Shadowdock – experience Belfast’s past, present and future from a new perspective (part of Belfast2024 until Sunday 29 September)

Walk down the Maritime Mile, past the Odyssey, past Titanic Belfast, past the back of the film studios, past HMS Caroline, the distillery and the Science Park, and on a wee bit further towards the Pump House and you’ll hit the Thompson dry dock which once housed the Titanic.

Descend the 66 steps and you’ll be on the dock’s floor, looking up at the tiny figures of the ‘above deck’ audience leaning against the railings at this Belfast 2024 project. Before the sun sets you’ll spot the yellow H&W cranes peeping into view at the far end of the dry dock before darkness descends. You’ll marvel at the sine wave created along both sides the 850 foot long wall. (When it opened in 1911, it was the longest dry dock in the world, and when the doors were closed the adjoining jump house could empty the water in a mere hundred minutes.)

Technically, Shadowdock is a large-scale light and sound show, which takes the ‘below deck’ audiences 40 feet down from ground level and onto the bottom of the dry dock. Wearing headphones, you’ll hear a beautiful soundtrack, some narration, and begin to interact with the spotlights that shine up, down and through the enormous space.

You’ll grow used to the percussive musical track suggesting hammering, steel work and heavy construction. Your spine will shiver as you hear the roar of water in your headphones, wondering if the wall that now seals in the dry dock doors has failed. You’ll be tempted to sing along with Katie Richardson’s Into the Night anthem: sure, everyone’s wearing headphones and no one can hear in a silent disco!

Artistically, it’s like a guided meditation. Time set aside to connect with the sea and the city, with people and place. And to consider how the planet is changing in terms of climate and how that could the affect the ground that we’re standing on. It ponders size and perspective, the shadows and impact we leave on where we live and work.

It’s not quite what I expected. A different – and even more costly to stage – version of this event might have insisted on projecting video onto the stone walls of the dry dock, and retold the history of the dock. But then, is that really what Belfast needs in 2024?

We need to be reminded that if you shine powerful spotlights through the legs of members of the public in a dry dock, even before the narration offers a hint, they’ll have started to dance in the beams and play with the shadows in the walls. Left in a vacuum people will let their hair down to play and cavort. They’ll be moved to create and collaborate in community. They’ll work with what’s to hand to make something beautiful.

Shadowdock is a product of the imagination of designer Henry Sykes and Three’s Theatre Company (known for their site specific storytelling). It’s a product of the lighting talent of Conal Clapper and Alan Mooney, and the sonic skill of Katie Richardson. And it’s an exceptional achievement for Three’s Theatre Company’s unflappable producer and artistic director Anna Leckey, the largest scale project undertaken, yet one that builds on eight years of productions that have gone before.

While tickets have sold out for the ‘below deck’ experience, there’s still availability to be up top where you can watch the show and hear a tailored version of the soundscape and narration.

Photo credits: Belfast City Council/Twitter/X, alaninbelfast, Shadowdock/Instagram

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