What happens when the structures inside us with collapse?

A man goes to work. Again. And again. Even when there’s no work for him to go to.

In the reflections of office windows, in the slow climb of escalators, in the soft rustle of plants in a pocket-sized city garden, Uncle Dad repeats the rituals that hold his world together.

Part father, part worker, part ghost in the machinery of late capitalism, Uncle Dad can turn any corner of the city into an office.

But routines slip. systems glitch. Typing, rustling, humming all slide into other sounds —until the daily grind becomes something other, something new. 

Under the neat surfaces of work and order, something restless and unruly begins to grow. The Rewilding Of Uncle Dad is an interactive sound walk with live field recording and elements of collective play which asks if wildness lies under the civilized surfaces of our lives, and what will happen if we entice it out.

Our dad’s worlds fell apart when they retired. Even without work to go to, they would get up and ‘go to the office’ – plug themselves in to the computer, tidy their desk, break for lunch. We’re afraid of moving away from the routines and structures that keep us safe, but the world those structures belonged to is crumbling in front of our eyes. What happens if we don’t keep trying to hold on to job security, mortgages, pension plans, but let go of the civilising safety blanket and follow our instincts instead?

“We are psychogeographic trespassers. This is a project about un-mapping ourselves, about getting closer to what is really happening all around us, all the time.”

The Rewilding of Uncle Dad is a site-specific walking performance which asks how changing the way we experience our environment opens up new ways of seeing and being. We ask what wildness is and how we can ‘rewild’ ourselves in even the most unwild of places. We create a shifting world of live and pre-recorded audio, using specialist microphones which pick up the city’s invisible sounds, like electrical advertising boards and the footsteps of tiny underwater insects. The capitalist architecture of the city’s financial district is reimagined as a ‘natural’ environment by the participants as they walk it and listen to it, inviting playful synchronicities and new possibilities for connection.

Age guidance 10+

Previews this spring in Berlin & London

Lizzy Margereson – Concept, Creation, Performance

Michelle Madsen – Concept, Creation, Performance

Kate Carr- Field Recording and Sound consultant

Silvia Mercuriali- Mentor

Thomas Mayer- Sound

Nigel Barret and Louise Mari- Mentors

Rachel Gay- Outside Eye

Vincent Jondeau- Videographer

Annabel Steen- Photos