Nicola Hollinshead

Profile

I am the founder and director of Islington People's Theatre (IPT), a Community Interest Company that uses applied theatre to engage adults affected by violence, involvement in the criminal justice system, homelessness, addiction, mental ill health, care experience, and social exclusion. Since 2022, I have led the development and delivery of funded community arts programmes that create opportunities for participation, creative expression, and social connection among underrepresented communities.

Alongside my work with IPT, I have collaborated as an applied theatre practitioner with organisations including Safe Ground, Unlock Drama, Magic Me, Outside Edge Theatre Company, Arcola Theatre, Southwark Playhouse, and the University of Leeds. My practice is grounded in applied theatre, participation, and social justice, with a particular focus on working alongside people whose voices and experiences are often excluded from cultural and civic spaces.

Small Acts of Resistance is a practice-as-research PhD project based in the London Borough of Islington and delivered through Islington People's Theatre. Working with women who have experienced intersecting forms of social, economic, and gendered disadvantage, the project explores how applied theatre, feminist praxis, radical care, and creative activism can support collective reflection, agency, and social action.

The research employs a reflexive, participatory, and dialogic methodology in which workshop processes generate the themes, questions, and activist responses emerging from participants’ lived experiences. Adopting an emergent and collaborative approach, the project centres participants’ knowledge, priorities, and aspirations, positioning them as co-creators of both the creative process and the knowledge generated through it.

At the heart of the study is the development of an original practice model, Feminist, Creative, Activist, which brings together feminist theory, radical care, applied theatre, and creative activism through an iterative process of collective reflection and action. Through this framework, the research seeks to contribute an original feminist activist praxis to the field of applied theatre, advancing understanding of how creative practice can support everyday forms of resistance, agency, and collective action among women experiencing multiple disadvantage.

Research interests

• Applied theatre and social justice
• Feminist praxis and radical care
• Creative activism and everyday resistance
• Women, precarity, and social exclusion
• Participatory and community-engaged performance