Edited by Matthew Reason, Lynne Conner, Katya Johanson and Ben Walmsley. Forthcoming 2021. Without an audience there is arguably no performance. Yet for a long time the serious and systematic … Continue reading
Welcome
Matthew Reason is Professor of Theatre and Director of the Institute for Social Justice at York St John University.
This site incorporates an incomplete archive of projects.
Current Projects
Suitcase Stories is a Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded public engagement project that used storytelling to explore climate adaptation with young people. When we talk about climate change and … Continue reading
Suitcase Stories
Projects Archive
A portfolio of research and practice in the areas of audiences, narrative, theatre and dance.
Trenthem Books 2010. “This inspirational book, that cares passionately about the child’s gaze, should be welcomed and cherished.” (Tony Graham Artistic Director, Unicorn Theatre) “…a colourful and fascinating account of … Continue reading Matthew Reason with photographs by Chris Nash Photography has long been utilised as a medium that allows us to capture, see and reflect upon the world around us. This is … Continue reading One of my earliest pieces of research into theatre audiences explored young people’s perceptions of liveness in performance. Theatre is frequently defined by its ‘liveness’: that is by how it … Continue reading Does giving children plasticine help when interviewing them about watching dance? I have previous used visual arts workshops with groups of spectators to explore their experiences of dance and theatre. … Continue reading The Watching Dance project used qualitative audience research and neuroscience to explore how dance spectators respond to and identify with dance. It was a multidisciplinary project, involving collaboration across four … Continue reading Qualitative audience research frequently produces large amounts of unruly data. For myself the process of beginning to make sense of or find routes through the unordered mass of material that … Continue reading Togetherness is an underlying principle of community arts, which values being with other people as we make theatre, music and art together. The lockdowns and social distancing required by Covid-19 … Continue reading As a result of the collaborative partnership with Imaginate, and developing from the research into how children watch theatre, two resources were produced designed to help school classes enhance their … Continue reading ‘Where in your body?’ is a single question online audience research survey, piloted for performances of 5 Soldiers by Rosie Kay Dance Company and now also disseminated to Scottish Ballet … Continue reading Edited by Matthew Reason, Lynne Conner, Katya Johanson and Ben Walmsley. Forthcoming 2021. Without an audience there is arguably no performance. Yet for a long time the serious and systematic … Continue reading Archive, Empathy, Memory: The Resurrection of Joyce Reason This paper uses the prism of archival, ancestral research to consider the nature of our relationship to the lives of the … Continue reading Talking About Theatre consists of a series of booklets designed to facilitated children and young people’s post-show conversations about theatre and dance. Operating through a series of questions or instructions, … Continue reading Intellect, 2014 Edited Dee Reynolds and Matthew Reason A key interdisciplinary concept in our understanding of social interaction across creative and cultural practices, kinesthetic empathy describes the ability to experience … Continue reading Thanks to the hard work and dedication of Kaori Nakayama, my book The Young Audience has been translated and published in Japanese (2018). To mark this publication the book has … Continue reading Palgrave, 2006 The documentation of practice forms one of the principal concerns of performance studies, provding an ongoing dilemma for theorists and practitioners alike who at once celebrate the ephemerality … Continue reading Applied Practice: Evidence and Impact in Theatre, Music and Art engages with a diversity of contexts, locations and arts forms – including theatre, music and fine art – and brings … Continue reading After watching a dance performance with friends we often leave the theatre and find ourselves asking each other, ‘What did you think?’ Or perhaps, alternatively, ‘Did you enjoy it?’ That … Continue reading Storyknowing describes a series of activities, workshops, articles and conferences explores how we know in and through story. For two years between 2013-15, the International Centre for Arts and Narrative … Continue reading Drawing is at once immediate, and yet takes time. The marks on paper – pencil, crayon, ink, pen – appear instantly, they are real and absolute, but the process as … Continue reading The Doodle Book was developed through the course of 2019/20 in collaboration with Mind the Gap, artist Brian Hartley and a group of learning-disabled artists. The objective was to create … Continue reading
The Young Audience: Exploring and Enhancing Children’s Experiences of Theatre
Photography & the Representation of Kinesthetic Empathy
Young Audiences and Live Theatre
Researching with plasticine
Watching Dance: Kinesthetic Empathy
Interactive Mind Map
Creative Doodle Book
Resources for Schools and Teachers
Where in your body?
Routledge Companion to Audiences and the Performing Arts
Archive, Empathy, Memory
Talking About Theatre
Kinesthetic Empathy in Creative and Cultural Contexts
The Young Audiences – Japanese Translation & New Forward
Documentation, Disappearance and the Representation of Live Performance
Applied Practice: Evidence and Impact in Theatre, Music and Art
Creative Writing and Audience Research
Storyknowing
Drawing and Audience Research
Doodle Book (part 1)
Matthew Reason 