VX Labs: Decolonising Disability
4 Apr 2025
Decolonising Disability was a four-day long Lab that provided a safe space for six disabled artists from the Global Majority to navigate their next steps in the industry. The Lab was delivered in partnership with and hosted at Bristol Old Vic. Across a week in early March, participating artists worked together to unpack their process of making work through a series of workshops delivered by Zuleika Lebow and Annabel Crowley, Independent Facilitators, and Harris Albar from Tamasha Theatre.
We caught up with the participants of the VX Labs to find out more..
What are VX Labs?
VX Labs is a cutting-edge three-year research programme by Vital Xposure, a disabled-led touring theatre company that promotes hidden voices with extraordinary stories to tell.
Supported through Arts Council England, the programme is delivered in partnership with Central School of Speech and Drama as well as regional theatres. It aims to explore disabled-led performance at the cutting edge of access and create the opportunity for learning that has the ability to make change. The research is styled in the Lab space to provide opportunities for disabled artist to push at the boundaries of possibility in a practical, experimental space.
What was the key question you wanted to explore or find answers to before coming to the Lab?
Rene: It was interesting, because I didn’t know what to expect. I think it was for me to examine: Can my disability stop me from developing my creative practice, or is it something that I can use to develop my artistry? That was a burning question.
I was interested in meeting other creatives with disabilities who were part of the Global Majority. It was such an exciting space to work with very like-minded people.
Eli: One of the big questions I had was how do you make that transition from pursuing something as a passion project or a hobby and making that transition into it becoming my career. I also wanted to learn practical steps. Also I had some existential questions: Am I doing the right thing? Is this the right place? I think I felt coming out of the workshop with just a lot of reassurance from my peers and the facilitators.
What is your big takeaway from the process?
Rene: At the end of every day I walked away, so happy. I walked encouraged and walked away, kind of just thinking, God, you're not alone. Over the last 20 years, I’ve been in many, many meetings and workshops. I’ve never walked away feeling like that. The biggest takeaway of the experience was the last feeling that I can do it.
I feel like every creative, with or without a disability should do this workshop. It gave me a grounding and a starting point for what I want to do.
Most of all, it reminded me: Your disability isn't limiting. It shouldn't limit you to not achieve what you want to do. As a creative with a disability, you have the right to ask for support that you need in order for you to be great at your practice.
We’ve started talking about working together, collaborating. The six of us want to create a collective: ‘Aggressively Civil: We’re Not A Gang’!
Eli: Reassurance was a word that we were saying constantly throughout the week. Connection was also such a massive one, because it is just so rare to be in a room full of other artists; and then you add the artists that are all disabled; and then you add the fact that it was all artists from the Global Majority - All those different layers of community. I've never been in a room like that before.
I think we all, or I at least, really cherished that and how important intersectionality is. It was so refreshing to be in that space where there was so much shared experiences, shared emotions and shared joy.
The workshop was definitely what I needed to remind me that I do deserve to be here. I'm in the right place. It was just so refreshing and not like anything I've experienced before.
What would be your top tip for disabled artists from the Global Majority?
Rene: You're incredible, and you're amazing, and you can do it. Find us. Find your tribe. We're here and we'll make sure that you don't feel alone and that you're part of something even greater as well.
Eli: I think the biggest thing that I've learned is asking for help and asking for those connections. It is really scary to reach out and message someone, or to reply to an invitation or an opportunity, and be candid in that way of ‘Look, I'd really love to do this, but your venue is not accessible. How can we work around that?’ Or ‘I'd love to do it, I can't afford it. Can you offer a fee or reaching out to other disabled Global Majority artists?’
One brilliant thing about social media is that it just gives you access to so many people like you that you wouldn't otherwise interact with. I think getting over the awkward human fear of that kind of daunting social interaction, and just being able to reach out and say ‘Hey, I've seen your work. I really liked what you do. I'd love to connect. I'd love to maybe work on something. I'd love to seek advice.’
What is the one thing you would change to improve sector support for disabled artists from the global majority?
Rene: It’s taken us such a long time to get this far, and we still have got a long way to go as well. But one thing? Firstly, acknowledging that artists from the Global Majority with disabilities do exist and are actually calling out, wanting programmes like this.
Create spaces for artists from the with Global Majority with disabilities, in order to learn together. One thing that we all said at the end was that we just don't feel alone anymore.
Eli: Moving diversity past just as inclusion, past just a bare minimum. We need to be not just invited to have a seat at the table every so often, when we're desired, but to be able to be in the room all the time.
One of the facilitators used the metaphor of a tent: it was the idea that we are all sat in this tent, and you don't refuse to let people in. You make the tent bigger.
How did the Lab help you develop your artistic practice?
Rene: I wrote a monologue for the last day. Then I wanted lighting and someone to do sound, everyone was going to have a programme. In that moment I just felt so happy that I thought ‘Dream big and don't limit yourself.’ I think the bigger, the better, the bolder. The discoveries of this laboratory have become the foundation of how I want to work and is something that I will keep returning to on a regular basis.
Eli: As part of the workshop, we performed a small piece of work. Mine was about trying to bring a kind of joy and whimsy and imagination back into what we do. So I ran a ‘silliness workshop’ as I called it. I just brought in pieces of my drag, and we did a little runway, and everyone was able to dress up and have a moment of having people cheer and clap for them. I think having that a moment in the spotlight is something that's really special, and something that drag has enabled me to do and to have, and something that I wanted to pass on to other people.
