Beach Image Credits: Jayne Jackson Photography
About Alice
Alice is a writer, movement practitioner, theatremaker and highly experienced facilitator working in community arts.
Alice trained internationally as a director and actor in Viewpoints and Composition and the Suzuki Method with Zen Zen Zo Physical Theatre, Australia. She has a degree in English Literature from Cardiff, University of Wales.
Alice’s community arts work is diverse, ranging from working with vulnerable and marginalised adults in creative contexts through to tutoring movement for acting at higher education level. She is based in Bournemouth, Dorset.
See past projects here.
Current Projects
Alice facilitates a weekly Writing for Wellbeing group for Vita Nova, a vibrant arts organisation and recovery community. She has been a visiting tutor at Arts University Bournemouth on the Creative Writing Short Courses Programme since 2023 and, in 2024, has taught movement and devising on the Acting Degree Course at AUB.
Alice is a co-director of Grace the Space, a free and inspiring community project for women, founded by artists Natasha Nixon and Ruth Pitter in 2021. The project exists to remove access barriers and create opportunities for diverse and marginalised groups of women to enjoy outdoor spaces and explore creativity together across Dorset.
In 2024, Grace the Space team were awarded a Seedbed Residency at 101 Outdoor Arts to develop their company and work. They are again partnering with National Landscapes, FLAVOURS and Dorset Food and Drink to deliver a summer season of uplifting, creative events in nature.
Alice is currently working on her first play for radio.
See past projects Alice has worked on here.
Community Arts
Alice creates uplifting, encouraging spaces in which people can explore and grow creatively and personally.
Alice has over 19 + years of experience working within community arts across the areas of creative writing, movement and performance.
Alice has facilitated wild writing walks in nature in partnership with Step into Nature, ArtfulScribe writing agency and Grace the Space, presenting her findings and reflections on an embodied approach to writing in nature at multiple writing and wellbeing symposiums.
In 2023, she facilitated on The Gathering Project for Fluid Motion Theatre using drama for wellbeing and to increase self-esteem. Alice worked with both young adults and adults with special needs.
For ArtfulScribe writing agency, Alice co-project-managed and delivered the Stories From Our Streets project. The multi-strand project offered free creative writing sessions to children and adults in order to nurture unheard voices and gather community stories, fostering greater connection and awareness. The team worked in collaboration with local libraries, community groups and was part of Bournemouth Writing Festival and Arts by The Sea Festival, Bournemouth.
During her time as co-director of Valise Noire Storytelling Theatre (2018 – 2022) with Michele O’Brien, the company created Women of Words, Dorset, a multi-form performance project working with women who experienced domestic abuse, to create new work inspired by female experiences in Dorset past and present. The project was funded by the National Heritage Lottery Fund.
Find out more about Alice’s community arts work on the projects page.
Writing
Alice’s distinct writing style often blends the lyrical with the everyday and humour with darkness. Alice is particularly interested in creating stories that speak to the human condition, existential questions and invite an audience into in-between realms. In these liminal spaces, the familiar becomes strange and new worlds and ways of being and seeing can emerge. Alice is currently working on her first play for radio.
In January 2024, Alice presented an interactive creative writing installation piece, MentorShip, as one of the cohort of commissioned artists for Diverse Capacities. As part of this she wrote pieces based on reflections on meaningful mentoring relationships as shared by members of the public.
As a playwright, Alice was longlisted for Women in Theatre Lab, 2024. In 2023, she was was awarded a Sanctuary residency at Lighthouse, Poole’s Centre for the Arts and received funding from the Dorset Community Fund for mentoring with award-winning playwright Anita Sullivan. Alice also received support from Activate Performing Arts and ArtfulScribe to develop new writing during the residency.
In 2022, Alice wrote and performed the story of the ancient woodland goddess, Elen of the Ways, as part of Earth Kin Events Solstice celebration at the Ancient Technology Centre.
In 2021, Alice wrote the script for Women of Words, Dorset, with Valise Noire Storytelling Theatre, a piece exploring language, being ourselves and expressing ourselves freely. The play was based upon the writing developed during sessions with Valise Noire, written by community of Dorset women who had experienced domestic abuse. The project was funded by the National Heritage Lottery Fund and the play performed as part of BEAF Festival.
In 2020, Alice joined Theatre West’s Women Playwright’s Script Development programme to develop her play exploring infertility and relationships ‘Water, Feather, Stone’. Working with Valise Noire Storytelling Theatre, Alice also wrote a series of performance pieces and sketches ‘Things We Broke During Lockdown’ inspired by public reflections on life during the pandemic, which were filmed and shared online.
Find out more about Alice’s writing projects here.
Image: Alice as Elen of the Ways, Earth Kin Events. Image credit: AWD Photography
Movement for Joy, Unwinding and Thriving
Alice is an experienced movement practitioner. Her sensitive, intuitive, and often playful approach to facilitating movement is informed by her training in physical theatre, Hatha yoga and bodywork.
Alice teaches movement for acting and devising using Viewpoints and Composition (created by Anne Bogart and Tina Landau after Mary Overlie’s Six Viewpoints), influenced by the Suzuki Method for actors. Alice regularly facilitates community arts events that nurture an awareness and appreciation of the senses and movement.
Alice’s work invites participants to explore and enjoy the body, movement, connection and to express through physicality. This approach often leads to greater freedom, enriched creativity, joyful creative expression, personal growth and increased wellbeing.
Events with Alice
If you’d like to join Alice in future events, visit the events page or sign-up to her mailing list below to be notified of the latest happenings.
Events with Alice can range from community sessions for all, through to bespoke learning processes for artists and movement practitioners. Examples:
Movement in Nature.
An embodied approach to creative writing in nature.
CPD for actors in Viewpoints and Composition.
Dance journeys and freeform movement sessions.
The craft of creative writing.
Drama skills and drama for wellbeing.
Image credit: We Make Southampton
