Hanging By A Million Threads

All Ages

The Next Chapter

We are delighted to announce after several months of Sophie’s commission being displayed across the front of The Festival Theatre, that her work is now being transformed in to a three step legacy. Firstly we are working with local Leith company Kalopsia to re-purpose some of the printed banners  to create 1000 face masks. These masks will be adorned with the words of thanks Sophie embedded on the fabric, which originally came from our emergency crowd funder. They will be gifted to Capital Theatres patrons, staff and local food banks in the hope of creating a practical use for this fabric and spreading the joy of Sophie’s work.

A temporary exhibition of eight of her pieces will be hosted internally at the Festival theatre to provide a chance for the public to see her work up close as we begin to re-open to the public. Watch this space for dates and times

Finally, we will have a single piece of fabric from the Commission framed and permanently displayed in our buildings to remind us all of the events and long lasting effect of the last year. Sophie’s work will take pride of place in our archive, so that for years to come people can learn about the tremendous support we received whilst closed.

We cannot wait to share the next chapter of this work with you. Keep an eye on our social media for updates!

Edinburgh based emerging artist Sophie Fields has created a statement of thanks to all who have supported Capital Theatres over the past few months, with her textile-based installation Hanging by a million threads. 

After successfully receiving emergency funding our L&P team decided to create an open commission as a response to the huge support we had received from the public and in the hope of getting some funds a quickly as possible in to the pockets of freelance artists. Artists were given a brief to create a large scale, positive engaging piece that expresses our thanks back to the people who have supported us. With a quick turnaround in mind, we were delighted by the number of submissions from right across the city. After careful deliberation of all of the thoughtful submissions Sophie Fields was picked as the winning proposal. 

Her brilliant piece centres upon the hundreds of comments posted on the Capital Theatres ‘Theatre Emergency Support Fund’ crowdfunding page. The title Hanging by a Million Threads is quite literal, as the fabric is made up of millions and millions of individual threads woven together to give it a strong tensile form. It links to the state of jeopardy the theatre has experienced this year as a result of closure throughout the pandemic. Capital Theatres was literally hanging by a single thread. But with everyone’s help through the crowdfunder, patron donations, money received from the Scottish Government and Creative Scotland, and the National Lottery Heritage Fund, as well as furlough being extended; all of these factors help the theatres sustain a stronger financial position over the winter until March…hanging by a million threads for now, rather than dangling in hesitation.

Working with Cat Sheridan from our L&P team as well as a host of support from our in-house technical and maintenance teams Sophie has produced her largest piece of art to date! Inside the glass panes of the Festival theatre façade, 30 individual, digitally printed banners:  made up of stripes of colour (blue, pink, purple and orange to match the Capital Theatres branding) and featuring highlighted comments in bold white text , on top of all 525 beautiful messages, thoughts and memories from the hundreds shared by the public during Capital Theatres’ crowdfunder campaign.

Our Raise the Curtain digital engagement for this project has ranged from zoom events with patrons to sharing the work digitally across our social platforms, reaching an audience who otherwise might not be able to travel to central Edinburgh to view it. We have also created the film below with Sophie to give a deeper insight into her process. The installation is available to view in person until mid April when we hope to recycle the material to create and donate face masks. Along with re-purposing some of her work as a surprise inside the Festival Theatre, for our audiences as we slowly reopen our venues.