ABOUT

Have you ever imagined what Tramway looks and sounds like at night after closing? What sort of stories lie hidden and forgotten from the past one hundred years?

Commissioned by Tramway, Portals is a new online experience, and three 360-degree performance films, that playfully explore and experiment with factual and fictional stories of Tramway as an imaginary folklore study. Meet John, a friendly ghost who looks after the building and recites Shakespeare; Bararomba, a mouse security guard; and Wylon, an ancient creature who is the last of its kind.

Lead artist Lucas Chih-Peng Kao has created Portals through months of collaboration. Firstly, he facilitated story making workshops with young people and adults, and interviewed Tramway staff about the history of the building. He then worked with a group of theatre and performance makers to respond to those stories and interviews, their movement and dance filmed with a 360-degree camera on location at Tramway. Finally, Lucas worked closely with ISO digital media and software studio to create an immersive interactive experience, using ‘Tramway XR’, their 3D architectural model. ISO have created a dynamic sculptural space to house the 360-degree films, and an ‘archive space’ where viewers can listen to the stories collected throughout the project.

Portals is a combination of Lucas’ ongoing research on collaborative performance making (The Fool’s Journey, 2019), collective story-making and reimagination (Faery Trail, 2018) and 360- degree film as a new performance medium (Charon, 2020).