O'Povo

​O’ Povo concerns the sugar plantation slave trade and was devised by Strange Fruit Company. The piece combines a modern sugar trade office with the life of slaves in the plantations. Tate & Lyle both made their fortunes from the activities of slavery, Henry Tate funded the building of the Tate Modern, inspiration for the uses of sugar in the piece were taken from this. Focus was given to symbolism, intense, crisp imagery, day to day rituals and attention to economical symmetry. There is constant repetition throughout the piece to create the feeling of the daily, mundane grind of the modern office jobs, combined with the brutal, extreme daily routines of the slaves in the sugar plantations. ’Exploited, plundered, assaulted and unknown, this anonymous mass is called… O’Povo’ (The people) ‘Elegant and economic in its visualisation and presentation, following a crisp aesthetic that complimented and amplified the corporate image of the world of trade and commerce that the work evoked. The success of the work was in its strength of presentation alongside the fragility of the enslaved human being. Poetics and politics found a home in this labour of theatre-making.’ Dr Simon Persighetti. 2013
 
 The entire piece was created from extensive research and extreme workshops. The paper trail ending was from an article concerning a slave called Priscilla who left a paper trail wherever she went so she could be traced through history, we decided this to be a story that needed to be told again to keep it alive. N/B. Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian art form which combines martial arts, music, and dance created in Brazil by slaves from Africa. Some were forced to work on sugar and tobacco plantations, we wanted to include this art form in our work as a symbol of struggle and of hope.