Co-presented by ArtsEquator and Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, the ArtsEquator-Esplanade Offstage Fellowship 2026 commissions the development and publication of four opinion pieces that are topical, of the moment and reflect critically on contemporary performing arts in Singapore and Southeast Asia. Selected by both arts organisations, the four fellows are mid-career or emerging Singapore cultural practitioners and writers.
 
In this essay, writer Claire Teo reflects on reshaping accessibility in Singapore’s theatre scene, considering access as an art form and the expanded possibilities that inclusion can bring.

I used to hate whenever I had to use my cane on stage. It seemed to highlight my limitations in some ways, inviting assumptions about dependence and competence in an industry that prizes versatility, precision and ease. As a visually impaired actor, I wished I was “normal”. But really, what does that word mean anyway? Can it shift and evolve?

Efficiency and who it serves

We have learnt to move quickly, haven’t we? Efficiency has become a value we have internalised. Rehearsals, manpower and timelines are compressed, and we learn to adapt and offer the best possible quality with the least possible resources.

How much of this have we accepted as normal? 

There are moments I catch myself trying to take up less space, to adapt faster, to not ask for “too much”. Moments where I measure my own worth against how seamlessly I can keep up. Perhaps this is what internalised ableism looks like. If I can appear easy enough to work with, then maybe I will be allowed to stay, for longer? If we have built systems that reward speed, then it is worth asking: Who do they serve? And if the answer is, no one, not in any lasting way, then what kind of art and what kind of community are these systems producing?

I wonder if access can become another, or perhaps, an entirely new kind of currency in the arts? One that isn’t treated like a good-to-have or afterthought, but which has the ability to shape decisions, timelines, budgets and artistic processes.

The value of consultation and communication

I have been in productions with only eight to 12 hours of rehearsal before a show. Performances that included acting and singing 10 songs with a chamber ensemble. Some of these were specifically intended to raise awareness about the disabled community and promote inclusion. I don’t think it was easy for anyone in the team. We were under immense pressure, and knew the performance would have been 10 times stronger if we were given more time.

I don’t want to presume I was the only person who struggled. But perhaps we experienced the pressure of a tight schedule differently. Decisions moved quickly, often without my input. What was limited was time to adapt to changes in direction, understand the space, piece together bits of visual information that were given too quickly or too late, and build enough familiarity and chemistry as an ensemble in order to respond confidently. What should have been a collaborative process became an individual’s negotiation of trying to keep up.  

Without prior consideration, consultation and communication, even the best of intentions become fragile. I have always believed theatre to be a space where we confront and question existing beliefs, and experiment and build better practices that others may one day model. So when access becomes negotiable, adjustments happen late and quality is compromised along with it, doesn’t the work undermine its own purpose?

The truth is, a disabled body on stage is rarely neutral. Undeveloped or unpolished work does not read as a lack of time. It reinforces harmful narratives that disabled artists are symbolic rather than capable of excellence or professionalism; victims to be pitied, heroes to be worshipped or artefacts to be examined. These narratives do not remain on stage. They influence social imagination, shaping how disabled people are valued, trusted and given authority beyond the arts.

So inclusion may still be named as an aspiration, but without the conditions for quality and with efficiency as the dominant value in the room, it becomes conditional, secondary and inevitably, a casualty.

When belonging is absent

Inclusion is understood as creating barrier-free environments where people are welcomed, respected, supported and able to participate fully. It appears in mission statements, grant applications, public messaging and cultural policy. In Singapore, it has also become a shared national aspiration, reflected in the Enabling Masterplan 2030: a vision of a more inclusive society. But what does it look like in practice?

The truth is, a shared space does not always mean a shared stake.

There was a show where I cried after. Not because anything in the show had gone wrong, but because something had felt deeply absent. During curtain call, with about 70 of us on stage, we had a complicated bowing sequence. It had not been rehearsed due to time constraints. I relied on the person beside me for cues and I fell out of sync. At some point, I was facing a different direction from everyone else.

In that moment, it did not matter how strong the performance had been or how much I had contributed. What surfaced instead was a familiar feeling that no matter how much I adapted, I didn’t quite belong.

Inclusion and belonging aren’t the same at all. You can be included in a room, accommodated and welcomed, and still have little influence over its pace, structure or assumptions. You can be given a seat at the table and still be expected to sit quietly in the place assigned to you. I believe belonging may ask for something more. Perhaps it begins when disabled people are not simply included, but recognised as part of the room from the start, with a legitimate and respected voice that can shift mindsets and shape process.

Access from within and going beyond

There has already been meaningful progress across Singapore’s arts and cultural landscape, with many examples I am excited to experience and learn from. Companies such as Wild Rice, Checkpoint Theatre and Singapore Repertory Theatre have expanded access through captioned and audio-described performances, touch tours, Singapore Sign Language interpretation and relaxed performances. The Necessary Stage’s Invisible has also opened up exciting ground by exploring creative and embedded access, while National Gallery Singapore’s Calm Room reflects a wider understanding that access can also include sensory care and regulation. These reflect real thought, labour, commitment and momentum, and they have already shifted what artists and audiences can begin to expect from our cultural spaces.

Perhaps the question now is how we can continue building on that progress. What becomes possible when access is not only provided thoughtfully, but considered early enough to shape process, authorship and artistic form from within?

In Scenes from the Climate Era, directed by Ellison Tan as part of Esplanade’s The Studios 2025, access was not an afterthought. The production, adapted from David Finnigan’s play, moved through a stream of urgent, intimate and matter-of-fact snapshots of life in the climate crisis. 

Before rehearsals started, Ellison met with me to understand my needs: how I navigate space, how I receive information and how she could best support me in her direction. I was given the option of bringing in my own access worker, or building shared capacity within the room by involving the cast and crew to learn how to respond to my needs. We chose the latter.

Time was set aside not only for me to articulate my access needs, but for the team to learn how to respond to them. This included learning how to be a sighted guide, how to move with me safely through the rehearsal room and on stage, and how to describe themselves and the room around me so I could remain part of passing conversations, spontaneous jokes and grasp details of scene work. One colleague even described an unassuming actor in the room as a 10 out of 10 in handsomeness. Insignificant as that sounds, it mattered so much to me.

There were also movement sequences in the show that required the ensemble to move in sync and create complex shapes and stage images. Many might have assumed this would be impossible with me unable to see the rest of the team. But through negotiation with the actors and director, we devised moments where touch, breath and sounds could provide the information I needed. What emerged was not a simplified version of the choreography, but a different way of arriving at precision together. What began as practical strategies later found themselves integrated into the creative access elements and overall sensory tapestry of the show.

Access was not only supporting the work from the outside. It was beginning to shape the work itself. The director was open to allowing these needs to inform the artistic language of the piece. We began experimenting with what we called Embedded Narration, a creative and integrated form of audio description, where descriptive lines were woven into the dialogue. Soundscapes and amplified movement carried information about environment, atmosphere and intention. Rather than isolating access through headphones for a specific audience, it became part of the shared experience, regardless of ability or disability.

Disability leadership expanding possibilities

Let’s take a look at another case study. In September, MONSTRESS will be presented as part of Esplanade’s The Studios 2026. Written by me and directed by Yvan Karlsson, we examine how harm is enabled, normalised and overlooked within the systems we trust. The play follows Mei Ling, a blind girl, who moves into the apartment beside Melissa and Sam, a single mother and her son with high support needs. As their lives begin to intersect, the work confronts what we choose not to see in everyday life: the behaviours we justify, the silences we keep and the ways pressure builds behind the walls of ordinary homes. As lead artist of the project, I guided the devising process, and was able to reframe and influence how access was understood and positioned from the beginning.

The work had its first staging in March last year, which was Yvan’s and many of the team’s first exposure to creative access elements. It was a journey of sharing, research, dialogue, negotiation, advocacy and rigorously confronting our own internalised ableism about what disabled-led work could look and feel like. Now that we have a second chance to make the show, something has shifted. Many of the inventive and cool design ideas around embedded and creative access have come directly from Yvan. Not as accommodation, but as artistic possibility. To me, this is exactly why I do art: To open up new ways of seeing, making and imagining together.

A shared belief is shaping the process: that access is not about creating the same experience for everyone, but ensuring that everyone has a full experience. Captioning will be embedded into the set itself, with its size, placement and prominence shifting according to the audibility and perception of sound. Positioned close to the performers, it allows audiences to receive information without having to choose between reading and watching. At the same time, tactile markers will be built into the floor, supporting my navigation through the space while remaining coherent within the world of the play. As for how we plan to describe the abstract movement sequences in the show, you’ll have to buy a ticket and watch the show! It’s truly exciting, if I can say so myself.

My experiences in these productions have shown me two things. First, disability leadership and representation are important. When disabled artists are included early, not only as performers but as collaborators, consultants and experts of their inner life, access becomes co-created rather than added on. It becomes part of the authorship, reshaping how a work is structured, communicated and experienced. Second, access can also be considered an artform.

Audio description as art

Traditional audio description provides key visual information about setting, costumes, expressions and movement for the blind and visually impaired audiences in the room. It is delivered through earphones, creating a clear, focused and contained experience.

But audio description could be a form of literary art. 

Experience the same action described in two different ways:

1. She bends down, scooping her right arm down and up to her chest, before sweeping it to the right.
2. She bends down, picking up a honeyed rose and sharing it with all of you.

Which did you prefer?

There is no right answer. One offers precision. The other offers sensation.

My collaborators and I have been exploring access as a language that clarifies intentionality, plays with delivery, and adds layers of complexity, sensation and imagination—in a way that isn’t exclusive to a certain community but enriches the experience for everyone. It requires time, dialogue and a willingness to experiment. It invites disagreement. And it is through that friction that new possibilities emerge. After all, if you already know it, why do it?

Rehearsing belonging: Beyond the stage

Does the problem lie in the language we use? To “provide” access can still imply a hierarchy: one side holds the power to give, while the other waits to receive. That framing can limit dialogue, discourage critique and position disabled artists as passive beneficiaries rather than active contributors capable of becoming performers, dramaturgs, access consultants, backstage and technical assistants and more. Against this, organisations like ART:DIS (Arts and Disability) Singapore have been an important ally, championing disabled artists, disability leadership and the development of training and career pathways in the arts.

Additionally, perhaps due to limited resources, access does not yet function as an ongoing practice. To move beyond one-off events, access may need to be embedded in the structures that support them. This could look like ringfenced access budgets, so that audio description, captioning, relaxed performances, access support workers, transport or adaptive technologies are not competing with the design budget or artist fees. Another way to look at it is funding models that support access as process rather than output, which means commissioning briefs that name access goals from the beginning, bring access practitioners into the creative team early, and allow the longer timelines needed for consultation, experimentation and co-creation. It could also mean evaluating success not only through artistic merit or audience numbers, but through the depth and quality of access integration.

I think often of a small tea museum I visited in Taiwan. It was modest, quiet and unassuming. Yet when I approached a wall of visual displays, a staff member immediately brought out tactile representations of the tea cakes and pastries handcrafted from recycled materials. For example, a coconut pastry formed from ceramic and eraser dust.

I asked who had made them. The cleaner. The receptionist.
I asked how many visually impaired visitors had come since the exhibition opened. Two.
I asked if it was worth it. Of course. Every experience matters.

What stayed with me was not only the ingenuity of those objects, but the mindset they embodied. That museum had not waited for large numbers, formal access expertise or ideal conditions before deciding that blind visitors mattered. Sometimes, all it really takes is a giving heart and a creative mind to work within resource constraints. But more importantly, it takes a collective sense of responsibility: a belief that access is not one person’s expertise or burden, but something all of us can begin to think about, build towards and hold together. Often, designing for the most vulnerable in mind, we end up caring for everyone. 

This is why the arts matter to me. They do more than tell stories or raise awareness. They give us a space to rehearse other ways of being together. Singapore theatre strives to “give voice to the voiceless, validate the consciousness of the minority, and stand for conscience of the people.”¹ I see this essay as taking steps to serve this mission. It means building rooms where access is a shared responsibility, where difference is not managed with disdain or apprehension, and where everyone in the space has a real stake in every stage of the work. Perhaps, if we can practise that on stage, we can begin to ask for it beyond the theatre too.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely that of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views, position and policies of The Esplanade Co Ltd and ArtsEquator.