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The HopBarn is a micro residency and we supports Artists and Dance Residencies throughout the year with the aim to offer a very focused and intensive period for any companies to come to work, think, breathe, eat, sleep, explore together away from any distractions.

 

The HopBarn (our rehearsal and performance space) has onsite accomodation (3 bedrooms, 2 of them ensuite) attached to the creative space to allow 24 hours uninterrupted creative flow. Our rehearsal space is fitted with super warm underfloor heating with plenty of natural light.

Artists also have access to our wildlife consisting of 71 species of birds as well as our kKo research space which houses 386 art books and 157 dance and film dvds collection.

Pickup service is available from Newark Northgate or from Nottingham Train Station to The Hopbarn with prior arrangements.

To check for availability please email us. For more info about our various spaces.

Our Wildlife & Art Books Collection

Our Residency Accommodation

Our Rehearsal / Performance space

Current Residencies

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06.11 - 18.11.21

Daniel Lukehurst

Choreographer and composer Daniel Lukehurst will be returning to create a new work in our space.

Ta/To/Me tells the story of a man in trouble. As the world changes, we see what happens when he feels he must maintain a grip on the forces in his life, even if it means dealing with his stark reality. As he deals with the world open before him, he must make a choice whether to move on or keep looking back.

 

Choreographed and Composed by Daniel Lukehurst, Ta/To/Me looks at mental health in men and the emotional toll it can take on the psyche.

for more info

Past Residencies

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DAMAEDANCE

04.10 - 09.10.21

During their stay at The HopBarn, Alice and Sara (DAMAEDANCE) will be undertaking a research and development towards their next work (After)Party, an ambitious outdoor dance/physical theatre piece starring two dancers and a rotating set, supported by Arts Council Project Grants.

The piece will unfold the lives of Giorgia and Iris, two young women who find themselves sharing a flat at the beginning of 2020.

New jobs, a new house, a fulfilling, loud, slightly crazy social life - the world is their oyster and they’re ready for it. When the pandemic hits, their world suddenly stops and what they think they know about themselves starts to crumble.. 

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Milk Presents

03.09 - 05.09.21

Milk Presents a weekend long summer camp-style for early career queer artists, an opportunity for a wide group of UK, early career artists to develop intensive and specialised skills.

 

You can read more about their residency with us here.

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Dominie Hooper

25.07 - 30.07.21

Dominie Hooper is a singer, multi-instrumentalist and performer from Dartmoor, Devon but currently based in London. She explores crossovers between music and theatrical performance and is the catalyst behind the creative projects undertaken at The HopBarn by bringing together incredible musician in the past such as Yola, Ríoghnach Connolly, Mikey Kenney and Alabaster Deplume.

 

The HopBarn managed to steal some time to speak with Dominie about her process of creating songs, to read the interview, click here.

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Haris Kittos

3.07-10.07.21 & 1.08-8.08.21

Haris Kittos is a Greek visual artist and avant-garde composer who lives in London since 1998, when he moved there to study composition at postgraduate level, after completing his studies in music and fine art in Thessaloniki.

 

The core theme that preoccupies his current output is that there is no such thing as real repetition. Nothing can never be repeated exactly the same and this reminds us of the ephemeral nature of everything. However, acknowledging the fact that everything attains a brief but also unique presence in time and space, can enrich our perception and self-awareness. Furthermore in art, if time and space are formed during a moment of focused and repetitive action, it leaves a ‘record’ of the artist’s (or performer’s) meditative and intimate creative process, as he/she experiences that moment fully and deeply. In his work, this ‘record-making’ process has a core role in enhancing the ‘present moment’ awareness, especially when repetition is placed into context by working in obsessive detail with delicate and vulnerable materials: for him, the latter are essential tools to control time and space intuitively in an ‘organic’ manner, even if there is pre- planning in some cases. Ultimately, his aim is to seduce the viewer or listener to immerse themselves into the mindful world of each of his artworks (visual or musical, or both) and experience a ‘present moment’ communion with them.


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Simon Roth

04.09-11.09.20

Simon Roth is a multi-instrumentalist, improviser, curator and composer whose work straddles the Contemporary and Traditional. He is known first and foremost as a drummer and grew up within a family of musicians in a house between an old forest, the M25 and the Metropolitan line, immersed in Big Band Jazz, Free Improv, Classical music, Klezmer, 1960s Pop and a well worn tape of the Metropolitan Police Big Band performing The A Team Theme Tune, which was the sound of adventure in the form of press rolls and brass swells. Since then he has toured across Europe, North and South America and Asia. UK Performance highlights include Ronnie Scott’s International Piano Trio Festival, South Bank Centre, Kings Place Festival and opening of the EFG London Jazz Festival. Other festival appearances include Latitude, Green Man, Shambala and Wilderness.


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DAMAEDANCE

23.08-28.08.20

DamaeDance is a platform created in 2018 by Manchester-based dance artists Alice Bonazzi and Sara Marques to collaborate, produce and share their artistic vision through dance. Respectively from Bologna (Italy) and Porto (Portugal), they met in 2017 during their time as apprentice dancers with Company Chameleon in Manchester. Here they had the opportunity to work extensively together, exploring and deepening especially their knowledge of contact, partnering and improvisation under the direction of artistic directors Kevin Edward Turner and Anthony Missen. It’s during this time that the seed of the idea for IRMÃ, their first duet, was planted. Alongside Damae, Alice and Sara keep pursuing their independent careers as performers.


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Daniel Lukehurst

17.02.-22.02.20

Daniel and his company undertook a preliminary week at The Hopbarn in February and will return in March to conduct a second week before sharing the work created in Leeds on Friday 6th March. Here Daniel provides a short extract of his background and the work that he is interested in making. 

 

As a choreographer, I make work that is highly physical, presenting socio-political ideas in a grounded, personal way. I wish to make work across several artforms including Dance, Music, Film, Theatre and Installations. I'm not satisfied confining myself to 

just one discipline and over the last few years have endeavoured to make work that is usually a cross breed of many of these different elements. I am eager to explore as many avenues as I can within the performing arts sector and collaborate with other disciplines. 


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Matter of Fact Dance Company

3.02-09.02.20

Almost a year ago, Matter of Fact Dance came to The HopBarn to initiate a new work entitled era we are. Led by Choreographer and dancer Erin Pollitt, with Daisy Howell and Fanny Pouilot; Matter of Fact present quirky and inspiring work that take audiences on a trip back to the 1980’s and early 90’s.

Era We Are takes a good look at the way that popular trends and fashion in today’s society, dictates and controls the minds and soul of young people. Here, Erin is challenging our popular perception that through targeted media, social media platforms and the rise of the celebrity culture; young people are inclined to follow such trends, comply and replicate them rather than formulate their own identity and unique self-realisation. The work pulls apart this idea and looks to question what happens when we rebel and follow our own thoughts and opinions.


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Tom Dale Company 

30.09.-12.10.19

For the first two weeks of October Tom Dale Company undertook a last period of rehearsal before embarking on a UK your with a new production Step Sonic. The company and its Choreographer Tom Dale, are renowned for experimentation, creating and building custom made instruments and stage designs that provide a digital playground for the dancers. This marrying of dance and digital technology has established TDC as a leader in its field and the company has received numerous awards for its work bringing digital technology and performance together. 

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Anthony Matesna

07.01-11.01.19

Choreographer and company director Anthony Matesna was at The HopBarn rehearsing his latest work Lies to be The Truth which featured as part of Resolution 2019 at The Place in London. 

 

Lies To Be The Truth is influenced by the characters of Hamlet and Ophelia in William Shakespeare's Hamlet. The work particularly questions the themes of sanity, revenge and religion. 

 

Matsena Performance Theatre is a performance company, led by brothers Anthony Matsena and Amukelani Matsena. Having a strong background in different styles of Hip-Hop, African traditional dance and Krump, they madly merge contemporary movements together for a visceral and expressive experience of performance. 

 

Strongly moved by aspects of theatre, poetry and writing, the work tends to combine different aspects of performative arts. Above all, the many mediums of the work serve as a body to empower, explore, and inspire, accepting no substitute for curiosity or innovation. 

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Xavier Velastin

04.08-09.08.18

Me and My Whale was a multimedia work explored and further developed together with Hannah Mook here at The Hopbarn.

 

Xavier in supporting Hannah re-enact the relationship between the submariner and the whale offers a concrete and stable connection with the array of digital and computer technology. So often, when relying on computer technology, productions have come crashing down due to a ‘technical glitch’ but with Me and My Whale, your faith in Xavier and his extensive knowledge allows you to sit back and enjoy the work without fear that something disastrous is going to happen. 

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Rachel Clarke Dance Company

17.07-31.07.18

Towards the end of July, The HopBarn welcomed Rachel Clarke Dance Company for a weeks R&D. Following the conclusion of the company’s 3-week Research and Development, the company drafted a short blog of their time whilst at The HopBarn and at Yorkshire Dance in Leeds. 

 

The project itself has 2 strands: on the one hand, RCDC will make a piece of contemporary dance that explores the 7 barriers to effective communication (physical, perceptual, emotional, cultural, language, gender, and interpersonal – 

a quick Google will give you a decent crash course into them!), and on the other, they will raise awareness of the difficulties that the deaf/hard of hearing community have in engaging with the performing arts. 

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Brick Dance Company

1.10-14.10.17

Brick was a new company managed by Jazz Gritt and directed by Jo Delany and Daisy Howell.  Their ambitious new beginnings for the company looked to explore the possibilities of movement language and how dance work is formed. Their repertoire focused on the articulation of the human body through the power of contemporary dance technique.

 

The company’s prime aim is to produce work that not only stimulates and communicates effectively with audiences, but also challenged the dancers to push themselves to new extremes when honing in on dance in both its purest and expressive form.

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