A Quiet Word is a performing arts company, based in Yorkshire, engaging with people to create performances which reflect their experiences of the places in which they live and work.

Our approach has developed through collaborative performance practice over many years, investigating the potential of working outside conventional theatre spaces. We are an association of artists including designers, performers, choreographers, video artists, musicians and writers, collaborating with people in their locality to create performances which animate spaces and places. The company name reflects the place of text in the work – the word is there, but it is there quietly. The primary driver of the pieces we make is the place we are working in. The text develops over the life each of project.

The work is informed by contemporary discourse around community arts practice – we are concerned with exchange between the arts and the places in which its meanings are defined. Collaborators include those who identify themselves as artists and those who work in a wide range of other areas.

We make pieces which are for viewing by small audiences who are usually invited to move through a site, uncovering the story as they move.

‘The architecture of a gallery, in which the work must take shape, is perhaps not only the actual exhibition room (where the goods are shown), but also the director’s office (where the goods are sold), the store-room (where the goods are kept), the reception room (where the goods are discussed). It is also perhaps the external architecture of the gallery, the staircase up to it, or the lift from the street leading to it, the area where it is situated, the town.’

As well as creating our theatre and performance, we also work from time to time with other organisations to help realise their plans and to find ways forward in developing the operation or setting up a project. We are part of the Yorkshire International Performing Arts Network and members of IETM, the network for the contemporary performing arts in Europe.

There is more information about the people who make the work and the organisations we are working with in other sections of this site. Thank you for having a quiet word with us…