This is the Amara Zee, the world’s only tall-ship theatre. She’s been touring North America and Europe for 27 years.
Plans are afoot to bring her to Bristol harbour for two or three years to be used as a multi-faceted venue for theatre, music, dance, circus, and more.
A (very abridged) history of the AZ
Since 1997 the Amara Zee has been the touring, floating, home and stage of the Caravan Stage Theatre Company, aka “The Caravan”. Founded in 1970 in British Columbia, Canada, The Caravan originally toured in large wagons pulled by Clydesdale draught horses and performed all over the west coast of Canada and the U.S. in a 700 seat tensile tent.
Clydesdale horses pull a wagon into town
The Caravan's performance tent
A wagon scene from the horsedrawn days
After 20 years of horse-drawn adventures, a new plan was hatched - to take the Caravan on the water. A design was chosen based upon the classic Thames Sailing Barges, a type of commercial sailing boat once common on the river Thames in London. These flat-bottomed barges with a shallow draught, raisable leeboards, and foldable masts, were perfectly adapted to the Caravan plan to perform across the U.S. from the Great Lakes to Louisiana via the Mississippi River. The large flat deck makes a perfect stage, and from the two sturdy masts all kinds of theatrical rigging can happen…
The construction of the AZ happened in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, commencing in 1993 and she was launched in 1997.
The Amara Zee build - early stages
First hoisting into the water
In all her glory
For the next eight years a constantly evolving crew of performers, creators, technicians, facilitators, and (most importantly) a cook and an engineer, made their way down the Mississippi stopping at every town that would have them, amusing and bemusing audiences with political theatre spectaculars comprising acting, singing, original live music, acrobatics and aerial performances, moving set pieces, theatrical lighting, and multi-angle video projections. The audience would watch from the shore and the performances would happen on the deck and rigging of the boat and sometimes the water around her. Often the action would move from boat to shore and vice versa via ziplines.
Amara Zee on the water with a Ferris Wheel on deck
Amara Zee during a set build
Amara Zee during a performance with giant puppet heads
Amara Zee rigging silhouetted on a sunset
Amara Zee in Brooklyn NYC
Amara Zee in full performance mode
In 2005 the Amara Zee reached the end of the Mississippi near New Orleans. What to do next? They looked east, towards Europe… Due to her shallow draught the AZ is not an ocean-crossing vessel so she was picked up onto a large container vessel and taken to Rotterdam to start a whole new adventure, this time down the Danube to the Black Sea and then around a large section of the Mediterranean coast. She spent eight happy years touring and performing in Europe before it was time to return to North America. Once again she was craned onto a large container vessel and taken back across the Atlantic, this time to Houston, Texas.
Nafpaktos, Greece
The European route
The Bay of Kotor, Montenegro
From Houston she sailed around the Intracoastal Waterway, a 3,000-mile inland waterway all around the eastern side of the U.S., stopping outside New Orleans again and then heading around Florida and all the way up to NYC, then back across the Great Lakes to the home waters of Canada. Once back in British Columbia she underwent a well-deserved large scale re-fit between 2018 and 2020.
Amara Zee being raised from the water
Removing woodwork to get at the rust
Bruce working on the running decks
Sandblasting the hull
New stainless steel leeboards
Painting the hull
Pretty new hull
Shiny new foredeck
The relaunch
Of course, once she was looking smart and ready to get out and about again, the great plague came across the lands and the next tours were waylaid for a couple of years. The Caravan managed to squeeze in a few shows in Western Canada where they could, but not too many before the original founders of the company, bona fide legends Paul Kirby & Adriana “Nans” Kelder, now in their 70’s, decided it was time to semi-retire (they’ll never fully retire, it’s just not in their nature…).
Nans and Paul as Lady Love and Dr. Heart in the horse-drawn days
Paul and Nans in Canada 2017
The OmbraZee
They have downsized to a beautiful Shpountz schooner, the OmbraZee, based in the south of France, from which they will present renegade video screenings and puppet shows. The next chapter of a beautiful legacy. And the Amara Zee currently resides in Jacksonville, Florida where she is being used as a theatre by a couple of the local college drama departments and a training vessel for two sea scout troops. But there are plans afoot for her next port of call…
The Bristol plan
For a while after the covid dark ages the Amara Zee was languishing a little compared to her previous adventures. She was in British Columbia, the birthplace of the Caravan, but facing an uncertain future. Before the Florida plan was hatched, it was uncertain who would take her on. Paul and Nans’ footprints are dauntingly large ones to walk in! It was realised that although the AZ has never been to the UK there are an uncanny amount of “Caravaners” based in Bristol. And the centre of Bristol is a floating harbour: 70 acres of scenic waterway which although beautiful to look at, has plenty of space and opportunity for more cultural venues. Especially as the harbour is subject to an imminent council regeneration program… Feels like a great time and place for a floating multi-purpose arts venue on a beautiful historical vessel…
Bristol harbour cranes
Bristol marina
Backflip on a water jetpack during Bristol Harbour Festival
So the idea formed that the Amara Zee should come to Bristol. She would obviously fit beautifully into this creative and artistic city. The hope is to moor her in a central spot where she would be an attraction to both locals and tourists and for her to be a stage and platform for a wide variety of performing arts with an emphasis towards accessibility, youth arts, and environmentalism. To begin with she would easily integrate with the many existing events around the harbour, from the annual harbour festival to the folk festival, the poetry festival, the new music festival, the graffiti festival, the film festival, the sea shanty festival, the light festival, the cocktail festival, etc, etc. And going forward she would be a beautiful stage for the many local theatre, music, dance, and circus groups. There is already strong interest among such groups to use her as a development and performance space that could move to different spots around the harbour.
The Amara Zee in the Bay of Kotor
A performance of "Utopian Floes" in Greece
Aerialists rehearsing
Monstrous scenes
The interior of the boat is a beautiful living space with a galley kitchen and even a working organ. It’s a great space for small events such as workshops, spoken word nights, book clubs, supper clubs, meetings, etc. And there are bunks to sleep twenty, lending it perfectly to artist residencies. What artist wouldn’t want to live aboard a vessel like this for a few weeks whilst developing and performing new work…?
"The salon" - The Amara Zee living space
The organ
The galley
The companionway
A three-bunk cabin
Dinnertime scenes
So what will this take?
At the most basic level: funding and a mooring. The budget is still being calculated in detail but initial calculations indicate the total cost of bringing the Amara Zee to Bristol and operating her for a year would be ~£230,000. This includes shipping her from Florida to Southampton, sailing to Bristol, and insurance, maintenance, mooring, power, and legal costs for the first year. She will also need some electrical work, nothing too complicated but for example the electrical sockets in the cabins are U.S. standard. This is a rough estimate thus far and a more detailed budget will be produced in the next few weeks, but we feel it’s actually great value for a project likely to add a lot of value to the Bristol Harbourside and we’re hopeful the money can be raised through a combination of private and government funding. We plan to set up as a non-profit Community Interest Company (C.I.C.) and to offset running costs with revenue from ticket sales and income from hiring the inside of the Amara Zee out for events, workshops, corporate hospitality etc.
Who’s behind the project?
A team of Bristol-based Caravaners - people who’ve been part of the Amara Zee’s adventures at different points over the years. All of whom have also been heavily involved in the UK’s events/arts/festival scenes. A few of us were working on the Arcadia spider at Glastonbury festival when we realised we’d all also been on the Amara Zee at various times. And from there the Bristol idea was formed…
Spearheading the project are:
Rupert de Renzy-Martin - sound engineer on the Greece/Albania/Montenegro tour 2009 and Louisiana 2014
Tim Steer - sound engineer on the Montenegro/Croatia/Italy tour 2010
Katie Davies - lighting engineer on the Louisiana tour 2015
Charlie Knight - sound engineer on the Louisiana tour 2015
How can I get involved?
If you’re interested in the project we’d love to hear from you at amarazeebristol@gmail.com and please sign up to the newsletter link at the bottom of this page. And spread the word to others who might be interested!
A fundraising campaign will begin early 2025 and we’ll be developing partnerships with the organisations who run the various Bristol arts festivals and the performing arts establishments who want to use the Amara Zee as a stage.
Thanks for reading!
