* PRESS RELEASE -2003*

THE GAPP GETS WIDER!

In May 2000 through a joint venture with American performance artist Tim Miller and the Fierce! Festival, a group of gay men were involved in creating a performance piece entitled: 'Lie back and think of Birmingham'.

After this experience men from that group founded a gay men's performance group called GAPP (Gay and Performing Proudly). GAPP have since been commissioned by Fierce! Festival in 2001 where they performed their devised piece: 'Great Adventures Past and Present' which was supported by Birmingham Pride and the Lottery's "Awards for All" scheme.

GAPP worked with Birmingham Opera Company on their community opera 'Votzeck' in February 2001 and will again perform in their forthcoming production of Beethoven's 'Fidelio'.

GAPP were commissioned by "Duckie" - London's premiere performance art club at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern - to create "Horrorshow", a piece of work exploring gay men's experiences of violence. The piece premiered at the club on January 12th and played at the MAC (midland Arts Centre) in the spring.

For The Birmingham Pride Parade (formerly Mass Camp) in June 2002 GAPP were awarded £2000 pounds from West Midlands Arts' Youth Arts Fund and working with professional performers, artistes, and choreographers to create a spectacle of spectacular splendour with glitter galore! - did you see last year's float at Mass Camp?!

GAPP are looking for supporters and seek new members for the group to create performances from workshops for a Play called The Maths Tutor in Nov 2003 appearing at the REP Theatre on Broad St..

Non-professional performers from Birmingham and the West Midlands are invited to join us in this new exciting performance piece.

Interested?

If any one out there thinks they might like to go along to one of their sessions to see if they want to get involved in future projects call Mike and leave a message on 0121 446 1087 .