Performance inspired by mummers’ plays and masked traditions weaves its way to mid Wales

A free, bilingual performance project exploring the folk theatre of the Wales/England border, featuring work from leading artist Lewis Prosser inspired by mummers’ plays and masked traditions is set to take place next month.

Making Merrie is a new performance project by artist and basketmaker Lewis Prosser, exploring the material culture of folk theatre.

Inspired by mummers’ plays and masked traditions from the areas around the Welsh border, Making Merrie combines craft, performance, and language to reflect on cultural heritage and exchange.

Roots

Mummers’ plays are traditional folk performances with roots over 500 years old, often tied to Christmas and New Year.

Full of humour and spontaneous revelry, these plays were staged in streets, homes, or pubs by amateur troupes, telling simple stories of combat, death, and miraculous revival.

Unlike the religious Mystery Plays, mummers’ plays are secular, carnivalesque, and performed for community fun.

 

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The project features large-scale wicker costumes, handcrafted using regional willow basketry techniques, highlighting basketry as an essential human skill we’re at risk of forgetting—a skill that, if lost, means losing part of what it is to be human.

Borderlands

Scripts blend Welsh and English in a garbled nonsense dialect, combined with improvised movement and carnival procession. Unrehearsed and set within communities, the performances invite spontaneity, joy, and humour.

Originally from Bristol and now based in Cardiff (via Glasgow), Prosser uses this work to reflect on his journey across the UK, observing how craft and performance connect people with the landscape.

Through Making Merrie, he treats linguistic and geographic borders as spaces for dynamic cultural exchange, fostering a deeper sense of identity.

The Making Merrie performance takes place at 3pm on 21 December at Hafan yr Afon, Newtown.

Supported by Arts Council of Wales, Oriel Davies, Chapter Arts, Mission Gallery, and Galeri Caernarfon, Making Merrie will go on display at Galeri Caernarfon from February to April 2025.

Find out more here.