The Theatre of the Underbelly - research
Setting the Scene
The Theatre of the Underbelly is an immersive experience situated in a ruined graveyard in Bath. It takes guests on a journey of morality meant to inspire an indelible change in those that experience it.
My initial research consisted of a series of exploratory transect walks through Bath to investigate not just the shiny exterior of the city, but also the subtleties of its underbelly. Bath is a city of layers and contradictions, and the story of its underbelly is one of overcoming preconceptions about a place that presents as one-dimensional but in reality, consists of many facets. Whilst carrying out these transects, I experienced an alchemical change within myself where I entered as one person and left as another. The Theatre of the Underbelly is an exploration of the power of narrative in architecture, and how architecture can induce an alchemical change. The Theatre provides the scenery for a story that I wrote in the style of a medieval morality play. These plays were allegorical dramas that aimed to teach the audience the lessons of right and wrong. They follow an ‘everyman’ character who represented humanity as they struggle through initial temptations, a fall into chaos and the eventual redemption where they find God. In my story, rather than reaching a divine salvation through God, it is the acceptance of our insignificance in the face of the natural world that inspires acceptance and humility in the characters. This links with ideas on how we can use narrative to understand and accept our place within complex existential issues such as the climate crisis.
The architecture of the Theatre provides the scenery for the play and consists of seven scenes set in seven ‘buildings’:
THE ENTRANCE HALL – where guests become part of the story
THE DINING ROOM – where they experience the death of what came before
THE BATHS – where they are subject to the chaos of change
THE FOREST – where they experience a realignment of ideals
THE SHIPWRECK – where they experience the sublime power of nature
THE CRYPT – where they reach a state of equilibrium by accepting the inevitability of their death
THE CHAPEL – where they are invited to take a piece of this fictional world as a memento
Although this is a piece of paper architecture, the challenge is to think how it would exist in the real world. The Theatre is a complete fabrication: the ruined façades of the Entrance Hall are not really ruined, just as the hot waters of the natural Baths is not naturally hot like it is in the city so it must be artificially heated. Therefore, the other half of the project consists of a behind-the-scenes exposé of the practical functions of the Theatre. Just as Bath is a fabrication of smoke and mirrors, interspersed with grains of authenticity, so too is the Theatre of the Underbelly.
Narrative Creation
My research has focused on journeys and narrative. I’ve been inspired by a book - Rings of Saturn by W.G. Sebald - that takes the reader on a semi-fictional walk down the Suffolk coast. Although it is this journey that forms the backbone of the book, Sebald presents us with hundreds of interconnected tangents inspired by people and places he encounters along the way. At the end of the journey, although Sebald has only travelled a short way up the coast, he also manages to transport us thousands of miles away exploring scrapsof lost history and unreliable memories. It is his ability to weave a coherent path between hundreds of seemingly disparate points that I am drawn to. Although at first it is fragmented and blurry, the narrative arc is clear to see by the end. It is this non-linear narrative that creates such an incredibly powerful experience, and you leave that book with your head reeling and your ideas about the world fundamentally changed.
The Theatre of the Underbelly sets out to explore how architecture as an experience can induce ‘alchemical change’ in those who experience it. This idea is derived from the writer and director Antonin Artaud’s Theatre of Cruelty where he proposed a style of theatre where the audience becomes immersed in the narrative, and gesture and movement take precedence over text to create a multi-sensory environment that seeks to change the viewer in an ‘alchemical’ way. Artaud aimed to create an experience that wouldn’t just entertain but would make us understand our place in the universe and the relationships between man, the environment and the Divine. By accepting our insignificance when presented with a higher power. I have formed a version of this within my project that takes visitors on a journey that represents a different aspect of the journey of alchemical change. Seven different ‘scenes’ explore the different stages of change within the visitor.
The scenes are:
BECOMING FATALITY CHAOS REALIGNMENT THE SUBLIME EQUILIBRIUM MEMORY
This project looks to get under the skin of Bath and those who experience it. It is not something to be built (although it could be). It is not a viable project to be picked up by a developer (although I’d like it
to be). It is instead a story, illustrated with architecture. This was inspired by Douglas Darden’s collection of story buildings ‘Condemned Buildings’.