we have all been here -now into the light is a multi-disciplinary installation combining video and audio work with short live encounters performed in the installation space.
How did we arrive to the here and now? Who was here before us and what was here before them? What does the future look like – for the building, the workers, the mice and the pebbles by the gate?
Weaving a web through moments in time and taking the shape of a conceptual/magical biography of a place, the work explores moments from the site’s past, present and imagined future.
At the core of “we have all been here” is a mock historical-biographical installation for the place itself, in a way that human and non-human elements are treated equally. The installation is a narrative-led, sensory, valid multi-disciplinary experience on its own, without the performance element as well.
Each evening of the festival, the installation will include short live performances that the audience can choose to tune into. Short visual/physical snippets – as if we could see memories of activity that may have happened at the site, or events yet to unfold.
The installation will be accessible throughout the festival in the Locker Room and the Link, with additional live performances each evening:
Wednesday 11th June, 18:30-18:50h; 19:40-20:00h
Thursday 12th June, 18:30-18:50h; 19:40-20:00h
Friday 13th June, 19:40-20:00h, 21:30-21:50h
Saturday 14th June, 19:40-20:00h
Sunday 15th June, 18:30-18:50h; 19:40-20:00h
Jim Scott worked in what was then the Reed Packaging factory for 39 years, beginning in 1985 as a labourer before eventually becoming a middle manager.
Marlyn Price worked in the factory for two months in 1969 when she was nineteen before going to art school.
Jim and Marlyn’s memories of working in the factory have been invaluable to this project.
Lawrence Boothman trained at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. He recently appeared in Fiddler on the Roof at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre, which won a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Musical Revival. His other stage credits include: Mistero Buffo (Òran Mór/Ayr Gaiety), The Brief Life & Mysterious Death of Boris III, King of Bulgaria (59E59 Theaters, NYC/Arcola Theatre – Offie Award for Best Ensemble); Jack (Òran Mór/Traverse Theatre); Ode To Joy (How Gordon got to go to the Nasty Pig Party) (Sydney Festival); The Devil Drinks Cava (Òran Mór); Julius Caesar (Company of Wolves); The Odyssey (The Scoop); Incident at Vichy (Finborough Theatre); A Dream of Dying (Edinburgh Fringe).
Tom W Green trained as a composer and electric guitarist at Southampton University, with Masters studies supervised by Michael Finnissy. His background in rock and folk has combined with contemporary classical training to make an unusual perspective on notated music. Concert commissions include works for the Vale of Glamorgan Festival, Ligeti Quartet, Francoise-Green Piano Duo, Gemini, The Ragazze Quartet, Aditi Singers, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Red Note Ensemble and the Mavron Quartet. He has written and directed music for two experimental productions at the National Theatre London, including the widely acclaimed ‘Home’. Sound installation work includes collaborations with Footprint and a large-scale reactive-electronic installation at the Hansard Southampton.
Colombian-American soprano Stephanie Lamprea is an architect of new sounds and expressions as a performer, composer, and multidisciplinary artist, specializing in contemporary classical repertoire. Trained as an operatic coloratura, she uses her voice as a mechanism of avant-garde performance art, creating “maniacal shifts of vocal production and character… like an icepick through the skull” (Jason Eckardt). She has performed as a soloist at Roulette Intermedium (New York City), Constellation Chicago, Sound Scotland, Kings Place (London), Southbank Centre (London), the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the National Concert Hall (Dublin), the Centre for Contemporary Art (Glasgow), Hidden Door Festival (Edinburgh), and the Casa da Música (Porto). She has collaborated with leading new music ensembles and bands including the Riot Ensemble, International Contemporary Ensemble, the City of London Sinfonia, Sō Percussion, and Post Coal Prom Queen.
Neil Cooper is a writer based in Edinburgh who has written for numerous publications. An archive of his arts journalism can be found at www.coffeetablenotes.blogspot.com. New work can be found at The Noise of Art – neilcooper.substack.com
Eszter Marsalko works in a mix of direction, choreography, writing and dramaturgy in live performance and on screen. Her work is characterised by genre-bending form, a strong atmosphere, and a focus on connection. Eszter has contributed to a range of projects, including theatre, outdoor performance, variety, opera, dance theatre, and film. In Scotland, Eszter has worked with the Royal Lyceum as well as Magnetic North, Scottish Opera, Curious Seed, and Grid Iron Theatre Company. Internationally, Eszter has worked for Volksbühne (Berlin), Hungarian State Opera, Weimar National Theatre and Nordland Visual Theatre (Norway). Eszter makes her own work through her companies Snap-Elastic and ghostbag.
Valerie Reid is a designer and visual artist based in Edinburgh, working across mediums from print to set design, installation and cross-artform practice. She likes making art with other people as well as objects, computers and lots of paper. She has created performance designs for dance and theatre companies in the UK, Ireland and the USA, and is particularly passionate about experiential, space-driven work.
Tsoi Huen Wong is a performer, maker, and practitioner whose work spans dance, theatre, performance, and participatory contexts. She has a regular practice in Contact Improvisation and Gaga Movement Language, and enjoys exploring how choreography can expand and compose a range of creativity and imagination. She sees the body as an earnest medium and considers improvisation in dance as a practice of life. Tsoi Huen is a current member of Dance Base’s 2024/25 Dancers Emerging Bursary Scheme. Tsoi Huen has performed with several Hong Kong-based physical/devised theatre companies, including Alice Theatre Laboratory, iStage, Riceballershk and Thoughtful Theatre, as well as with Frantic Assembly, Curious Seed, Vamos Theatre, Tmesis Theatre, Scottish Youth Theatre, and Journey to the East.
We have all been here – now into the light is one of our 2025 Creative Collaborations, four newly commissioned interdisciplinary projects waiting to be encountered by visitors as they explore The Paper Factory’s labyrinths. Visionaries from radically different disciplines – from electronic musicians and installation artists to contemporary dancers and theatrical innovators – have been challenged to create something that could only exist in this distinct moment and place.
