Birmingham’s Mac is bringing the outdoors inside with a month-long walk in the woods.

Behind the blacked out door into the gallery on the arts centre’s first floor another world has been created.

Inside is a woodland habitat. Massive green diaphanous screens curtain the scene but, once inside, you cross into a concentrated blend of natural and unnatural, light and dark, touch and sound.

Sitting amongst the trees and bark are unexpected objects – a bed, electric lights, a sink. It is disorienting and just a little confusing.

This is the world of The Woods which has been created by Birmingham artist Jane Packman. And, just as it challenges you to place yourself in a space which is part reality and part fantasy, so too it is aiming to blur the distinctions between the arts.

Packman’s work is both an installation in which visitors can walk, touch and experience the woods but also a theatre space where a story will unfold at set times during the next month.

In combining the art forms, Packman is hoping to reach a wider audience and encourage people to cross the artificial barriers which are erected and maintained in cultural fields.

“I would really encourage people to come to the gallery and just see and experience what it holds,” says Packman. “Then, when they have experienced the installation, to book in and see the performance – and I hope they will be pleasantly surprised.”

Packman, whose work Treasured was hosted at mac last year, says both aspects of The Woods aim to encourage you to disappear into your own thoughts, responses and emotions.

“With the installation we are thinking of including some kind of feedback form, not for criticism but for people to say how they have responded to it,” she says.