Creating the Colchester Fringe Festival: Finding the ‘fringe’ experience

In this thesis I document a Practice as Research project that explores the creation of the inaugural Colchester Fringe Festival in 2021. I use a constellation of field-research, case-studies and autoethnographic experiences to create an original methodological framework, which I define as ‘artist-centred creative producing’, to explore my journey in designing and delivering the Colchester Fringe from 2019 to 2021. The methodology is guided by my first-hand experiences as a ‘fringe artist’, observation visits and original interviews conducted with fringe festival leaders and makers, which in-turn has allowed the creation of future practice within this PhD. The thesis is supported by video documentation which consists of a series of festival recordings and filmed diary entries from 2019 to 2021 and highlight the key events and decisions that took place in creating the festival including the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Through a series of case-studies, I analyse the main Fringe models used by fringe festival leaders and will outline the differences and benefits of each individual model, gesturing towards their hybrid futures. I utilise Bakhtinian theory, in particular the exploration of ‘carnival’ and the extra licence this space grants to alternative and transgressive modes of social behaviour as explored in Rabelais and his World (1965). Bringing queer theory alongside Bakhtin, this thesis will ask if Fringes are a potential ‘queertopia’ for its participating communities and will unpick the unique nature of the ‘fringe experience’ for artists. In this thesis I explore the conditions needed to design and deliver a fringe festival for Colchester, the key principles of Fringe, the relationship between a fringe festival and its community and the benefits artists can gain through performing their work at a fringe festival. These research questions allow me to apply knowledge and insight to my practice in producing the Colchester Fringe Festival, making recommendations for future artist-centred creative producing. I determine that the conditions needed to design and deliver a new fringe festival are Place, Space and Artists as well as the importance of creating a ‘fringe atmosphere’. Finally, I will conclude that if a festival can execute an artist-centered perspective through its modelling, then artists are more likely to have a positive experience, leading to a more productive festival environment.