ABOUT ME (BIO AT THE BOTTOM)

Hello! I am an award winning multi-disciplinary artist (I know we're meant to be anti-awards these days - but it's the only way that my mum can see that I'm legit!). But we did really win an award!  Two actually - in collaboration with Rosie Poebright, Splash & Ripple, for Play Inside : Other Mothers. It's really great - you should listen. We have also just received a £75k grant from the British Council International Collaboration Fund - to create another 9 Play Inside stories - 'My home is your home' - in collaboration with Dawar Arts, Cairo and The Freedom Theatre, Palestine. Find out more here

I am passionate about making work that changes how people see the world, themselves, and their place and power within it. I love creating unexpected connections that bring together sections of society that wouldn't normally meet, that bring about deeper understandings, connections and compassion. I believe deeply in inclusion and creating space for every 'body' using art as a tool for change. 

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So, what else do you want to know about me? I grew up in an old people's home in Wiltshire. I was cleaning out commodes before school with my grandad, and feeding dying residents after school. My mum was a nurse, from the Philippines, my dad was a welder from Devizes, Wiltshire. Growing with 8 old people with dementia was pretty incredible - I even wrote my first solo show about it.  

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I only got introduced to theatre when I was 27, up until then I worked in Community Development, and longed to work in International Development. At some point I thought I'd be brilliant on EastEnders (my mum would have been super proud!), and so thought I'd try drama classes, but ended up in an audition for The Importance of Being Earnest at the local Am-Dram, got put on stage, and totally loved it! I soon realised the limitations of am-dram, and ran off to the States where I trained with Double Edge Theatre - a physical theatre company making promenade, immersive large scale work, that has influenced my work since. I also trained in New York with Playback Theatre, the power to share people's stories has also stayed with me ever since. Returning to the UK I joined the Bristol Playback Troupe, and joined the Invisible Circus making crazy big shows in disused, often squatted spaces, before co-founding The Wonder Club. I won't give you the full history here, but you can see some of the work I have made here. 

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As a multi-heritage person that grew up in the 80's and 90's in a small village in Wiltshire, I experienced my fair share of racial (micro) aggressions - 'go back to your own country', 'god forgot to paint you white', 'Paki!'. Recently I took part in Tara Arts week-long residency for people of colour, and met with a bunch of amazing multi-heritage women that all suffered these slurs too, silently, and yet, no doubt impacting our choices and beliefs in life. I am in the process of putting together a Being Mixed Festival to celebrate those of us that have grown up straddling cultures, celebrate all that we have endured, and all that we have created. Please get in touch if you'd like to take part, or be involved somehow. 

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I am 44 and don't have children, and am privileged to have created a life that I fill with amazing people and projects all over the world. I am also very interested in exploring how we as child-free people (whether by choice or not) navigate the next stages of our lives, in a world set up for families. 

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I have a Masters in Advanced Theatre Practice from Central School of Speech and Drama, and a Degree in Business from UWE, Bristol. 

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Proper BIO : 

Michelle Roche (she/her)

Michelle Roche is a multi-heritage woman of colour, a socially engaged multi-disciplinary artist and maker of journeys, experiences and connections. Michelle’s work has included large scale theatrical co-creations in non-traditional spaces, magical journey’s for two, community projects with hard to reach groups, and more recently an award-winning audio journey for one co-created with Splash & Ripple, Play Inside : Other Mothers.

She is passionate about working in, and building, communities; creating journeys exploring belonging and connection to oneself, each other, and to place; and making joyful, unexpected experiences that make you excited about the world and proud of your part in it.  

Other projects have included an online computer game with young people with Roundhouse and Royal Opera House, creating content for a virtual reality tour for Norfolk and Norwich Festival & National Trust with young people, producing a multi-location theatrical street game with Southbank and IGFEST as well as working internationally in New York, West Bank, Palestine and Rajasthan, India on youth projects, using the arts as a tool for social change. Michelle is also a life skills facilitator for British Council and Future Foundations, empowering youth to connect with their community and be mobilised to make changes in relation to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.