Bambo Soyinka  is a multi-platform writer, director and curator, as well as a senior lecturer at UWE. With a background in interactive television she is instinctively interested in engaging audiences with immersive experiments and the idea of creating a fictitious environment that people can participate with. These notions are clearly apparent in Bambo’s current projects that she goes on to talk about.

A fundamental character and concurrent theme for both of Bambo’s projects is the trickster. The trickster is a classical icon, a subversive, shape shifting changeling that often poses as a friend but then takes you through a series of tricks that often play on your own weaknesses and ego. The trickster has a clever way of enveloping you into an alternate world that is hard to escape from, much like Alice down the rabbit hole. There are many variations and versions of the trickster, ranging from a playful, benevolent character to a cunning, magical and evil presence. The trickster is often referred to as a person but it can also be viewed as a manifestation of fate and circumstance.

Bambo uses this notion of the trickster within her practice. With it’s many faces and approaches in playing and engaging with audiences the trickster provides a universal platform for stories to unfold. The trickster is as much a performer as a story teller, which is why Bambo considers trickster so relevant to practitioners. The trickster is nothing without his audience.

Dial 419 For Love is in early development. 419 is the code that Nigerian government uses to refer to phishing emails that arrive in your inbox inviting you to invest money, collect a lottery win etc. The concept of the project derived from a particular branch of 419; the romance scam, this is when scammers post false identities on to dating agencies to contact prospective lovers. They then engage people in romances over a period of time, the relationship develops and often the scammers suggest marriage. The romance culminates in a false meeting where they are invited to donate money under difficult circumstances such as problems with immigration or a family bereavement.

Bambo was interested to explore whether this story structure could be used to develop an alternative reality game. Based on real life accounts she created three characters: Jonnah Love, a reformed scammer; he begins the drama by sending people an email or a letter inviting them to play a game that he claims he has created in order to understand how scams work. A scam baiter, who is someone who makes it their life’s mission to out scam scammers. Scam baiters they pose as victims in order to reel scammers in and reveal them as criminals. In Dial 419 For Love, Mickey Lynch is this character, who’s ambition is to hunt Jonah down. The third character is Carol, she is Jonnah Love’s last victim, she discovers that Jonah is a scammer and asks him to come over to the UK to meet her, when he arrives she stands him up. This story is in the background of the audiences’ experiences, who are invited to enter this world as the drama unfolds around them. These ideas were tested on real audiences over two days, from which a video was developed. Video coming soon.

The second project, Translating Tales of the Trickster is open network exploring who the trickster is today, within modern, contemporary society, how the trickster informs our own practice and what the role of the trickster is. The structure of the project is based on creating an archive of trickster tales, both traditional folk tales as well as modern versions, which may include a collection of scams or viruses. Participants will then be asked to respond through their own practice to the material generated, as well as to attend a series of events. An example of a response so far is from Stuart Nolan he proposes to produce a bag of tricks, where he will run a short workshop which will show how tools of deceptions are used in magic, this workshop will be particularly geared towards practitioners, encouraging them to think about how they might use magic in their work. This will be part of the The Trickster and The Tricked storytelling event held at the Tobacco Factory on 21st May 2012. There will be an open space workshop here at the Pervasive Media Studio on 22nd May 2012. Those participating in the Open Space workshop will receive a free ticket for the storytelling evening.

Find out more about Bambo’s exciting work and events by visiting www.trickstertales.org.uk and following @trickstertales