Ep. 586 - Tom Bailey - Theatremaker & Arctic Expeditioner. Recorded from The Arctic Wilderness

About this episode

Tom Bailey discusses his work as a theatremaker and his upcoming Arctic expedition.

Tom Bailey is a Bristol-based theatremaker and artist, and creative director of Herald Angel award-winning company MECHANIMAL, whose work — described by New Scientist as "extraordinary… moving and enlightening" — has toured to over 15 countries and explores humanity's relationship to a changing planet. We caught up with Tom from a remote shack in northern Norway, where he is currently midway through *Threshold – A Wild New Border Journey*: a 600km ultra-slow expedition by ski, sled, foot and boat across the Arctic borderlands of Norway, Finland and Sweden. Beginning on 10 March 2026 at Barents Spektakel, the two-month journey travels westwards through the Russia–Finland–Norway border region before concluding at Stamsund International Theatre Festival in the Lofoten Islands in May 2026. Along the way, Tom is meeting local communities, artists and researchers to document the lived realities of life in a fast-changing Arctic — with a new performance piece set to premiere in 2027. Threshold builds on a body of work that has consistently used endurance and landscape as artistic material. In 2024 Tom walked 1,000 kilometres solo as a tribute to lost species, research that fed directly…

People in this episode

Guest: Tom Bailey

Topics covered

• theatre
• art
• ecology
• expedition
• interview

Keywords

• Tom Bailey
• MECHANIMAL
• ecological theatre
• Arctic expedition
• Wild Thing!

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: MECHANIMAL, Arts Council England, Arts Council Norway, Danish Arts Foundation

Books & works: Wild Thing!, Threshold, Edinburgh Fringe, Barents Spektakel, Stamsund International Theatre Festival

Places: Bristol, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Lofoten Islands

More episodes of My Time Capsule

• My Time Capsule The Dig - Ep. 6 - With Lindsey Santoro from episode 305! · June 11, 2026 · 56 min
• Ep. 588 - Andrew Ryan - One of UK and Ireland’s most in-demand comedians, 60 million online views · June 7, 2026 · 1h 2m
• My Time Capsule The Dig - Ep. 5 - With Rufus Hound! · June 4, 2026 · 51 min
• Ep. 587 - Johann Hari - New York Times bestseller, over 2 million books sold in 40 languages · June 1, 2026 · 1h 18m
• My Time Capsule The Dig - Ep. 4 - With Janet Ellis! · May 28, 2026 · 36 min
• My Time Capsule The Dig - Ep. 3 - With Josh Bolt (from George Clooney's Catch-22 & Tom Hanks' Masters of the Air) · May 21, 2026 · 41 min