Archaos – semtex and juggling chainsaws

I delivered a presentation this morning at Artichoke’s Larger Than Life conference. The whole day was about large-scale ambitious productions and how to deal with particular aspects of producing events, including fundraising, logistics, marketing and specifically how to get press and media coverage for these kinds of large scale events.

It was an engaging morning, but also a frustrating one because it seems that under funded performance companies still struggle to create a dialogue with the media. There’s never been a more exciting time to make an impact with all the tools on the web. But clearly these companies’ artistic narratives struggle to be relevant with the modern media agenda. I saw a number of old friends at the conference who all reminded me of Archaos. It seems an age since they spontaneously combusted after the most exquisite but short life when they defined the idea of circus. This film should remind everyone about how truly spectacular they really were.