karla shacklock company ltd

kjs production

I have two decades of really varied performance experience, both in my own works and as a collaborator with other artists and companies from across the globe.
Early in my career I was co-Artistic Director of multi award winning performance and digital media company Precarious, before touring with a whole range of companies such as street theatre company Avanti Display, dance theatre company Fleur Darkin Ensemble, the European collaboration Paradance and circus companyMimbre. I trained and performed with Butoh choreographer Marie Gabrielle Rotie in London, acclaimed Bodyweather practitioner Stuart Lynch in Belgium and Norway, and dabbled in parkour with Willi Dormar in Brighton. I collaborated with the wonderful Czech choreographer Lucie Petrusova (T.R.A.S.H) and together we toured Czech and Netherlands. I've performed at The Barbican with Theatre of the Absurd and done some wonderful R&D with both Complicite and National Theatre of Wales. And for a number of years in between all that, I made and toured my own works with Karla Shacklock Company. You can check out some of my productions below.

kjs performance - Niplash

NIPLASH

Niplash is painful, absurd, heartbreaking, heartwarming, and full of love – a lot like feeding. A highly physical and visual lactivist call to arms. Expect to see milk.

Niplash is part memoir, part critical analysis, and explores the cultural and societal pressures and insane mixed messaging around infant feeding. The issues are pressing and under researched and there is a pandemic of mums who feel like they are failing.

This dance theatre solo attempts to give voice not only to Karla’s own journey of eight years continual breastfeeding, but the beating heart of the work are the stories and feeding paraphernalia kindly donated by dozens of mums across the country.

“Niplash is powerful, playful, courageous, raw, funny, disturbing, angry, joyful and so many other adjectives besides. But what comes through so palpably already is just how important a story - or stories - that need to be told.” Chris Fogg – writer

“Groundbreaking, important, seminal work that deserves to be experienced as widely as possible.” Audience Member Reclaim Festival 2024

Originally developed on Complicité’s Mudlarks International Residency. Currently being further developed with the support of Complicite and Exeter Northcott.

Work in progress sharings took place in November 2024 at the Reclaim Festival in Exeter and in Wales as part of Going Solo Together, and at Bristol Old Vic in April 2025 as part of Gather Up Presents.

Last performance: 11th June, Reclaim Festival, Exeter

Performance dates for 2025 are to be announced soon.

If you are interested in supporting the further development of this show, then please do get in touch.

Never have I made a show which has attracted such an outpouring of people wanting/needing to share their experiences. So I'm collecting them all up and trying to honour them in the making of this new work. If you would like to share something, please get in touch. Click here.

kjs production

HAPPINESS

Fast, fun, thoughtful and physical 'The Happiness' is is a provocative and entertaining adventure, designed to make you laugh, weep and squirm with recognition.
Using the company's trademark combination of breakneck choreography, spoken word, live sound and ever transforming images, The Happiness is an emotional and colourful explosion of joy, grief and confusion, which has been made, and will be performed, through the company's unique artistic practice; the performers decide the structure of the work live in the moment of performance - meaning that each performance is completely unique!
Combining first person stories, case studies from across the globe and referencing a whole host of philosophers and self-proclaimed happiness gurus, the work throws happiness up for all to question, see, experience and, ultimately, feel.

"The Happiness genuinely made me happy! A life-affirming show which everyone will relate to & be warmed and tickled by."
Deryck Newland, Artistic Director, Pavilion Dance South West

THE BUTTERCUP

A brand new and highly electric double bill.

Raw, charged and universally resonant, The Buttercup is a simple yet powerful story about hope - expressed through the body and a series of everyday, continuously transforming, objects. Using live music and set against a constantly shifting visual landscape, Karla gives a physical and evocative performance and bravely bares her soul as she breathes life into The Buttercup.

The Crutch depicts a highly intense relationship between two bodies, two beings. Through extremely physical contact work, a vocabulary which swings from violence to tear jerking tenderness, a pounding live score and a huge pile of crutches, the duet explores what it means and how it feels to be there for someone at a time of crisis. Created and performed using the company's own distinctive practice, the performers decide the structure of the work live in the moment of performance - meaning that each performance is completely unique!

"I was blown away by the performance - amazing!" Wendy Petitdemange, Activate


	BEYOND Physical raw performance, cutting-edge design, live sound - an extraordinary immersive event. Led playfully by the new inhabitants of a ghosted space you will bear witness as lids are lifted from glass jars and a symphony of real experiences spill into the nooks and crannies of the building and into your hearts and minds. Embark on an unknown adventure; lose yourself in a mysterious journey and join us for the after party. Beyond. A world where experiences are created. Produced by Theatre Bristol, Bristol Old Vic and Circomedia, co-commissioned by Bristol City Council. "Beyond is a truly extraordinary, powerfully unique theatrical experience" Bristol Culture Magazine "Beyond is about imagination and memory. Its genuine beauty, physical punch and superior storytelling make for an evening that will last with you long after the performers leave you." The Public Reviews





	The hysteric highs, agonizing lows and safe plateaus of the years 1980 - 2011 were pickled in glass jars. Shacklock physically, and mentally ricocheted through the years and allowed them to fall, seep and explode into an ever-changing landscape. "31 years is elegantly staged and wittily choreographed and is testament to Karla's skill and perception as an accomplished theatre-maker and dancer who is passionate about truth, and how to share that with her audiences." Kate Yedigaroff, BOV Supported by Ferment. UK tour 2012	Intent on challenging the norms of physical performance Shacklock and Petrusova worked across countries and brought together a cross-disciplinary ensemble. Combining cutting edge costume design, high octane performance and live composition, the work architected bodies as forms of physical matter, to go far beyond what we thought physically and vocally possible. 'Nobody' toured the UK, Netherlands and Czech Republic in 2011. "This is one of the most successful truly European pieces of theatre I have seen in an age." Pasco Q Kevlin, Lakeside Theatre Produced by L'avventura (Tilburg) and Productiehuis Brabant (Den Bosch). Supported by Arts Council England.

karla shacklock company ltd