From a VR gay sauna to the gothic pile that inspired Cluedo – Fierce festival storms back

Venues across Birmingham
As Britain’s longest-running live art festival returns, get ready for late-night artist dinners, a show in a swimming pool and Faye Driscoll’s incredible rotating disintegration

The phrase “two things can be true” is a frequent refrain in popular psychology and it’s also a frequent response, I find, to witnessing the farther reaches of live art. Hmm, is this performance confusingly self-indulgent or utterly profound? Sometimes it can be both. In fact, it’s not just two things that can be true, it’s as many things as there are people in the audience, since this is all about the live subjective experience, in the moment; presence and connection.

Launched in 1998, Fierce is Britain’s longest-running live art festival. For one week it takes over Birmingham’s conventional theatres alongside unconventional spaces, especially in ex-industrial Digbeth, which is fast becoming a creative hub. Also on the bill this year: late-night artist dinners, a show in a swimming pool, and a six-hour performance jam at a grand gothic hall that was apparently the inspiration for Cluedo.