Flying Eye are a theatre and performance company whose work combines stories with visual poetry. It is run by Director and Performer, Sachi Kimura, and Lighting Designer, Kristina Hjelm. The Flying Eye team have been using the Copperdollar Studios to rehearse so we caught up with Sachi and Kristina to find out a bit more about what they’ve been up to.
Where does the name Flying Eye come from?
From our experience of finding inspiration for our art in everyday life. Like our eyes are constantly flying and observing and being drawn into smaller details of how the world looks and people act.
As a theatre and performance company, are there any reoccurring defining features of your shows or is each one unique?
All our shows are devised and based on personal stories. Very often we also interview the general public to get an insight into their personal stories on the same theme. Our first shows, ‘Cutting the Cord’ and ‘It’s All About Us’ were very much aimed for an adult audience whereas our last piece ‘GLOW’ was for babies/toddlers and carers and our current development ‘Sensible Nonsense’ is for 3-5 year olds and carers. We never set out to create only adult or only children theatre, instead we let our inspiration into different themes decide who it is for.
Your most recent show, GLOW, is for babies and toddlers, have you found it easier or more difficult to create theatre for children?
Initially more difficult as we are obviously not babies or toddlers ourselves anymore so it was a challenge to develop material that we felt would entice this age range. The solution we came up with was to engage with regular test audiences throughout the rehearsal process, usually once or twice per week, in order to test run our material and get an insight to what really worked for babies and toddlers.
Can you tell us a little bit about what you’re working on at the Copperdollar Studios?
We are working on a new, devised piece for 3-5 year olds and carers called ‘Sensible Nonsense’. ‘Sensible Nonsense’ explores the nature of how children play and perceive an imaginary world. It is a highly interactive show that gives the parents and children an opportunity to enjoy playing together. ‘Sensible Nonsense’ includes physical storytelling, exploratory play on what children do such as jumping and how they have a completely different understanding of time passing, compared to adults.
You run workshops, do you have any upcoming workshops in Brighton?
Not at planned at the moment. We would love to work in Brighton in the future.
How did you hear about the studios?
Through word of mouth while we were looking for rehearsal space. We are very happy to have found this place as it has offered us 2 weeks of extremely productive development time.
What do you like most about the Copperdollar Studios and what would you say makes it different from other studios you’ve used?
The building itself has an incredibly welcoming feeling and we have felt really at home which has helped to make the development process flow. And whilst it also has a strong personal touch from Kt who runs it, you really feel free to express yourself through your own artistic work. It has a great sense of nurturing support which is sometimes difficult to find when you only work in a space for a few weeks.
Copperdollar Studios is the perfect space for rehearsing, check out our website to see our availability or get in touch to find out more. We’d love to meet you and show you around.
This post is part of our new blog series, ‘Behind the Scenes’, where we will be showcasing some of the amazing artists, performers, makers, photographers, videographers (you name it, the list goes on!) who have been in the Copperdollar Studios. We hope you enjoy the sneaky peaks. Feel free to leave us a comment and let us know what you think.