The theme for Design Manchester’s 2018 Festival is DISRUPT. With a strong focus on protest art and art in politics, DM18 invited disruptors from all fields to share their stories, creativity and design, whilst we look anew at our own creative paths in the face of a gloomy mediated future.

What better partner for the closing screening and party than Lost in Vagueness, a film charting the emergence of Glastonbury Festival’s most iconic and anarchic sideshow attraction and its ingenious but occasionally self-destructive creator Roy Gurvitz.

The debut feature film from director Sofia Olins traces Roy’s story through his emergence from a group of new age travelers who made Glastonbury a stomping ground in the eighties, to anarchic impresario, and on to a troubled creative force struggling to belong in a changing world.

A post film chat with director Sofia Olins with DJs, performers and special guests from the subversive days of Lost Vagueness will discuss their own experiences of Lost Vagueness, the importance of art in protest, and how art and entertainment can challenge people in politics and play.

Also for the very first time unseen footage will be screened from Sofia’s 12 years filming at Lost Vagueness, plus protest art from The People Are Revolting, Design Manchester’s ongoing creative workshop inspired by Patrick Thomas and his book The Protest Stencil Toolkit.

The event is hosted by MC Jana Kennedy, one of the original Lost Vagueness Can Can girls, as featured in the film.

5.30 pm           Doors

6.00pm            Lost in Vagueness Screening – introduced by Sofia Olins and followed by Q & A

8.00pm            DM18 Closing Party is now hosted in the Refuge bar

Lost in Vagueness – film synopsis

Lost in Vagueness is the extraordinary untold story of Glastonbury Festival’s most iconic and anarchic sideshow attraction, Lost Vagueness, and its ingenious but occasionally self-destructive creator Roy Gurvitz.

The debut feature film from director Sofia Olins, traces Roy’s story through his emergence from a group of new age travelers who made Glastonbury a stomping ground in the eighties, to anarchic impresario, and on to a troubled creative force struggling to belong in a changing world.

A reaction to Glastonbury’s post-Thatcher malaise, Lost Vagueness started as a fancy-dress cabaret and flourished into a festival-within-a-festival: an incredible twisted pastiche of the Vegas strip encompassing variety performers from dance to burlesque to circus to freakshow to pyrotechnic scrapheap robots, as well as a casino, a wedding chapel, hot tubs and a boxing ring.

The film combines exclusive footage of Lost Vagueness at the height of its hedonistic powers with in-depth interviews with Roy, his loyal but increasingly exasperated producer Leila Jones, Glastonbury stalwarts Michael and Emily Eavis and Melvin Benn, and artists including Suggs, Kate Tempest, Keith Allan, Fatboy Slim and legendary cabaret performer Mouse.