Mark Anderson leads a team of artists in a response to the inconceivable madness of the First World War. Taking place as night falls in no-man’s land, Furious Folly immerses the audience in an open-air collage of sound, kinetic devices, pyrotechnics and performance.
Anderson draws on the anti-war sentiment of the Dadaist movement of the early 20th century. The madness of the battlefield and the futility of WW1 leads these artists to a new artistic language that deliberately eschews structure and meaning, rejecting everything that had gone before. Furious Folly uses the Dada ethos to rail against the inhumanity and senselessness of conflicts past and present.
‘In Zurich in 1915, losing interest in the slaughterhouse of the world war, we turned to the Fine Arts. While the thunder of the batteries rumbled in the distance, we pasted, we recited, we versified, we sang with all our soul. We searched for an elementary art that would, we thought, save mankind from the furious folly of these times.’ Hans Arp, founding member of the Dadaist movement
Created at 101 Outdoor Arts Creation Space.
2016 production produced by Corn Exchange Newbury and OCM in association with Birmingham Hippodrome, Oxford Playhouse, Oxford Festival of the Arts and Stockton International Riverside Festival.
Weymouth performances presented at Inside Out Dorset, produced by Activate Performing Arts. Supported by Weymouth & Portland Borough Council and Dorset County Council.
Co-commissioned by 14-18 NOW and the Town of Poperinge.
