CHOCFEST is a multi-artform, community engagement & performance project about Birmingham’s connections with chocolate. It is co-designed by The Bone Ensemble, groups & organisations of Stirchley & Bournville, academics & artists of West African heritage based in the Midlands & Ghana, & cocoa-growing communities in Ghana, for Commonwealth Games 2022.
Cadbury’s cocoa in Bournville still comes from Ghana, & at a moment when we are re-evaluating our colonial history, that historic connection offers a lens through which to explore the darker side of chocolate, as well as celebrate the positive potential of the idea of Commonwealth.
Together with community & professional artists & performers from Birmingham & Ghana, The Bone Ensemble will co-create an engaging, witty, site-based performance, to tell their stories of cocoa & chocolate through words, music & song, developing & expressing their creativity.
From the good intentions of George Cadbury, the use of slave labour then & now, we take a fresh look at the cocoa trade; we’ll chart chocolate’s rise to global commodity & remind ourselves of the power we all have as consumers.
CHOCFEST will be part promenade performance, part installation, part trail. Audiences encounter a sequence of playful, satirical & thought-provoking artistic interventions, metaphorically threaded together by the idea of joined hands: from the hands that harvest cocoa pods, to those that pick up and devour a chocolate bar in a local Bournville corner shop!
Chocolate the Cabaret: From Pod to Bar
Twice daily cabaret-style show features the mysterious Cocoa as band leader, with George Cadbury on the bass. Tetteh Quarshie on guitar and local chocolate-loving girl, Connie, on keys. All seems to be sweetness and light, but soon band tensions begin to bite, and the show's shiny wrapper threatens to be torn off...
A Creative City Project generously funded by Research England, Birmingham City Council and Feeney Charitable Trust. Supported by Bournville Village Trust, Selly Manor, Bournville Primary School and the British Council.
Website: theboneensemble.com
