Chance Collective

Hi! We’re Chance Collective, a Meanjin/Brisbane-based ensemble who create theatrical experiences under the ethos of innovation, accessibility, and sustainable practice. Working with multidisciplinary forms, Chance Collective blends body, space, and audience experience to contest tradition and engage communities. Creating works and installations for all ages, authentic storytelling, and raw personal experience colours our work, allowing us to facilitate conversations and push boundaries. 

We have been working together for over four years, developing theatre works, interactive experiences, children's experiences, and cabaret shows. We have presented as part of Anywhere Festival, at venues like The Zoo, Backbone, The Old Museum, The Bearded Lady, and most recently, we presented a work-in-progress showing at Metro Arts.  

We bring the chaos, the spectacle, and the taboo to meet the audience at the door.

The Slip Slop Slime Fundraiser

ITS TIME TO GET SLIMEY! on June 5th 2021 Chance Collective is pulling together a stellar line up of Meanjin artists and performers for our one-night only cabaret, SLIP SLOP SLIME! The event will mark the end of our fundraising campaign, and we invite you to come party with us! We’ve teamed with The Brightside to bring you all your slimesafe needs for a STELLAR night out hosted by our very own Gogo Bumhole and featuring:

Johanna Lyon 

Bhangra

Vivica D Ross

Miss Bubbles

Frigid Sinbin

Fortuna Maxima

Bad Sext

+ A killer set to dance the night away from DJ Goo

Tickets are $25 presale + booking fee and $30 on the door. But with these incredible performers and a limited capacity tickets are SURE to sell OUT!

We will also be selling some oozeywoozey merch at the event so bring some cash, card (EFTPOS available) and dress in your slimy best xx

Get tickets through the link here. The funds raised from this event and our online campaign are all going towards the creation of Sludge Bank.

About Sludge Bank

A snarky slime-creature is lurking in the pipes of a newly erected Meanjin (Brisbane) development called Riverbank Towers. This inner-city, upper-class apartment building is rapidly filling with the mysterious, sentient slime that won’t stop until it has consumed every cavoodle in sight. It is up to the residents to put aside their body-corporate bureaucracy, paleo vs vegan diet debates, and Instagram activism to save themselves and everyone else in the face of global disaster. Featuring an original song by feminist, indie-pop band Bad Sext, Sludge Bank is Chance Collective’s stickiest show yet.

Sludge Bank is set in Meanjin, which is currently a hub for rapid development and sits relatively apart from any visible, pressing climate disaster. However, the play could really take place in any major city across Australia, because they all contain this tension between a growing public interest in “choosing green options”, while the city continues to expand to accommodate population growth. The contradictory nature of this has seen greenwashing campaigns and virtue signalling activism blow up. Sludge Bank presents this tension comically – highlighting this absurd contradictory way we are currently handling climate change.  

What is often depicted when it comes to climate disaster is the flooding of poverty-stricken countries, the melting of ice-caps far away, and the blaze and destruction of the Amazon forest. Climate Disaster is coming for everyone, yet we’re told the most privileged will feel it last. So how would they react if it came now?

Sludge Bank is the meeting point between theatre, drag and camp performance styles, b-grade 80s horror films, and a John Waters’ musical. Featuring an original song written by the popular up and coming Meanjin band Bad Sext, Sludge Bank is a hyper-theatrical performance for the political and apolitical alike. This cutting comedy will make you feel both seen and attacked at the same time. You can read a review from our work-in-progress showing here.

Project Timeline

‘Sludge Bank’ began in April 2020 and has had three developments:

• November 2020: A Conceptual Development 

• February 2021: A Creative Development at Backbone Youth Arts

• April 2021: A Creative Development and Work in Progress showing at Metro Arts 

The next stages of this project will involve:

• Late 2021: 1x week further creative development and finessing of production elements with the creative team 

• 2021/2022: 1x week of rehearsals directly before premiering

• 2021/2022: A Premier season of ‘Sludge Bank’ in Meanjin (Brisbane)

• 2022/2023: Touring of the work across Australia 

Creative Team

The Chance Collective company partners and creative directors are: 

Siobhan Gibbs
Siobhan Gibbs is a performance artist, MC, and community worker in Meanjin/Brisbane. She graduated from QUT with a Bachelor of Human Services and Bachelor of Creative Industries. Siobhan is a founding member of Chance Collective; working as a performer, and creator across the company's various projects. Siobhan is also a performance company member for Zen Zen Zo Physical Theatre, dance captain for the Common People’s Dance Project with Neridah Waters, and co-captain of ‘For The Record,’ a monthly storytelling event in Meanjin. Siobhan debuted her performance persona, Gogo Bumhole in 2020 at Candy Social Club, and has continued to perform the disco gremlin regularly in the Meanjin club scene including Shandy, Candy x Mardis Gras and FROOT. Siobhan has recently debuted her original work, Sewer Rat Girl, in May 2021 with support from Backbone and Zen Zen Zo Physical Theatre.

Victoria Barlow

Victoria Barlow is a Meanjin/Brisbane performance maker and creative. Her creative practice is centred on collaboration, emotion, and intimate audience experiences. Working in areas of performance, devising, and technical development Victoria is passionate about exploring and blending different mediums and styles of creation. In the development of marketing and social media strategies Victoria is focused on connecting with audiences on an intimate level and broadening the reach and engagement of the wider community in theatre and art.

Milly (Amelia) Walker

Amelia Walker is an emerging producer and theatre maker based in Meanjin/Brisbane. Having graduated from QUT in 2018 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Drama), she now predominantly works on independent productions in a variety of roles. As a company partner, Amelia has produced, directed, and written for Chance Collective since 2017, assisting in creating 9 shows as well as online content. She is also the CFO of the company, managing finances and administration, as well as producing online and physical fundraising events for the collective. Amelia is also an Associate Producer at Metro Arts as part of the Ian Potter Emerging Producer XChange. 

Olivia Brand

Olivia Brand is a Meanjin artist, working as a playwright, performer, and producer. In 2019 she graduated from QUT with a Bachelor of Fine Arts Drama, and she is a founding member of Chance Collective. With an interest in comedic and immersive work, Olivia’s credits include shows with Backbone Youth Ensemble (Ride, 2018), for Anywhere Theatre Festival (There’s No Sex ’Til The Third Act, 2018; Dream a House, 2017), with local comedian, Geordie McGrath (Short and Sweet, 2017), and with The SUI ensemble (GAME and Suicide Show, 2015). Her practice tends to toy with traditional theatre boundaries, encouraging work that unpacks social taboos and acts as an outlet for introspection. Channelling her skillset into community arts events and initiatives, she has helped produce Candy Social Club’s 2021 Mardi Gras, local 2019 music festival Jailbreak Festival, and both Vena Cava’s playwriting program and workshop programs in 2018. Olivia is currently completing a mentorship with Playlab’s Incubator Program in which she will produce a new play by the end of 2021.

Honor Webster-Mannison

Honor Webster-Mannison is a Melbourne based performance maker and playwright. Honor works in a variety of mediums to create politically charged and tenderly strange theatre and performance art. After graduating from the University of Queensland, where she majored in creative writing and minored in drama and philosophy, Honor moved to Melbourne to undertake a Masters in Writing for Performance at the Victorian College of the Arts. Although she has technically trained as a playwright, undertaking mentorships with companies such as Australian Theatre for Young People, Playlab and Queensland Theatre, she also works as a facilitator, performer and performance maker. Her approach often involves exploring ways to combine text with visual and sensory experience. She is passionate about making art that resists categorisation.

Original Cast & Crew

Our work-in-progress collaborators and performers included Ti’ana Thorburn as the lighting designer and:

Aurora Liddle Christie

Aurora Liddle-Christie is a multidisciplinary artist practicing in the forms of acting, theatre making spoken word, singing and songwriting.

Sho Eba

Sho is an actor and performance maker with a Bachelor of Contemporary and Applied Theatre from Griffith University. He works with a serious vulnerability coupled with a ferocious energy and a love to laugh. Currently, Sho is training with Dr. Lynne Bradley of Zen Zen Zo in the Suzuki Method and in performance skills with Gareth Harris. His most recent works include Boys Will Be (2021 - post production), a film directed by Jake Moss, and Gay Rage (2020) a physical theatre piece devised with the Polite Gay led by Nicholas Mohr.

Fundraising Aim

$5,000 by June 7th 2021

Your donation will contribute to the further development and premiere of Sludge Bank. Here’s a breakdown of the costs you’ll be contributing to:

Production Costs:

$200: Set Maintenance and Rebuilding

$600: Costumes

$350: Access consultation + AUSLAN Interpreter 

$100: Consumables (Tape, etc.)

$100: Contingency

Marketing + Documentation:

$250: Marketing Materials

$700: Videography + Photography

Additional Creatives:

$500: Dramaturgy Fee

$1000: Costume Designer

$1000: Lighting Designer

$1000: Sound Designer

= $5800

This number is higher than our fundraising goal, and we have other additional costs on top of this like our own wages. We will seek further grant funding and contributions from presenting partners for these costs. If we exceed our fundraising goal, all donations will go towards making the work. 

As independent artists, securing funding is a major barrier to creating work. Funding streams from the government and opportunities from established theatre companies are sparse and highly competitive, especially now as the industry tries to recover from Covid19. The solution to this has been offering up a lot of our own time and energy for free.  

Your donation will curb these financial blocks, and will ensure that all involved artists are paid accordingly. By supporting the final development and premier season of Sludge Bank, you are investing in the creative practice of Chance Collective and our ongoing commitment to generating high-quality, politically-charged, and innovative work for both Queensland and Australian audiences. Your financial support will mark a significant shift to seven artists’ career trajectories, and is invaluable to our collective’s growth.    

Sludge Bank has been developed with support from Backbone and Metro Arts.