and audiences to inhabit, manipulate and transform, collaborating with artists in dance, theatre and with the general public. As a sculptor, she is fascinated by the choreography of materials, objects and form in space.

    Working in visual and physical theatre inspired her to create Stretch, the performance installation Hands Full – Phenomenal People (Fuel, WOW Festival) and to apply to the 2016 Jerwood Choreographic Research Project II for which she was shortlisted.

    Recent designs and installations include: The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk – Kneehigh Theatre (Bristol Old Vic); And The Horse You Rode In On – Told by An Idiot (Barbican, Drum Theatre Plymouth, Brighton Festival); Get Happy – Told by An Idiot (Barbican); 16 Singers – Katherine Morley (Dance Umbrella, The Egg – Theatre Royal Bath); Life Forces – Jane Mason and Phil Smith; Grandmothers – Encounters Arts; Oxygen – Dreadnought South West; The World At Your Feet – led by Barbican Theatre Plymouth (Plymouth Cultural Olympiad); In This Place – Pentabus Theatre.

    Sophia was Associate Artist to Theatre-Rites 1998-2008. She designed many national and international touring & site-specific productions (The Young Vic, LIFT, Wiener Festwochen, Teater Der Welt, Polka Theatre, Unicorn Theatre for Children, Lyric Theatre Hammersmith). She co-created the company’s TMA award winning dance theatre production Mischief with Arthur Pita, (Sadler’s Wells, Dance Touring Partnership).

    Nick Burge

    Sound Artist and main collaborator – Nick and Sophia have worked together on Stretch since 2004, his role developing and expanding with the project as his extensive creative and technical skill base has been revealed. He has responded to and continues to develop Sophia’s original ideas for the installation’s component parts in sound design, lighting and video projection.

    Nick worked for many years as a dancer in the USA & England in opera, musicals and contemporary dance. With a travel grant from ACE, Nick studied with tap dancer Chuck Green in the USA leading to the creation of his own tap dance act Stamp Collection. Nick studied sound design & music technology at the London College of Printing supported by the Dancers Resettlement Fund. He has composed soundscores for Company of Angels and choreographers Olga Calleja, Amparo Badiola, Catherine Seymour & La Dinamika.

    Nick draws upon his experience as a dancer, and in sound design & technical theatre to create objects & devices that invite physical intervention. During a year long residency at BilbaoArte, Nick collaborated with dance artist Amparo Badiola to create The Trembleators – six platforms designed to be danced upon. Sculptural objects in themselves, they transform into furniture-like instruments, miniature playgrounds of sound, filled with devices that vibrate, bounce, rock, tremor, tremble, trigger & twang. The Trembleators were presented as an installation for The Great Indoors at Manchester International Festival 2009 & at BilbaoArte in 2010.

     

  • KEY SELLING POINT

    Beautiful interactive installation

    Can adapt to site-specific locations

    Occasional performances

    Workshops for all ages and abilities available on demand

  • TARGET AUDIENCES

    For all ages

    Art and music lovers

    Suitable for everyone