News Story

Isaac Shieh is this year's recipient of the £10,000 Alumni Fund for The Space Between Us, the final part of a trilogy of works created by Isaac.

Following a year-long residency and subsequent two-day R&D process supported by the Modulate Ideas Fund, this Alumni Fund award will enable Isaac to develop The Space Between Us as an interdisciplinary immersive theatre work that explores lived experiences of disability. 

This piece will build on Isaac's previous work The Shape of Absence, which he created during his year as a Musician in Residence with Paraorchestra, and which recently won the Best Original Score at the FOCUS Wales Film Festival.

The Alumni Fund offers grants to help sustain the groundbreaking work undertaken by our Musicians in Residence once they have completed their year in the programme, with support from the PRS Foundation Music Talent Development Network supported by PPL.

It became apparent that although now is not the time to approach it as a film, it is definitely the time to approach it as a live immersive theatre work that has the ability to form and develop in that environment, but also be shaped by the people that observe and participate in the work. It’s the right medium for us to create a work that needs to have certain elements of freedom, musically and theatrically, that film cannot provide.

Isaac Shieh

Since acquiring my disability, I have always been fascinated and passionate about exploring lived experiences of disability, as well as advocating for those experiences to be empathised in the wider context in order to create a more inclusive environment where disabled people can feel valued.

Isaac Shieh