Feet First: Edinburgh's Hogmanay Gets Performative

On the first day of 2009, while the majority will be nursing hangovers or spending quiet time with their families, Edinburgh’s Royal Mile will play host to many of Scotland’s most exciting performers. From old lags like Mischief La Bas, who have been erupting at happenings across the world for over a decade, through the masters of mobile monument Puppet Lab, with Al Seed leading his diploma students through Windows of Opportunity, to Iron Oxide and Boilerhouse’s aerial finale, the new year will be welcomed by the nation’s vibrant creators.

Paul Pinson, founder and artistic director of Boilerhouse and co-director of the Feet First project, has a clear mission in mind. Despite his company’s international reputation, he was concerned that his city base was getting a raw deal. “We did a feasibility study looking at creating an outdoor theatre event in the city: it’s been an ongoing area of interest for quite some time, to do some work for Edinburgh. Much of work in the past few years has been for export.”

Having worked on site-specific pieces from Glasgow’s Kingston Bridge through to French beaches, Pinson has developed a powerful outdoor aesthetic.
“Over a year ago, the council approached me to create something for Hogmanay, and I said I was more interested in creating an event than just a show,” he remembers. “I wanted opportunities for many artists. And they were open to that. I got hold of Chloe Dear from Iron Oxide and Feet First was born as an idea: the council said yes.”

Feet First will taking over the Royal Mile from 7.30pm on Hogmanay, inviting the audience to travel through a series of works that draw from visual and performance traditions. Orkestra Del Sol will be knocking out their brass-driven tunes, Eric MacLennan will be preaching from the battlements and Puppet Lab will be making dreams come true.

Symon MacIntyre can explain this vision in more detail. “Our idea is to collect the thoughts and hopes and dreams of the people for the new year and put them into a giant processer.” This will be done through three linked, huge puppets. He continues, “The first sculpture has lots of ears on it, and you whisper into it. That’s the gatherer. The second one is the broadcaster and it is moving through the crowd. And eventually the final one is the giver, which gives you your dream in the form of a love heart: a sweet dream.”

Puppet Lab’s work emerges from a deep appreciation of mythological resonance, a sort of all-ages work that patronises no-one: comprehensible for children but satisfying for adults. This inclusivity – and accessibility - were the main parameters set by Pinson and Dear.

Despite the adventurousness of many artists, Pinson is quick to point out that “the main thing is entertaining the public. Ten thousand people are going to come along and have a great time. A fantastic mix of stuff for them to experience.”

But Pinson was almost as concerned with the potential for the performers. “Also it offers opportunities for people to collaborate together,” as well as, for Scottish artists, to present their work to a home crowd. “There are lots of really strong artists, and this is a chance for that talent to show that it exists in Scotland. We know it does: it just gets very few opportunities here. Those artists are proven over many years: their international profile is great.”

For Pinson, this is more than just a one-off event. Future large-scale, outdoor shows are on the horizon, and Feet First stakes Scotland’s claim to have the performers who will generate them. “On the horizon are the 2012 Cultural Olympiad and 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games: are Glasgow going to import all the artists from abroad? I would hope not.”

Feet First works on multiple levels: it is an audition piece for Scotland’s experimental artists, demonstrating how they can create pieces that are accessible and challenging; it is a celebration of indigenous ability and skill; it is an attempt to fuse rich traditional symbolism with contemporary aesthetics; and it is a long street party with a parade of dreamers and musicians, dark alleyways and closes revealing hidden art, brilliant architecture housing fascinating choreography, all culminating in a trapeze display from Wired Aerial Theatre. It is an evening of inspiration and optimism, proclaiming Scotland’s creativity on a day that usually suffers from the excesses of the previous night.