During Open City, a project which explored how technology can be used to improve city life, Watershed commissioned Give Me Back My Broken Night, a theatrical guided tour which used location-sensitive technology to guide audiences around Guimarães.

However, unlike conventional guided tours and historic walks, which encourage audiences to explore the past, Give Me Back My Broken Night was a guided tour of the future.

Audiences were given a mobile device, a blank folded paper map, and a micro-projector which members of the audience would wear around their necks. An actor guided the audience members through various parts of the city, and asked them what they would like to see there. As the audience describe their own visions of the future, the imagined buildings would appear on the map in their hand as a series of glowing lines.

The tours took place in Guimarães in October 2012, and were created by performance groups Uninvited Guests and Circumstance.

Uninvited Guests are a group of artists that use creative technology to create memorable performance pieces. Their work has toured nationally and internationally, showing in the UK, China, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, Slovenia, Austria and Australia.

Circumstance are a group of artists who use creative technology to create cinematic experiences in unexpected locations.

Give Me Back My Broken Night was first commissioned by Watershed in 2010 for Theatre Sandbox, a commissioning scheme for theatre makers to research and develop experimental pieces of performance that incorporate creative technologies.

A project in partnership with The British Council.

Posted on Mon 1 Oct 2012.

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