Tim Etchells - Hugo Glendinning

In 2003, long before the pandemic, director Tim Etchells and photographer Hugo Glendinning initiated Empty Stages, a long-term photography project. Ever since, as the title suggests, they have photographed all kinds of empty stages worldwide – theatres, pubs, conference centers, parish halls. Ghost rooms that seem like so many fantasy spaces, inviting the public to imagine different types of events that may occur or might have taken place. A way, in these uncertain times, to pay tribute to the irreplaceable power of the performing arts.

"Before we even started the Empty Stages series, we spent hours and hours in spaces like that, wondering what might happen, waiting for performers to appear, for lights to be ready and sound to be checked. I think we were both drawn to the stages as spaces of imagination. (…) We chose spaces that were multi-functional, not fully functioning theatre spaces. They just kept giving in the ways that they were used. Actually, they weren’t used to show people saying or doing things, but to stack ping-pong tables and chairs. (…) Part of the comic value of our work was due to what was left on the stages."

In partnership with Théâtre Garonne | Scène Européenne