The History Bois: A Drag King Take-Over

May 3-7 at The Spire, St Marks Chapel, Eastern Road, Brighton, BN2 5JN

Created with drag king and artist E.M. Parry, this week-long take-over of the Spire is an exploration of masculinity through the ages, combining exhibition, live art, workshops and a two-night drag king cabaret.

The History Bois: Adventures in Drag King time-travel

May 6 & 7, 7:30-11pm

The Bois are back in time! Come and play with the space-time-gender continuum at this epic Drag King cabaret. As part of the History Bois Drag King take-over of The Spire, we bring you Adventures in Drag King Time-Travel: two nights of delicious historically-themed cabaret performed by a succession of legendary kings time-travelling direct to Brighton Fringe 2020, bringing you a queer crash-course in masculinity as performed through the ages. Whether you like your manhood ruff-and-ready, Boi-Georgian, sweet-as-funk 70s style or post-apocalyptic robo-camp, the Bois have one hell of a history lesson lined up for you…

The History Bois: Meeting the Unruly Dead

May 4 & 5, afternoon / evening workshops

Part of the History Bois Drag King take-over of The Spire, these workshops run by Drag King and artist SL Grange are for folks wanting to connect with their queer tr/ancestors. Using writing, drawing and performative processes, we’ll create our own rituals and art to uncover and honour lost queer hero/ines. If you already have a historical figure in mind that you want to work with, please bring any research along. Otherwise, there’ll be a range of folks to explore at the workshop. Basic art materials provided, or bring your own if you already have a creative practice you’d like to incorporate.

The History Bois: We Elizabethans

May 3-7, 10-5

An exhibition of visual and live artwork by E.M. Parry, as part of The History Bois drag king takeover, using costume, scenography and performance to stage dialogues with past and future, tracking queer and trans embodiments in the negative spaces of the historical archive.

Snowblind

Bringing together musicians and songwriters Jo Silverstone and Jeannie Skelly, writer, performance-maker and sound artist Sarah Grange, scenographer and visual artist Ellan Parry, and dancer-choreographer / live art practitioner Janine Fletcher, Sundogs is a cross-disciplinary adventure into artistic terra incognita.

Our first project is Snowblind. Part music gig, part installation, part dance, part theatre, Snowblind is a voyage into multi-disciplinary story-telling and cross-practise collaboration. Wrapping together tales of Arctic exploration and heroic folly, Snowblind uses song, sound art, ice sculpture, scenography, script and movement to investigate a place to which we are all far more connected – and responsible – than we might realise.

Expect glacial meltwater, haunting song-scapes, flying ships, up-close interaction, extreme feats of physical endurance and conversations with the ghosts of walruses…

Inspired by the centuries of doomed attempts to find the North-West passage through the Arctic, we will embark on our own voyage, from the Journey of St Brendan to the Franklin Expedition, through the sub-zero, subconscious and subliminal.
Looking at a fragile landscape that preserves whilst itself disappearing, we’ll map out absence, loss, perseverance and myth. We are Lady Jane Franklin’s last rescue mission.