Empatheatre co-founders Neil Coppen and Dylan McGarry will be exploring the last 10 years of their award-winning theatre company, Empatheatre’s work towards sculpting empathy in South Africa and around the globe through innovative public storytelling processes. Sharing principles, practices and processes of the Empatheatre methodology, including co-design, ethics of representation, political acupuncture, theatre-based research and their iterative “call and response” practice.

They will also be discussing the making of their latest work Unruly while launching the published text of their acclaimed play Isidlamlilo (by Wits University Press).

The workshop will be followed by a performance of Empatheatre’s newest production, Unruly, starring Andrew Buckland. Unruly is part of the international research project Unruly Natures which explores baboon/human interactions across the Cape Peninsula. The production is an extension of Unruly Natures research process and has been designed to help audiences reflect on the many complexities of human-baboon interactions in their neighbourhoods and regions.