In this episode, we are joined by Olya Petrakova, a theatre director and creative industries practitioner. With a track record in producing, curating, and organising festivals, events and conferences, Olya is passionate about cross-disciplinary collaborations and community engagement. In addition, Olya is lecturing on MA Creativity at the University of Exeter, she is a co-Artistic Director of ARTEL (American Russian Theatre Ensemble Laboratory), a visual theatre company, and Artistic Director of Maketank, a cultural lab in Exeter. 

Episode highlights

We explore questions such as, 'How are stage layout, costume design and props used as a form of visual jargon to help set the scene for an audience?', 'What is it about the arts that makes it a credible way of communicating real life relationships, emotions and stories?', and 'How might we understand the difference between a cultural hub and a cultural lab?'.

Olya also gives her entry to our series feature, 'What Does It All Mean?', where one or several speakers share a piece of jargon that they know, and the hosts must guess - to varying levels of success - what the term or phrase means.

Olya's fascination in the use of jargon within theatre

"Performing arts and events industries use specialised nomenclature to streamline communications when it comes to directions (e.g. stage right, stage left), as well as specific names that relate to staging and technology. Those are all part and parcel of working in any specialised environment. But in theatre - an ancient art form full of peculiar rituals and superstitions - the jargon is particularly piquant: saying 'Macbeth' in a theatre space is considered bad luck, using 'ghost light' to ward off evil spirits (or avoiding an accident?), saying “break a leg” instead of “good luck” before performance starts (in French theatre that expression is "Merde!'', which means... well, you might already know...)" Olya Petrakova