Corby pop-up festival coming soon with robot giant tortoise, funky litter pickers and a trail of empty chairs

A free all-age festival that is touring the UK will pop-up in Corby town centre on Saturday, February 19, for one day only.

The Liberty UK Festival will offer a full day of free streets shows, powerful performances, art installations and interactive workshops for all the family.

Across the town centre there will be art installations and interactive workshops on the themes of freedom and democracy including an animatronic giant tortoise called Zelva.

ArtReach, producers of the festival, have previously worked on Corby Mardi Gras and Grow Festival and are partnering with the team from Made With Many and The Core at Corby Cube to bring the series of free events and performances to the town.

Lorna Fulton, creative director at ArtReach, said: "ArtReach has helped to deliver many events in Corby before, including Mardi Gras and Corby Grow Festival, and the town always shows great support with fantastic audiences.

"Working in partnership with Made with Many is allowing us to bring a great festival line-up to town for the Liberty UK Festival this February and we will be supporting some brilliant local projects too.

"The festival will host - all for free - incredible street theatre, new contemporary performances, family arts workshops and virtual reality experiences, it's going to be a great day to celebrate in Corby."

The pop-up festival will explore the themes of freedom and democracy and will feature local people in two of the key performances - one at The Core theatre and the other, 'SUPERMOMENTS' to be performed at the Willow Place Shopping Centre during the evening of the festival.

During the interactive outdoor performance of 'SUPERMOMENTS', artist Ling Tan uses wearable technology and selected audience members will listen together and perform to stories told by people from Corby.

As well as creative arts workshops, some of which will take place in the run-up to the festival day, there will be seed planting, pot decoration and creative collages using materials found in nature followed by cape and mask making for environmental 'superheroes'.

A talking animatronic, giant tortoise called Zelva will be roaming the streets chatting to young audience members alongside Britain’s liveliest ‘Keep Britain Tidy’ campaigners, The Disco Litter Queens - who bring a new level of 'funk to tidying up junk'.

Handing out free lollipops will be the Slow Down/Liberty Lollipops team and rave culture will be celebrated in an immersive live performance by Debris Stevenson whose work has toured across the world.

Working with a group of young people, Debris has co-created a performance exploring the journeys of people 'trying their best to rave whilst the world tries its best to stop them'.

The festival finale at the Core theatre will see a team of youngsters from the Core Creates company will perform their latest work where they share their hopes and dreams for the future.

To explore the festival more, visit www.libertyukfestival.com or use Instagram and search @libertyfestivaluk.