#IMC: September 14 - 18 2025

Presenting Black Rock at the Kendal Mountain Festival: the value of live performance in mountain festival economies

Assigned Session: FS 3.205: Mountain Festivals: The Representation, Marketing, and Consumption of Mountaineering Cultures

Abstract ID: 3.9319 | Accepted as Talk | Talk/Oral | TBA | TBA

Jonathan Pitches (0)
Jonathan Pitches ((0) University of Leeds, School of PCI, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT, Leeds, West Yorkshire, GB)

(0) University of Leeds, School of PCI, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT, Leeds, West Yorkshire, GB

Categories: Culture, Economy, Tourism
Keywords: Festivals, Live performance, Rock climbing, Translation

Categories: Culture, Economy, Tourism
Keywords: Festivals, Live performance, Rock climbing, Translation

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In 2017, in a joint venture between the Kendal Mountain Festival, the University of Leeds and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, a new piece of live performance was created, entitled Black Rock. The piece, devised by Dr David Shearing (Central School of Speech and Drama), written by Claire Carter (KMF) and with dramaturgy by Jonathan Pitches, was an immersive digital performance translating the experience of elite rock climbing to an audience sitting in a theatre studio. The project explored Johnny Dawes’ first ascent of Indian Face (E9 6C) on Snowdon/Yr Wyddfa in 1986 (a groundbreaking climb which attracted national media interest), and explored wider issues of heroism, risk-taking and tactility. Co-commissioned by KMF in 2016, the project offers an interesting case study to consider the value of live performance in the film-dominated economy of mountain festivals. Sharing some of the striking documentation of the project, this short paper, will unpick the collaborative challenges we faced in the project, and evaluate the extent to which live theatre has a place in mountain festival economy. Can live art offer something unique to the mediation of mountain culture? How is it received and consumed? And what are its limitations?

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