Wiebke Acton

Profile

I’m a part-time, practice-based PhD researcher at the School of Performance and Cultural Industries at the University of Leeds. My research explores the effects of contemporary transnational theatre-making in the context of the cultural industries of Germany and the UK through the lived experience of the performer-translator-researcher. It seeks to find out whether and in what way the process of taking devised theatre on a cross-border journey changes the theatre pieces, and how it might affect the performer’s sense of self.  

The study employs a Practice-as-Research methodology, drawing on a variety of creative methods including devising, performing, translating and performative writing.   
Taking as a point of departure my positionality as a transmigrant performer, my research approach enables a phenomenological and embodied examination of transnational theatre-making. The approach, which I call making & migrating, involves the creation of two theatre pieces in two countries, i.e. Germany and the UK, which both go on a transnational journey, crossing the border in geographically opposite directions. 

My first practice research project involved the development of the theatre play AS THE CROW FLIES. The piece was created in collaboration with German theatre artists and in partnership with Globe Berlin where it premiered in July 2022. Following a successful run at the Globe throughout the summer, I translated the piece into English and performed it in Manchester and Leeds in November of the same year.

My second research project, called PHOBIA, is currently in the making. PHOBIA explores the world of irrational fears and will be developed in partnership with Waterside Arts Centre. It will premier in early 2025 before the piece embarks on its transnational journey to Germany. More information to follow soon.

My PhD research builds on my existing practice as a theatre artist and literary translator. I graduated from Drama School Hamburg in 2005, and have been working as a performer in Germany and the U.K. since then. In 2014, I received my MA in Translating Popular Culture from City University, London. As part of my dissertation titled ‘Translating Theatre for a Young Audience’ I translated Charles Way’s play ‘The Gift’ which is now published in Germany. 

More on my professional work as a performer and translator can be found on my website. 

Research interests

• creative practice as research
• transnational theatre
• autobiographical theatre
• theatre translation
• self-translation
• transmigrant studies
• performance and identity

Qualifications

• MA Translating Popular Culture, City University London
• PGCert Principles and Practice of Translation, City University London
• Acting Degree, 3 years, Hamburg Drama School, Germany