Tonight is the second evening in a row where I’ve come home and flopped down in front of my computer – tired, but incredibly proud of my work and enthused by the young people and creative minds I’m so lucky to be able to work alongside. As with my post about the Radiate Training I’ll keep it brief and promise to fill in the gaps later.
The project was commissioned by The Lichfield Festival as part of their Learning and Participation programme. Pupils from two schools have researched aspects of World War Two and filmed interviews with veterans and people with memories of the period. The result is 12 excellent films that were premiered at the Wedge Gallery at Lichfield College this evening – but you can go and view them there next week during the festival. This evening many people were moved to tears, and Len Owens, an SAS veteran was keen to praise the pupils. In my mind praise doesn’t come higher than that.
We have been experimenting with using a Blog for the project, to enable pupils to communicate with each other and share their work, so you can read more about the film making process on the Lichfield Festival Learning and Participation Blog under the category ‘Memory Box’.
Back in December I spent the day with people who live in and around Kingshurst. Part of the morning was spent interviewing pupils from Kingshurst School. The rest of the day I had the privilege to run a workshop with some of Kingshurst’s older residents. I call it a privilege as it really felt special to indulge in chatting with them about their memories of the area and its development over the past six decades. We were lucky enough to be able to use a selection of photos collated by local resident Stan Tarrant to provoke some really interesting discussion. The result of the workshop is a lovely selection of interviews, illustrated by Stan’s photos of the area over the years. We’ll be launching the film sometime in March, so watch this space for an update on that.
Also in December, the 