Acknowledgment of country

Polyglot acknowledges that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are the Traditional Custodians of the lands on which we live and create, and we pay our respects to Elders past and present. For more than 65,000 years, children and families have created and played here, and we are grateful to make our art on this country too.

Shows

Polyglot Theatre creates playful, interactive and spectacular experiences for children and families.

We have a repertoire of performance works that are available for touring and presentation, and come in two distinct forms.

  • Play Spaces

    Polyglot’s Play Space works are conceptual, durational productions that use simple materials and elegant frameworks to allow for instinctive physical participation and fun. They explore freedom of choice and the power of art in public spaces and between generations, and can grow new audiences by removing many traditional barriers to access.

    Our Play Space works invite children to create their own imaginative adventure as part of the fantastical worlds we offer. The works are intuitive - unfolding and revealing themselves over time, and allowing for a different experience each time a child interacts with the work.

  • Immersive Theatre

    Polyglot develops sophisticated theatre that places the audience as central to the story. Our immersive works acknowledge the adult/child relationship and engage audiences physically and emotionally, resulting in memorable experiences and powerful responses. These works are intensely theatrical; creating transformative environments with drama, scenography, light and sound.

An outdoors Ants production photo. A Polyglot artist in an intricate Ant costume crouches in front of a child, offering them a giant breadcrumb. They are surrounded by lines of crumbs, and blue sky and tall buildings are in the background.

Ants

Ants is an interactive performance which brings children together to explore the landscape around them.
An outdoor Bees production photo. A Polyglot artist in an intricate black and yellow bee costume crouches on a green lawn. A small child, holding their parent's arm, looks at them intently. Other families are visible in the background, and the grassy area is surrounded by trees. Photographer: Theresa Harrison

Bees

Bees is a joyful interactive work in which children are welcomed into a world of community, communication, wonder and imagination.
An outdoor Boats production photo. A performer wearing gumboots and a raincoat rings a bell. To their right, two children run forwards in a bottomless boat-shaped vessel on a tiled concrete pavement.

Boats

Boats engages children and their families in accessible play that transforms familiar space into something wild, unpredictable and fun.
A Cerita Anak production photo. Two Polyglot artists wearing blue and red costumes stand at the bow of the boat, joyfully celebrating a special moment. Families sit in the boat behind them. They are surrounded by billowing blue silk cloth, and illuminated with theatre lighting.

Cerita Anak
(Child’s Story)

Cerita Anak (Child’s Story) takes children and their adults on a sea journey never to be forgotten.
A Come Back Home production photo. A group of children and adults sit on the floor under theatre lighting. They face a performer who points to a dimly-lit ceiling. The audience is surrounded by cardboard silhouettes of skyscraper buildings. Photo: Studio Znke, courtesy of Esplanade - Theatres on the Bay, Singapore.

Come Back Home

A tale that winds through the past and the present to seek out a child who went missing a long time ago.
A Feast production photo. A family sits on one side of a long rectangular table. The table has tubs on top of it, holding coloured paper, decorations and pencils. In the foreground, a pizza made from paper is placed on the table. There is a pink wall in the background behind the family. Photo: Casey Horsfield.

Feast

A meal like no other, inviting children to make gastronomical delights from a pile of most unusual ingredients.
An Invisible Orchestra production photo. A performer in a white suit jacket stands on pink carpet, gesturing with a flourish. There is a circle of chairs around him, with families sitting and standing. Large colourful shapes are suspended from the ceiling.

Invisible Orchestra

Invisible Orchestra is an exciting musical experiment where beautiful sounds are created with the body in the most unconventional and hilarious ways.
A Light Pickers production photo. A small child is surrounded by abstract glowing objects, which they are interacting with interestedly.

Light Pickers

Babies and their adults are gently invited to enter a dark space, where abstract, organic shapes, flexible and easy to handle, are made of light.
A Paper Planet production photo. A forest of tall, brown cardboard trees, adorned with colourful tissue paper plants and creatures, fills an enormous, light-filled space. Children and families create and play amongst the trees, adding to the forest with paper and tape. Photographer: Sarah Walker

Paper Planet

Paper Planet is a universally accessible experience that families find utterly captivating.
A Pram People production photo. An adult wearing headphones smiles at their child, who they are holding. The child looks directly at the camera. Other adults wearing headphones and pushing prams decorated with colourful ribbons are visible in the background. Photographer: Theresa Harrison

Pram People

A moment in time for children who ride in prams, and the adults who push them.

Sound of Drawing

Sound Of Drawing brings together texture and technology in an interactive soundscape.
A Sound Shadows production photo. Two children dance in a darkened space, in front of a wall that is illuminated with brightly coloured projections, engaging with their shadows.

Sound Shadows

A playful, sensory space for children and families to engage with sound, movement and light.
A Tangle production photo. A child with short dark hair is suspended upside down amongst hundreds of strands of colourful elastic. They are smiling at the camera.

Tangle

Tangle invites children and their families to create a giant, vibrant, interactive artwork that shifts and grows over time.
A We Built This City production photo. A child with dark curly hair, wearing a red shirt, leaps into the air, smiling. They are surrounded by hundreds of cardboard boxes piled high.

We Built This City

A wonderland of a construction site that brings whole communities together to think big and build the city shapes of their dreams.
A When the World Turns production photo. A young person in a wheelchair and their adults sit at a small table, surrounded by plants. They are in a large, darkened space with theatrical light. Other small groups are visible in the background. Large pieces of wrinkled brown paper create motion blurs. Photo: Theresa Harrison, Arts Centre Melbourne

When the World Turns

A fantastical experience for young people with complex disability and their families, leading a participating audience into a sensory state of mind and body.
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