Voidspace Dispatches, April 2025: new frontiers, last chances, and a spaceship in your basement
Interactives arts news
It's been a busy month here in the Void. We spent the first part of April with our heads down, as we reviewed more than 100 submissions for Voidspace Live, which comes to Theatre Deli on June 7-8th.
We have a super exciting programme to share with you, including:
- over 30 shows
- over dozen installations
- 15 shows getting their public premiere at Voidspace Live
- 4 workshops
- 4 larps
- 3 one to one shows
- 3 shows involving demons
- 2 party shows
- 2 Jubensha
- 1 self guided audio piece
- 1 pervasive game
- 1 piece of furniture
- 1 sing song
and lots more.
Check out the programme here and secure your place at what is going to be a very special weekend.
Beyond the Void, April is an exciting month for the wider interactive arts world, as Darkfield takes over Shoreditch Town Hall for the whole month, Broken Bone Bathtub comes to London for a limited run, and the London Games Festival brings us the last chance to be part of Now Play This, as the experimental games behemoth opens its doors for the last time.
Get out there and play.
Voidspace at home
interactive arts to experience at your own pace
Voidspace in conversation:
Read our conversation with remote theatre innovators and sci fi lovers CirqueSaw. We talk to company creators Nicole Orabona and Nathan Leigh about the origins of their groundbreaking practice, the practicalities of creating remote interactive theatre, and what it's like to have a spaceship in their basement.
Pre-order Voidspace in Conversation, Volumes 1 & 2: the collected hard copy conversation series and a curated selection of essays, provocations and conversation starters about interactive art.
Voidspace explores
interactive arts listings
VoidThings
Voidspace events coming up this month and next:
FREE Interactive fiction workshops: Thanks to the generosity of the Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation, we are able to offer three workshops introducing different ways of creating interactive fiction:
The last workshop in the series is a remote workshop from Voidspace poet Mark Ward, introducing us to Twine, the branching narrative tool he used to create CYOA sonnet, Faultlines. Beginner friendly and promising to be fun!
Sunday 13 April, 8pm
Voidspace Meets: meet fellow friends of the Void, share what you’re working on and bounce ideas around the Void in our creatives networking meet.
Thursday 8 May 2025, from 6pm Theatre Deli
Free event - register here
Strange Play: this month's online meet sees us playtest Longing, a new piece of remote interactive theatre from Craig Edgar
Sunday 25 May from 8pm
Free event - register here
Tickets for Voidspace Live (in association with Theatre Deli) are now on sale! Our festival of interactive arts returns to Theatre Deli on 7 & 8 June 2025.
Tickets are going fast, so bag your space in the Void while you can
Online events
ISKLANDER by SWAMP Experience - A three part series of online escape experiences, Working together as a team, follow along this immersive adventure that involves scouring the internet, solving puzzles and uncovering the grand conspiracy.
Online
Various dates until 26 April 2025
Lennox Mutual by Candle House Collective - Welcome to Lennox Mutual: a Life En-surance company, here to help you make the most of the time you have. We offer policies – to get yours, all you have to do is make an appointment.
For more information, book a one-on-one phone session. Our live representatives are trained to make you feel, make you think, and of course, make you smile. You’ve never experienced service like ours. Read our conversation with Candlehouse Collective here.Online
Various dates, 2025
In-person events
April 2025
Broken Bone Bathtub - After over 600 performances in 40 different cities and the feature of an award winning documentary, Broken Bone Bathtub comes to London for the 10 year anniversary of the show. After a serious bike accident, your friend Siobhan borrows your bathtub and asks for your help. You join her by the tub for about an hour.
Leytonstone or Battersea, London
2 April and 12 April
DARKFIELD @ THE DITCH - Four immersive, audio pieces that combine sensory effects and 360 binaural sound.
Headline: ARCADE - A ‘choose-your-own-path’ experience that allows players to decide where the story takes them.
DOUBLE - A troubling exercise in familiarity for two people sitting opposite each other.
VISITORS - A reflection on our irrepressible desire to touch that explores why the dead find so little comfort in the world of the living.
ETERNAL - Experienced lying down in a bed, this piece explores the quandary of eternal life and wonders what price you would pay to achieve it.
Shoreditch Town Hall, London
1 - 17 April 2025
The Argument - Spare the Rod Theatre presents an opportunity to argue with them. In this 60 minute show and “entirely serious experiment”, the performers will be guided by the audience to have heated exchanges and answer big questions.
Barons Court Theatre, London
8 - 12 April 2025
NOW PLAY THIS Running for its final year, Now Play This is a festival of experimental game design. Expect workshops, games, talks, exhibitions and family friendly activities focused on experimental and art games. Also with an online programme!
Somerset House, London
11 - 12 April 2025
asses.masses - London Games Festival - a custom video game designed to be played from beginning to end by a live audience, one person at a time. It’s a 7+ hour epic story of a herd of unemployed donkeys trying to get their jobs back, all while navigating the perils of a post-Industrial society in which they’ve been made redundant.
Battersea Arts Centre, London
12 - 13 April 2025
Future Ritual Festival - A new festival of choreographic work, performance art, ritual offerings and sonic activations.
Various venues in London and Venice
23-27 April 2025
Sh!t Theatre: Or What’s Left Of Us - Folk music, singing along and a trip to the bar later for a singaround. Beautiful, poignant and some wonderful interactive moments.
Bristol Old Vic
8-19 April 2025
Jury Games, live - play , sift through evidence and interview defendants to get to the truth. Read our conversation with creator Tom Black.
Theatre Deli, London
Ongoing until September 2025
Bridge Command - Ever wanted to fly your own starship? Fully interactive adventures in space from the team behind Parabolic Theatre. Read our conversation with Director Owen Kingston
Vauxhall, London
Ongoing until September 2025
May 2025
Feel the Sound: An Exhibition Experience on a Different Frequency - Co-produced by MoN Takanawa; The Museum of Narratives, a bold new multi-sensory experience exploring our personal relationship to sound and embracing a world of listening that goes beyond the audio.
The Barbican, London
22 May to 31 August 2025
Faust - Seth Kriebel & Zoe Bouras - Come in. Have a seat. Name your price. From the creators of The Unbuilt Room, Discover a new version of a very old story, with an interactive twist. Read our conversation with Seth & Zoe.
15 May - South Street Theatre, Reading
16 May - Attenborough Arts Centre, Leicester
S L E E P by Moi Tran - Tran will curate a series of creative sharings, and extends an invitation to all sleepers be part of a ritual as part of this commemoration.
Toynbee Studios, London
17 to 18 May 2025
Multisensory Storytelling Summit - Come together with MyWorld Bristol to explore key innovations in the multisensory storytelling space.
The Sheds, Bristol, UK
29 May 2025
Call of Cthulhu Live - Join Keeper of Arcane Lore Mark Meer and an all-star cast of Investigators as they confront the terrors of the Cthulhu Mythos in this live version of the TTRPG.
O2 Institute, Birmingham
29 May 2025
Earth and Sky - Presented by Opera North as part of Bradford City of Culture, this immersive soundwalk uses geolocation technology to trigger new sounds as you walk through the epic moorlands of Penistone Hill.
Penistone Hill Country Park
May - October 2025
June 2025
Voidspace Live 2025 (in Association with Theatre Deli) - Join us for a weekend in the Void as we showcase the best grassroots interactive art. Weekend and day tickets available
Theatre Deli, London
7-8 June 2025
Game of Shrooms 2025 - An Easter egg hunt for unexpected art.
Worldwide
14 June 2025
Jonah Non Grata: Inspired by the Book of Jonah–and probably God–award winning Shunt artist Simon Kane presents his hugely acclaimed, horrifyingly evergreen divine comedy about the extremist in all of us: “Jonah Non Grata”– an exciting biblical adventure in which YOU are the hero, played by HIM!
Fun hymns! Tiny Stunts! Is it a church for a churchless faith? Is it a loud man getting things wrong? SEE the unmapped complexities of the human soul brought to stupid life! SEE a man on a plane! SEE something in the corner!Soho Theatre, London
21 June 2025
STOREHOUSE - With a stellar team, new immersive company Sage and Jester present STOREHOUSE. In a vast, disused warehouse in Deptford – once the paper store of Britain’s most influential newspapers – you’ll uncover a sprawling, hidden archive, built to house every news story, message, memory and meme ever transmitted across digital networks the world over.
Deptford Storehouse
4 June - 20 Sep 2025