Stories from the sands: New fragments of ancient plays - a creative commission

Context

In summer 2024, an astonishing discovery was made by an Egyptian archaeological team. While excavating an ancient necropolis, they found fragments of two lost plays by the master tragedian Euripides. These represent the most significant find in the study of Greek tragedy for a generation. The fragments preserve around 100 lines of original text, from two plays very different in nature, but linked by the death of children. One passage portrays a woman’s dreadful revenge over her scheming love-rival, while the other depicts a grieving father who cannot accept the permanence of death.

The new finds offer the possibility for dramatic and artistic inspiration through stories that have not been told for two thousand years. The aim of this project is to gather an interdisciplinary team to make new art in response to them. Yet the text that has been recovered is partial and damaged, and there are many uncertainties and mysteries about it. We see these gaps as a spur to creativity, and the experience of dealing with fragmentation can be as compelling as the story that was once told.

For more detail on the new finds and the issues they raise, see this link.

The commission

In response to these finds, Oxford University will fund three creative commissions of £3,000. This opportunity will be coordinated by theatre company Potential Difference.

We aim to commission 3 artists, where that term is used in the broadest possible sense. If successful, you will form a cohort who will exchange ideas and work alongside each other between November 2025 and June 2026 while working towards their own creative outputs. This will involve collaboration with academics from the University of Oxford, so that the artistic work can engage with and be informed by research on ancient papyri.

We are open-minded about what type of discipline you work in: we welcome applications from theatre-makers, poets, visual artists, composers, puppeteers, creative technologists, and any others who feel they have something interesting to say in response to the source material.

We are not looking for people who come with pre-existing projects they want to bring to life, or firm ideas about what they want to do. Part of the process will be to develop your creative project in response to and collaboration with the ideas and methods that emerge from the group.

We are looking for people who are excited about new ideas and the intersection between academic and creative approaches. We would like to select people who are enthusiastic about the prospect of adapting their process and outputs in response to a collaborative environment. It’s also important that you find something to be inspired by in the material.

Between November 2025 and June 2026, you will participate in a series of workshops to learn more about the myths and text, explore shared interests and ideas, and critically make together. You will then co-create early-stage creative works that will be presented or shown in a sharing day in June 2026.

We will also be working with a partner secondary school in Oxford, and would hope that the artists selected be willing to participate in a workshop with students, and to share ideas with teachers on how to develop resources for curriculum enrichment.

Please note, we can only accept applications from artists who have the right to work in the UK, and who have some existing practice in the UK.

Details of the commission

• We intend to make three commissions of £3,000. (Approx. 15 days depending on your day rate)
• We welcome applications from individuals or from collectives. If you are applying as a group of 2 or more, please note that the total commission will need to be split between you and that we will expect everyone involved to be fairly compensated for their time. For this reason, we discourage applications involving large groups that would require additional funding.
• Artists will be expected to attend 3 workshops to collaborate with researchers and the rest of the artistic cohort. These will take place in Oxford at dates to be determined in November, January and April. Reasonable travel expenses for these will be covered and we will provide refreshments.
• Artists may also be invited to take part in an outreach event at a local secondary school. Participation in this will be optional.
• The creative projects and process will be shared with a wider audience at an event which we anticipate holding in June 2026. We will pay an additional fee of £200 for this sharing day.
• We don’t necessarily expect to be sharing finished projects at this event but we expect artists to be able to produce something that can be shared with an audience in a meaningful way.
• There is a small additional budget available for materials or for hiring equipment.

Application process

Please send your expression of interest of up to 2 pages to eoi@potentialdifference.org.uk by 9:00am on 20th October.

It should respond to the following:

-         What interests you about this call?

-         What relevant experience do you have of collaborative creation or working with ideas derived from research?

-         What approach would you take to the collaborative process?

-         What type of questions do you immediately want to explore?

-         Provide a short summary of your creative practice and tell us about 1 or 2 previous pieces of creative work which you feel is relevant to some aspect of this call. You are welcome to provide links to documentations of this work.

Please also fill in our equal opportunity monitoring form here: https://go.potentialdifference.org.uk/equalopps

We intend to interview a shortlist of artists on 29th or 30th October to find out more about their approaches. These will be held online.

We will respond to all applicants.

If you have questions about the opportunity, please email eoi@potentialdifference.org.uk

Access

We aim for this to be an inclusive opportunity. If there are reasonable adjustments we can make to adapt this commission to the specific needs of the artist, we will commit to doing so.

We aim to meet the access needs of applicants at all stages of the recruitment process. Please contact us with any access requests you may have and to let us know if you feel we've missed anything. Meetings and the final presentation can be held in spaces that are wheelchair accessible.

If you need to discuss an alternative format for submitting your expression of interest, please contact us at eoi@potentialdifference.org.uk