Writing
Dynamic edutainment makes learning way more fun. My Immersive concepts combine my writing and design sensibilities. This results in innovative ideas and unique experiences for the audience.
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immersive, story-based experiences
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live performances
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educational learning aids, story-based toys
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activities, games
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digital interactives
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lesson plans and educator training
Immersive Interpretive Programming and Theater
How it all began:
After quite a bit of thematic design work, including work at Disney, I began teaching on the side. Starting with art lessons and then changing to thematic content. I curated and directed educational themes, and I noticed how providing active content made the information stickier. My content featured the cultural arts of over 90 countries, national parks, music of the last 50 years, greek mythology, recycling, space, circus, zoology, and history. Each package included introductory and break-out information, videos, photographs, and interactive, participatory programming based on art, movement, and drama.
Breakthrough Innovations:
In Lola's Lab, my third concept, I spent eight years developing the frontier of immersive collaborative arts programming. My content was written to leverage the power of a collective audience. As the objectives and the scope became wider, I experimented with advanced forms of content delivery, breaking the fourth wall, delivering news reports that played with time and sequence, and creative game-based audience missions. The themes were inclusive and promoted positive values through engaging narratives, group-built environments, critical thinking, negotiation, and problem-solving. I wrote and produced 40 immersive plays paired with a full-day curriculum and training materials for Lola's Lab. Stories took place over 1 -5 days, staging 2 acts daily. In 2018, I licensed 2 of these week-long plays to Encore Theater in Virginia. I also presented at the National Children's Museum. I further developed some of the stories as interactive books and interactive web-based concepts for teaching over live stream and video.
Lola's Lab won audience favorite awards in 2016 and 2017. More about Lola's Lab content can be seen here.
Immersive Arts Education:
In my multidisciplinary writing, I combine information, story concepts, and gamified missions to make information easier to recall. The breaking of the fourth wall via live characters humanizes the content with a dramatic appeal and creates a more personal relationship that helps audiences confidently engage and become heroes.
The picture above exemplifies a program I developed to convey the science of the color spectrum. The science was couched inside an immersive adventure called Captain Kaleidoscope, an overarching story about the importance of diversity. Together, the kids used their imagination to sail on a mission to bring back color to the Island of Black and White. Above, Captain Kaleidoscope explains the mission to the island's inhabitants. The other citizens in the town have been drawn in black and white and hung on chairs for the "town meeting."
Interactive Books, Videos, Learning Aids and Activities
Superoink takes readers to the county fair to tell the tale of a stolen pie, a super fast pig, and how creativity saves the day. 80 pgs.
Zoopossible: Royal Kingdom tells the tale of a selfish Princess who comes to live in a sustainable Kingdom. Published by Createspace in 2015
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Content development also included a "party pack" with illustrated engagement activities for small groups of up to 10 kids..
Enganing Museum Content (physical and digital)
I've created museum proposals and aspects of exhibition content through interpretation and design. You can explore one of these projects here.
What I love about museum content is the variety of ways to explore ideas. As we add technology, the need to humanize experiences becomes evermore important. Good interpretive content is essential to achieve that goal.
I create the flow of the interactive discovery through initial ideas and wireframe sketches. Then I work through the development of the ideas with the technology team to achieve the right tone and level of creativity that keeps the audience engaged. I align the digital experiences to "the best practice pillars" I formed while working with live audiences. Though audiences are different, the spirit of informal educational entertainment is the same.
Unconventional Opening Ceremonies and Extravaganzas
In 2004 I co-wrote and designed the opening ceremonies for VSA at the Kennedy Center, which celebrates international creative artists with disabilities. I structured the show with pockets for acts couched inside an overarching story about a crayon that brought color to everything it touched and included acts from dance to instrumental to live art-making on stage.
Unexpected Theatrical Concepts
I've also written and designed large public-format projects. Sometimes I see the imagery in my mind first, draw it and then write it. Sometimes I write it all out first, then bring it to life with illustrations and ideas for engineering, lighting, music and more.
Waking is an example of one such project. It's a "Musical Dream Parade" that rolls by an audience for a world expo-type outdoor performance. I have also broken this format down into bite-size segments to become non-linear performances. The theme explores introspection, faith, and celestial myth. In the play, Henry, the protagonist, wanders through a dreamland. As he encounters and explores his fears, he unlocks others similarly trapped by illusions. Explore the writing here.