What is Fringe?
In 1947 eight uninvited theatre companies arrived at the Edinburgh International Festival eager to perform, only to be turned away. Feeling rejected, they decided to group together and stage their own festival. Thus, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and a new premise of an artistic event was born!
What started out as an artistic protest has produced an estimated 50,000 artists participating annually in fringe festivals in the U.K alone! Also, 250 international fringe festivals draw in 19 million audience members every year to watch theatre, comedy, dance, circus, spoken-word, live art and all other types of performances imaginable.
The Journey…
The Colchester Fringe was established in 2019 by Cameron Abbott-Betts and Steve Goatman.
Due to COVID-19 pandemic, they had to reschedule their festival a couple of times. However, their first Fringe event took place on in May 2021. It was on this day that they took over public spaces for the first ever #ShopWindowTakeover.
Their first festival took place on in October 2021. The aim was to support work by local emerging artists, whilst attracting performance companies to the town from across the U.K and overseas.?
?Now every Autumn, Colchester Fringe take over a variety of venues within the city centre, including theatres, shops, pubs and nightclubs and fill them all with extraordinary artists from all corners of the globe.
They believe that the Fringe is for everyone. Therefore, they are committed to keeping ticket prices low and promoting under-represented voices, including LGBTQ+, global majority and disabled people within their programme and festival team.
They are proudly a non-profit festival and any money made will be put towards supporting artists and developing the Fringe for future years.
