From international shows to extravagant festival productions - September Newsletter

BODY attracted critical acclaim from audiences and academics in Calgary, Canada last weekend as it made its North American debut. For three days BODY was open to the public as part of Beakerhead’s science festival programme.  

Combining light, sound, special effects and fire, BODY explores human biology, designed to inspire scientific curiosity in whoever journeys through its six different anatomical zones.  

British Consul General of Calgary, Jonathan Turner, had this to say of BODY’s premiere “It’s fantastic that British creativity was featured at last weekend's Beakerhead 10th Anniversary of Science, Art, Engineering and Tech.” 

School Trustee Theresa Letendre: “As an education system we are preparing our youth for jobs and opportunities that haven’t even been imagined yet. Taking in Beakerhead’s ‘BODY’ by Walk the Plank - last night, it’s exciting to imagine what kind of exhibits with what kind of mashups will be imagined next!” 

And Canadian artist Maria Galura said "Thank you Beakerhead for bringing BODY to Calgary! It was an awesome experience and a load full of sensory wonders. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️” 

To bring BODY to your event, festival or venue, contact us at [email protected]

Our longstanding collaboration with Lost Village festival continued this year with the most ambitious series of shows yet. The story of The White Hart unfolded over four days, with a different spectacular performance or installation daily, and a volunteer cast of forty: projections, a giant stag, underground and underwater stunts, and the moon rising above a giant grand piano.  

The shows were the culmination of several different strands of research and development work led by artistic director, Richard Babington, along with designer, George Babington. In the fabrication of the stag puppet, we were privileged to benefit from 3D printing consultancy from Manchester Metropolitan University’s PrintCity programme and robotics consultancy from the North of England Robotics Innovation Centre. 

If we were to choose one highlight out of many, it would be the gasps of shock and disbelief as a performer rose out of the ground, led the crowd to the shore of the lake, and then kept walking until he disappeared underwater. 

One of our volunteers had this to say: "Thanks so much for such an incredible time. Absolutely loved every moment. Thanks so much for the opportunity to be involved in something so spectacular and to meet so many wonderful and beautiful people." 

We have begun research for the Delta Life finale for Oulu2026, when Oulu will be the second European Capital of Culture city within the Arctic Circle. As well as being a high tech, progressive Arctic city, Oulu hosts the World Air Guitar Championships, bringing together an international community who enjoy the dark sense of humour that characterises northern Finland… #MakeAirNotWar. 

Delta Life is a multi-year cultural project that culminates in the Oulu River Delta in August 2026, led by Finnish singer songwriter Jukka Tavalo working with Oulu August Festivals.  

We worked with Loomaland (Berlin) to build some remote-controlled platforms which we tried out in the waterspace at the confluence of two rivers. Oulu’s breakdance supremo Timmo, and Air Guitar Champion of Champions, Nordic Thunder, joined Jukka on the water, with improvised sounds from the Southgates, one of Oulu’s upcoming bands.  

The visit also offered us a chance to build connections with the local kayak and canoe clubs, work with local artists, and present to cultural organisations and artists in the region. We will return next year to research and develop other aspects of the performance… having honed our air guitar skills in the meantime! 

Summer festival season is over for the year. We’ve been overjoyed to have been a part of and produced some wonderful festivals. 

We’ve produced One Amazing Day for St Helens as they celebrated becoming Liverpool Regions Borough of Culture. Manchester Day underwent a transformation from previous years and went 'On Holiday', becoming an all-day, fun-filled festival in the city centre. We also programmed and produced Serious Nonsense Festival in Knowsley as part of their Borough of Culture legacy. 

Shows such as Climate Change Myth Buster, Emperor’s New Stage and The Veg Tombola have also made their rounds at several local festivals, including We Invented the Weekend, Swinton Sounds, Spirit of Little Hulton and further afield, at the Harbour Festival in Whitehaven. 

The Tower of Light made an appearance at Tall Ships Festival this July, and we headed to Lost Village in Lincolnshire for a bespoke commission. 

If you and your team are starting to think about what to programme at your festival next year, looking for a partner to produce the festival or thinking about bespoke commissions, why not have a chat with one of our producers and start that conversation today? 

Get in touch 

That’s right, the days are getting shorter and that means our pyrotechnic team is gearing up for a busy autumn season. Having already produced a marvellous display in Derby for Darley Park Classics, and a firework display for Manchester's Pride candle-lit vigil, our pyro magicians are heading to produce displays for Craigavon Fireworks, Derby County Cricket Club Fireworks and Wakefield Fireworks.  

Our Fire Garden will be popping up at multiple locations in the next few months, so watch out for more site-responsive fiery spectaculars.  

Have you checked out our Fire and Light offer yet?

On Thursday 26 October, spooky walkabout performance The Strolling Bones will be in Lincoln for The Big Spook, presented by Lincoln BIG. This processional performance, which includes a six-piece band, is a mischievous crowd-pleaser that will get everyone, small and big, dancing along.  

And closer to Walk the Plank’s HQ, on 28 – 29 October, we are bringing the Monster Parade to Manchester for Halloween in the City, commissioned and organised by Manchester BID. The Monster Parade is an unmissable roaming performance of large-scale monster puppets, giant skeletons, stilt walkers and six-piece band, inspired by Monster designs by artists Filthy Luker and Pedro Estrellas, created by Designs in Air.   

Learn more here  

We have partnered with Salford Council and From The Other on the Trafford Road Family Fun Day, celebrating Salford’s latest Bee Network addition. 

In the lead-up to the event on Sunday 1 October, we are working with local schools and community groups to create a wildflower meadow, ready to be pollinated by artist Chris Anderson’s bee creation as part of the wider programme of family-friendly activities. 

Discover more about the fun-filled day of activities

As part of Creative Embassies – a network that creates unexpected connections with art scenes throughout smaller European cities – two of the Walk the Plank team, General Manager, Sarah Heard and Salford Producer, Ben Turner, recently travelled to Faro, Portugal, to connect with local artists in a cultural exchange. 

After their trip to Faro, artist and producer Mauro returned to our creative headquarters in Salford, UK, to spend a few days discovering what makers at Cobden Works are busy creating, how we can collaborate in the future and finding out what is happening in the arts and culture scene in Manchester and Salford. He also visited the Serious Nonsense Festival in Prescott and joined the team pushing the rocket. 

Creative Embassies is continuing to grow, with Kaunas in Lithuania now becoming a part of the network, joining Salford, Faro (Portugal), Leeuwarden (the Netherlands) and Rijeka (Croatia).

We’ve just published a Green Space Dark Skies Impact Report which tells the story of our six-month journey across the UK, from inception through to delivery. Discover more about the original idea behind the project, the development of the new Geolights technology, how we worked with artists in every location, what it meant to our Lumenators to participate in the events, and how we created our series of short films. 

Check it out here 

As part of the legacy from Green Space Dark Skies, we awarded bursaries worth £1,500 each to four community groups from Bradford, Luton, Powys and Ynys Môn/Anglesey, to support them to explore an area within one of four of the UK’s National Parks - North York Moors, Broads, Bannau Brycheiniog/Brecon Beacons, and Eyri/Snowdonia. Each group, inspired by the landscape, produced a bespoke creative response and we’d like to share their work with you. The visits took place over summer this year and we want to thank all the groups and National Parks for participating in this bursary programme. 

The original idea came from Rukia Saleem, who through the University of Bedfordshire Chalkscapes Project brought a group of Muslim families to our event in Dunstable Downs, The Chilterns AONB last July. 

Get Involved!

We’re doing a special Ullswater Droving event in collaboration with Eden Arts on Saturday 21 October using our Geolights, you can sign up to participate here.

Working with brilliant Manchester-based web developers, Studio Treble, we have upgraded our website to showcase the breadth of what we do and how we do it.  

Our goal was to make each user’s journey as accessible and straightforward as possible. And as always, to put sustainability at the heart of the project; we are using green host, Cloudflare, have an option of reduced animation, as well as having a maximum file size upload function. This is just a couple of examples of the learnings we have implemented that were taken from the Green Space Dark SkiesSustainability Impact Report – which you can find here.  

Learn about the current work we have available to book, our bespoke commissions and our work with communities & participation on www.walktheplank.co.uk. 

As part of the website redevelopment, our marketing team have made information packs on our available to hire productions. Please take a look, download and share amongst your team, collaborators and stakeholders.  

We are thrilled to announce the appointment of Neal McBride, who has joined the production team as Technical Production Manager, after relocating from Saffron Walden, UK, where he worked as Senior Production Manager for Saffron Hall.  

“I’m delighted to be working with such a dynamic arts organisation as WTP and I'm looking forward to seeing where we go in the future.”  

Circostrada is a network of European contemporary circus and outdoor arts organisations which we have recently joined. This week Creative Producer, Liz Pugh, attended their FRESH 2023 conference, which explored the concepts of care, safety and sustainability in the European street arts and circus sector. We want to congratulate Circostrada on their 20th anniversary.