The Justice Syndicate
Overview:
This project explores ways of increasing the intensity of interaction and audience members’ agency in interactive and immersive performance. It seeks to do this by creating a new form of technologically-enabled actorless performance. In the fictional context of the performance, 12 audience members, all provided with an iPad, become a jury considering a difficult case. On the iPads, they examine documents, watch witness testimonies, receive prompts to discuss the case and invitations to vote.
The Justice Syndicate has been performed at National Theatre of Scotland’s Citizen of Nowhere Festival, Battersea Arts Centre, Sheffield Doc Fest, York Mediale, Random String and the Edinburgh Science Festival. It has received a number of excellent reviews, including a 5 star review in The Stage.
Research Team:
Dan Barnard, London South Bank University and The “recovering theatre company” fanSHEN
Computational artist Joe McAlister
Neuroscientist Dr Kris de Meyer
Funding:
Near Now, King’s Cultural Institute, LSBU
Project Website:
https://www.fanshen.org.uk/justice-syndicate
Short film about the project: