CRIPtic Arts

Autobiographical work can be very powerful, but it must be made with genuine care, consent, agency and choice - not because it’s the one kind of work the industry will accept. Read our new blog, Autobiographical Work for Theatremakers by Jamie Hale (@jamierhale ), for more thoughts and advice on creating autobiographical work. Up now on our website. Image description: A series of black graphics with white and blue text. Text reads: 1 - Theatre often asks people, especially people from marginalised groups, to mine their trauma as the most valuable creative inspiration we have to offer. That expectation isn’t just limiting, it’s harmful. 2 - So, what can you do to keep an ethic of care, and self-care, in the work you make? 3 - Starting to make the work. Before you start to make autobiographical work, think about why you're making it and how you're going to hold on to your own power, strength, and agency when you make it. 4 - Making the work with a team. Theatre work is rarely made alone. If you decide to make the work you’re going to need to build a team around you. 5 - During a run. The two things I suggest people have are an aftercare kit, and a set of friends who can act as a support network. 6 - Having an audience. You will need your own strategies for handling any distance you're putting between yourself and the audience, but part-fictionalising your narrative may well be quite a strong one. If people want to bond with you about your story or want you to share information with them, remember that you don't owe them anything and that it's up to you to decide what you do. 7 - Read the full blog on cripticarts.org

About this weekend... 🤩 Give it up for the performers, writers, creative team, crew, audience, and everyone who made The Acts so incredible 👏👏👏👋👋👋 🎶 Song is "Get Up & Try" by SO SHA, Jacy Sim, and Nick Kingsley 🎥 Video by Luke from the tech box Video Description: Performers take to the stage at Bristol Old Vic for their final bows. They dance, clap, join hands and bow. The set consists of a white bed on white lino flooring, the lighting is colourful with yellows, pinks and blues. Tatum Swithenbank (@tatumkarmen ), Writer & Performer, REALMS Caitlin Magnall-Kearns (@caitmkearns ), Writer, The Ache of It Kathrine Payne (@kathrine__payne ), Writer, body job SO SHA (@so_sha.mp3 ), Writer & Performer, Pruu the Pidj Georgi Arthur (@georgi_arthur ), Performer, The Ache of It & body job Nathan Patterson (@nelpppppp ), Performer, The Ache of It & body job EM Williams (@hellothemwilliams ), Performer, body job Peyvand Sadeghian (@peyvandofpersia ), Performer, body job Jack Wakely (@wakely ), Performer, REALMS Natasha Trantom, BSL Performance Interpreter Jamie Hale (@jamerhale ), Director Caitlin Richards, Producer & Voice Over Performer Jack Wakely (@wakely ), Development Producer Rudzani Moleya (@rudzanikmoleya ), Movement Director Miggy Barker (@justdragthingsxo ), Assistant Director Roshan Conn (@roshanconn ), Stage Manager Ryan Webster (@rwebsterdesign ), Set, Props & Costume Designer Carly Altberg (@carlyaltbergdesign ), Lighting Designer Oliver Vibrans (@vibransoliver ), Sound Designer SO SHA (@so_sha.mp3 ), Music Producer, Pruu the Pidj Edalia Day (@edaliaday ), Creative Caption Designer Luke Rogers (@lukeyrogers_ ), Project Manager, Assistant to Jamie Hale & Voice Over Performer Meg Terzza (@megterzza ), Marketing Officer Daryl Jackson, BSL Consultant Foxy Direction (@foxychops_ ), Intimacy Director Shona Louise Cobb (@shonalouise_photography ), Photographer Thank you to the BSL & Creative Support Worker team. The Acts has been made possible with the support of Arts Council England (@aceagrams ) and Bristol Old Vic (@bristololdvic176 ).

That's right, folks! We've got a whole new season of Connect Through Creativity coming up and we CAN'T WAIT! Check out the line up of incredible disabled creatives, and a new Writers Salon with @londonwriterscentre 🎉 Spaces are available to book now via our website (or link in bio!) ✨ Writers Salon with mithago craze and London Writers Centre ✨ @mithago.craze & @londonwriterscentre 9th March ✨ Cripping Autobiographical Practice with Elana Binysh✨ @elanabinysh 10th March, 14th April & 12th May ✨ Table Top Role Playing Game: Killer Crips 3000 with Joseph Wilk ✨ @joseph_wilk 23rd March ✨ 1:1s with Jamie Hale ✨ @jamierhale 23rd March, 16th April & 25th May ✨ CRIPtic Open 1:1 Sessions with Meg Terzza ✨ @megterzza 17th April ✨ Using Our Voices: Confidence, Breath & Expression with Emma Joyce Brooks ✨ @emmasmagicaltales 27th April ✨ CRIPtic Chats: Networking with Alice Christina-Corrigan ✨ @aliceccorrigan 1st April & 26th May ✨ Scent Workshop with Alessandra Mondin ✨ @diffractive_studio 25th May Image Descriptions: First image is a black and blue graphic with white text reading "Free online workshops for disabled creatives" with a vibrant green neon painting by Rachel Gadsden beneath with a paper torn effect. The following images are of facilitators of the workshops with the above titles, names and dates.

Are you a wheelchair user aged 18 to 30? Want to help shape our new programme that will support young disabled creatives with high physical access needs to help kick-start their careers? 🎭 Come and join our Project Board for Embark! 🎉 Project Board Members will work collaboratively together and CRIPtic staff to co-design the structure of the programme. This includes shaping the content of workshops, creative expectations, the production process, access provision, and how the project is evaluated, as well as helping to select the programme participants. The CRIPtic team is then there to deliver the programme. Number of spaces: 4 Fee: £1,000 per person. Time commitment: 6 meetings across the year, plus a handover meeting in 2027 Location: Zoom Eligibility: Wheelchair users aged 18–30 Deadline for expression of Interest form: 12pm, Friday 5th June Head to our website for more information and to apply /embark-2026/ 📸 @shonalouise_photography Image Description: A graphic with text reading "Join our project board" digitally imposed behind a photo of Dr Jessi Parrott in a rehearsal room. Jessi, a white person with short brown hair, is in their powered wheelchair wearing rainbow dungarees. They look off camera with a smile across their face. #CRIPticArts #ProjectBoard

CRIPtic Arts are delighted to share that last week we won a Scope Award for Community Group 🎉 🎉 🎉 We're incredibly grateful for this recognition from @scopecharity and the judges, and are immensely grateful for this wonderful community. A massive thank you to our team, access team, artists, freelancers, audiences, partners, and everyone who supports us and makes up the CRIPtic Arts community 💙 As Caitlin Richards, our wonderful Head of Programmes and Producing, said: "It's amazing to be in the room, let alone on the stage." 📸 Natasha Hirst Photography Image Description: A photograph of a group of people at the Scope 2026 Awards ceremony. Ade Adepitan, Caitlin Richards, Funmi Aishah Lawal, and Dr Amit Patel are in front of a bright purple backdrop with Scope branding including logos and a large sparkling circle. They are smiling at the camera and lean in together to pose.

Excited to be apart of @cripticarts Launchpad Cohort!! . My work explores the body as both material and language, questioning how physical extremes can hold emotional, political and narrative meaning. Our creative practice sits at the intersection of high-level circus skill and character-driven storytelling. . My contortion dance and physical theatre practice interrogates the limits of the body, combining choreographic structure with extreme physicality to generate new movement languages. I work with ground contortion as well as specialist apparatuses, including a one-of-a-kind spinning contortion cube and a unique mouthpiece archery skill, using contortion to explore vertiginous movement, freedom, tension, resistance and transformation. . My process centres on generating original physical vocabularies and integrating them with theatre as an interdisciplinary practice. . My solo work has been supported by Arts Council England, Jerwood Arts, Cirko Vertigo Italy and the National Centre for Circus Arts, and was a part of the CircusNext platform. I am currently collaborating with @morganbarbour , a world-renowned performer and record holder. Our combined performance experience spans five continents, including appearances on America’s Got Talent, work with Harry Styles, A Magical Cirque Christmas, Kazakh State Circus, The Box, Giffords Circus, Coliseu Lisboa and The Roundhouse. . We will be working on developing our show “The Double Draw” with the support of the Launchpad program!

Introducing our 2026 Breakthough Artist 🔨 🔨 Tamm Reynolds (@midgittebardot ) Tamm Reynolds is a London-based performer, live artist, actor, singer, writer, (often performing as their drag alter-ego Midgitte Bardot). They subvert power dynamics for breakfast. They take their time and the piss. They’re the funniest person I know. They do cabaret. Their full-length-show, Shooting From Below sold out three nights in Southbank Centre’s Purcell Room in April 2026. 🔨 Breakthrough - A one-year commission for a mid or late-career creative to break the barriers to mainstream success. Image Descriptions: 1 - A bold and colour graphic featuring abstract artwork by Rachel Gadsden, right brush strokes of oranges and purple make harsh angles behind a hand written “Breakthrough” in white. Digitally imposed is a black and white image of Tamm Reynolds with an orange border. The bottom of the image includes white logos of CRIPtic Arts and Arts Council England. 2 - Tamm Reynolds performing on stage as Midgitte Bardot, with Nicol Parkinson on guitar. Photo by Holly Revell.

🥚 Meet CRIPtic Arts’ 2026 Incubate Cohort 🥚Amanda Grace / Factory of Love (@astuteandkind / @factoryoflove ) Amanda Grace is the Lover of Good Chaos at Factory of Love, a mad-led storytelling collective. Co-founded with Jess Corner, Factory of Love is dedicated to channeling the radical roads to loving discovered by mad and neurodivergent artists into community-based acts of care that cultivate transformative justice. 🥚Tríus / House of Tríus (@houseoftrius ) House of Tríus is a neurodivergent-led creative incubator building a sustainable ecosystem where artists facing structural barriers can share tools, collaborate, and make work together — without having to fit into structures that weren't designed for the way they think. Founded by interdisciplinary artist Tríus Douglas, the project spans digital infrastructure, concierge-style creative support, and live performance. 🥚Kirin Saeed / Visually Impaired Creators Scotland (@vicreatorsscotland @kirin_saeed ) Kirin is a visually impaired disability consultant, cultural leader and founder of Visually Impaired Creators Scotland. Her work focuses on empowering disabled audiences and artists, making work that is built around access. She is also a playwright, and has written two successful shows for the Edinburgh Fringe. She has provided access consultancy for major arts organisations across the UK. In three years, Visually Impaired Creators Scotland (VICS) has built a profile as an essential member of the Scottish disability arts community. VICS works to inspire, promote and encourage the work of VI artists through idea sharing, collaborative performances, workshops and monthly newsletters. Their previous work includes ‘Crossing Care’ (2020), ‘Cabaret in the Dark’ (2023), and ‘Sense of Loss’ (2024). Incubate - A leadership development programme for disabled people creating cultural change in the arts, whether as individuals or by building small organisations. Continued in comments...

Introducing our Reach 2026 Cohort… 🌱 🌱 Georgi Arthur (@georgi_arthur ) Georgi is an actor-singer with a passion for writing. A graduate of the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, she is a recipient of the SOLT Laurence Olivier Bursary and a Spotlight Prize Award Finalist. Having performed in Criptic's "The Acts 2025", she decided to apply for the Reach programme to steer her written work into the world of playwriting. 🌱 Caroline Williams (@caroline_mary_williams ) Caroline is an award-winning director and multi-disciplinary artist. She is currently Associate Artist at The Bristol Old Vic. Her directing work has been seen across the UK including at The National Theatre, Bristol Old Vic, The Young Vic, The Globe, The V&A Museum and Galway International Festival. Caroline has recently begun a practice as a playwright. 🌱 Rana Bader (@rana.bader_ ) Rana is a Palestinian Muslim actor and theatre-maker from London. After doing the rounds working across various theatre companies in the UK, she is keen to make her own work. Rana is dedicated to telling authentic stories about Muslim women living in the West. 🌱 Maya Owen (@mayaceliaowen ) Maya Owen is an anti-disciplinary artist and activist based between London and Essex. Her work tends towards reparative histories, utopian futures, and the interconnectedness of everything. If you meet her at a party, she will tell you she is Mad, gay, and once broke into the British Museum inside a wooden horse. 🌱 Kimberley Capero (@kimberleycapero @spoilerrotten ) Kimberley (she/they) is an East London/Essex born working class artist. She trained at East 15 Acting School and works across theatre, drag, vo/audio, film and community projects. Kimberley’s theatre credits include Gaggle at Soho Theatre and Alice in Rotterdam by Jon Brittain. Spoiler Rotten, Kim’s drag king persona was born on Soho Theatre’s Drag & Cabaret Lab in 2021. He was a finalist in Man Up & NADC All Stars (supported by Royal Central School of Speech and Drama). Continued in comments...

🚀 Introducing our Launchpad 2026 Cohort! 🚀 Fran Bushe (@franbushe ) Fran Bushe is a disabled and neurodivergent artist and an award-winning writer and performer. She is known for her funny, candid and poignant storytelling. Her play A Gig for Ghosts won the Tony Craze Prize and her solo show Ad Libido had multiple sold-out runs. She wrote The Diary of My Broken Vagina for Channel 4 and her book My Broken Vagina was published in 2021. 🚀 Jordan Charles (@iamjordancharles ) I write Magical Black Stories. I am a Queer Person of Colour, Disabled artist, novelist, playwright, composer, vocalist and storyteller. I bring a decade of experience in creating and performing for a diverse range of audiences. I’m currently beavering away, developing two musicals and a novel for people like Harper Collins, Book, Music & Lyrics and Manchester's Islington Mill. 🚀 Kathryn Bond (@misskathrynbond ) Kat is a queer, working-class writer, actor and comic originally from Essex. When not performing or developing shows with other humans is making her own unique comedy shows that combine stand up, clown and mostly lovely but often anarchic characters. Kat has written for CBBC's Bafta award winning 'Class Dismissed' and more recently 'Odd Squad'. She won The Funny Women Comedy Writing Award and has been developing scripts for TV since. Kat has a new diagnosis of RP and is visually impaired. Humour drives most of her work and she loves how helpful it is in storytelling. 🚀 Hannah Finn and Morgan Barbour (@hannahfinn ) My work explores the body as both material and language, questioning how physical extremes can hold emotional, political and narrative meaning. Our creative practice sits at the intersection of high-level circus skill and character-driven storytelling, using physical metaphor to explore emotional states that are often misunderstood or medicalised. My contortion dance and physical theatre practice interrogates the limits of the body, combining choreographic structure with extreme physicality to generate new movement languages. (Continued in comments)

What’s that? An announcement on the horizon? 🔥 🔥 We can’t wait to introduce you to this year’s #CRIPticArtists! Watch this space this week for a detailed look at each cohort and the fantastic artists we’ll be supporting. We can’t wait to see the work that gets made! Let’s gooo! 🚀🎨 🎭📖✨ Image Description: Text reads "Meet our CRIPtic Artists" on a background of black with bold green and blue paint splatters with the CRIPtic and Arts Council England logos.

We want to hear from you! 📣 This year, CRIPtic Arts are celebrating 3 Years of Connect Through Creativity 🎉 To celebrate all of the incredible workshops and disabled creatives who have been a part of this community, we're gathering feedback to put together and share our story. We'll be creating video content for CRIPtic Arts' online platforms (social media, website etc.) to mark this anniversary. Your feedback will also help us to keep running these free workshops. Have you attended or facilitated one of our workshops? Maybe you've read at one of our Writing Salons with @londonwriterscentre ? Head to the link in our bio to share your feedback! ✨ You can also opt in to be entered into a prize draw to win a £50 gift e-voucher for your participation - we'll let the winner of the e-voucher know by September 2026. 📸 @shonalouise_photography Image Description: Ada, a young Nigerian woman in a rehearsal room smiles behind a laptop and mug.