shunt (2000-14)

Gemma was a founder of the hugely influential and multi-award-winning Shunt collective, which transformed the British arts scene in the early 2000s, producing both large scale immersive shows and a curated night-club.

  • Shunt pioneered what came to be known as immersive theatre.
    WIRED

  • The daddies of immersive theatre.
    TIME OUT

  • An astounding piece of theatre. Radical. Original. Incredible.
    TIME OUT

  • Fantastic alarming inventiveness.
    THE INDEPENDENTT

  • The most innovative theatre company in Britain.
    THE GUARDIAN

  • The best bar in London.
    THE EVENING STANDARD

  • The most astonishing and disorienting coup de theatre I've ever seen. It really felt, watching Dance Bear Dance, like something new was happening. It was in the best way totally mind-blowing. I've never seen anything like it. It was strange, wild, beautiful and funny and it conjured astonishing things out of the darkness. 
    NICHOLAS HYTNER (AD of National Theatre & immersive hit, Guys and Dolls)

  • To say that it was exciting just wouldn't do justice to the experience. Your preconceptions were forcibly rearranged. 
    TOM MORRIS

  • The whole thing felt like being inside the head of a drunken genius.
    THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

  • Shunt are innovators whose ambitious work has long worried at the definitions of audience, venue and performance, whose powers to unsettle and surprise through sheer theatricality far outstripped the company’s many aesthetic imitators.
    TOTAL THEATRE

SHUNT PRODUCTIONS :

PERFORMER IN immersive

Gemma recently performed in Deadweight’s hit - The Manikins. Other collaborations as an actor (immersive) include: Darkfield, Coney, Gideon Reeling, Punchdruck & the BAC one-on-one festival, 2011:

  • The luminous Gemma Brockis is Max, and she’s so adorable you just want to eat her up. As delightful as any pudding. Go and be transported.
    FOURTH WALL

DIRECTING BEYOND SHUNT

Gemma wrote and directed Kingdom Come for the RSC. Since 2003, she he has travelled the world with her long-term collaborator, Silvia Mercuriali, creating theatrical experiences within real landscapes - Pinocchio 2007. She co-directed an immersive catwalk show in Conex for Tramando , for Buenos Aires Fashion Week. In lockdown, she lay in bed and made Oddvent.

  • The real star of Pinocchio is Dublin itself, made strangely new and wondrous through the smudged windows of the car.
    DUBLIN TIMES - Award nomination for innovation

  • Oddvent was necessary for the communal soul of participants and makers alike. It sustained us and nourished us during an isolating time, and brought us together.
    JULIA MASLI - Participating artist in Oddvent

SELECTED FREELANCE IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCES :

V&A ARTS PARTY

Testimonials

  • I have worked with Gemma on numerous immersive projects. She is an incredible theatre maker, writer & collaborator. She has a unique ability to determine what is truly important and meaningful amongst the general chaotic overload of the creative process.
    DAVID ROSENBERG - Co-founder of Shunt / Now AD of Darkfield

  • Gemma Brockis is one my favorite bright minds in immersive performance.’
    BRIAN SOLOMON - Creative Tech Director at Framestore, NYC and creator of the XR team at Meow Wulf

LINKS

Image: Britt Hatzius (Pinocchio) | Susanne Dietz (Shunt Shows) | NK Guy (Shunt Lounge) | Lottie Davies (Oddvent) | (Hotel)