Art and science show to capture pupils' imagination

The Icarus Project (8 to 15 March)

An art and science performance event, which aims to engage young people with the critical, moral and ethical issues of biomedical science, is to be shown at Nottingham Trent University. Dragon Breath Theatre is to perform The Icarus Project as part of the University’s celebration of National Science and Engineering Week 2007 (March 8-15).

The Icarus Project takes the ancient Greek myth of the boy Icarus, who flew too close to the sun, and weaves it with a modern story about a research scientist desperate to save the life of her daughter who has a degenerative disease.

It has been written by award-winning playwright and Nottingham Trent University senior lecturer, Peter Rumney, and directed by the Associate Director of Leicester’s Haymarket Theatre, Adel Al-Salloum. They are part of a top team of professional theatre makers, working alongside undergraduate puppeteers, designers and makers.

Over the last two years artists, students, school pupils, teachers and biomedical scientists have helped to research and develop this performance, which has already sold out to schools across the region.

Peter Rumney, who is Joint Artistic Director of Dragon Breath Theatre, said:

“This play is the result of an amazing partnership of people and organisations who are interested in encouraging young people to think about some of the hottest moral topics facing us today.”