THE EMOJI PROJECT Will Be Performed by The Hen & Chickens Theatre next Month

The Emoji Project is an intergenerational, participatory anthology of new writing responding to emojis' ever-evolving nuance, as one of the first digital languages created in 90's Japan to their far-reaching, institutionalised use in the present day.

We use emojis to befriend; show love; share feeling; describe ourselves and sometimes, to hide. They make people feel seen, they're a mark of progress, they're political, they spark real world debate and are altered in response to real world events. The crying-laughing-face emoji was the 2015 Oxford Dictionaries' word of the year and in 2020, as words grew wearied, Apple developed a range of bespoke pandemic emojis to reflect our "new normal".

Distracted Rat has assembled a team of creatives ranging from 11 to 75 years of age to consider the use and context of digitised communication. In The Emoji Project, writers playfully explore and challenge their relationship with a different emoji, translating its possibility into interactive work and pocket-sized plays. Emojis allow us to creatively share our experience, but what words in this collaborative, living language are still missing?

Our writers examine such topics as a democratised redesign of flags for pluralised belonging, the copyright of possible emotional reactions by emoji mega-corporations, expectations and mistaken meaning in online dating, the intergenerational difference in emoji use, the adoption of the lobster emoji by the Claws Out For Trans campaign for a trans flag, the presence possible through digital communication when caring for a loved one in respite, as well as a new-to-existence octopus searching for their Cthulhu mother across space and time.

Participation and co-creation with an audience is essential to this topic by nature of the translational, shared quality of language. The Emoji Project will continue to be developed toward future productions, working with more collaborators and voices, and further interactive possibilities both online and IRL.

The Emoji Project Team

Writers: Sean Wai Keung, Ariella Como Stoian, Tilney Brune, Jalice Corral, Will, Charlotte and John Jarvis, Phoebe McIntosh, Farokh Soltani, James Ireland, Alastair Gibbons, Aditya Manivannan, Rosemary Cirino and Emilia Stucci

Directors: Susannah MacDonald, Gabriel Harris and Annys Whyatt

Creative Concept & Dramaturgy: Ariella Como Stoian

Composer: Zygmund de Somogyi

To find out more about our participating artists and their previous work, click here.

Dates: Thursday 12th, Friday 13th & Saturday 14th of August 2021 - 19:30 GMT

Event and Bookings: https://camden.ssboxoffice.com/events/the-emoji-project/