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youth theatre
Having brought our family show ‘Stella’ to Gloucester Cathedral last Autumn, we wanted to use this original story as the basis for a number of online activities aimed at children and their families.
WISH UPON A STAR – A simple instructional craft activity. Create your own star, make a wish and share it on social media channels, with the additional option to receive Star letters in the post, like a Star pen pal!
HOW TO BE AN ALIEN – An interactive session with Stella, our very own girl on the moon.
STELLA STORY TIME – The story of Stella told online by Ivy from the show. Features original illustrations and an original musical soundtrack, with the aid of green screen software to transport the audience into the world of Stella.
About the artists
Filskit Theatre was formed in 2009 with a mission to ignite the imaginations of children and their families whilst developing artists, accessibility and hard to reach audiences. Filskit are committed to building future young and family audiences and a more inclusive, diverse and sustainable sector by developing the art form and the skills of our collaborators.
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Hannah Whyte: art radio
This project is a community art radio show, focusing on the broadcast of local/emerging music, poetry, audio-based artworks, and writing.
Hannah says:
Live radio transcends space and borders, connecting people across towns, regions, and even countries, which is why I think it’s an ideal format for art-sharing during a period of social isolation. Tuning in at a set time each week, with the knowledge that other people are hearing exactly what you are, is ultimately uniting, and could serve to bring people together during this isolated time, as well as providing a platform for little-known local artists.
Tune in at 8pm on Wednesdays by visiting www.tincanradio.co.uk. To get involved, submit your music, poetry and audio-art to tincanradio.glos@gmail.com.
About the artist
Hannah’s work revolves around community and collaboration. She is interested in books, zines, events, experiences, spaces – and their radical potential for bringing people together, forming alternative structures outside of the gallery format.
Sisterhood is a photography and mixed media project highlighting ten women from the Gloucestershire region. The portraits and artwork have recently been exhibited at The Wilson (up until the temporary closure of the venue). These uplifting stories of diverse, extraordinary women from the local area celebrate and pay tribute to the multi-dimensional beauty of women, and the value of that beauty in this time of crisis.
Each woman will share her thoughts on aspects of COVID-19, encouraging the audience to look at the current scenario from another perspective – to interact and connect with other people in this unprecedented time.
The project will be placed on a variety of online platforms including Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, as well as Create Gloucestershire’s website.
About the artist
Danielle is a young photographer, filmmaker and artist who is passionate in raising awareness of issues she feels strongly about, from human rights and social equality, to the struggling environment and the rise of veganism.
The Covid Covers is an online project by Soozy Roberts, where you are invited to dedicate a song to someone who deserves a shout-out during lockdown and social-distancing. The idea developed out of a series of self-portraits she created in 2017 that had songs as titles – the challenge being to create your own song cover using yourself, household members and objects.
The dedications will be played on BBC Radio Gloucestershire and a special one-off show on deepbedradio.org. Song covers and dedications will be exhibited on the website gallery and the top 10 images will be printed, framed and presented to GRH as a thank you for their amazing efforts. We hope to hold a concert in Gloucester when things return to normal. Get involved over at www.thecovidcovers.com!
About the artist
Soozy Roberts is a socially-engaged artist working in a range of disciplines and with communities to bring art into everyday environments and site-specific spaces.
Halima is a Gloucester-based poet and long-time friend of Strike A Light. She’s working with her local community, encouraging people to write and record their experiences of lockdown. We’ll be sharing them on our site soon!
Sneak peeks
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Creative support
We love supporting young people to develop their artistic skills and careers. We can help you put on a show, find training or work opportunities – or we’d happily just have a chat with you!
Drop us a line, any time: strikealight.org.uk/contact-us/
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Made at Hawkwood: Friday Reads
About three years ago, Alicia from Hawkwood and Emma Jane, our Co-Artistic Director, cooked up a cunning plan to offer artist residencies in the beautiful setting of Hawkwood, with producer support from Strike A Light.
Like all residencies, working for a week at Hawkwood provides invaluable time and space for artists to develop their shows, write or rehearse. Unlike other residencies, it comes with the bonus of being in the beautiful Cotswold hills, and the BEST food. In fact when we’re talking to artists about how it went and how we can support the next stage of their work, we have a hard time getting them off the subject of the food. But we caught up with a few people who’ve been at Hawkwood recently to find out how it went, and- other than the daily home made cake- what their highlights were.
Vinnie Heaven
We’ve been working with the amazing Vinnie Heaven since the beginnings of Strike A Light. We like to support new ideas and new voices getting to the stage and Vinnie wanted to use their show to make a change in the world. Vinnie worked at Hawkwood with director Emma Williams to create their show She’s A Good Boy. The show then went on a very successful national tour and you can read more about that journey here.
“Your first exploration and draft is raw, its messy, frustrating, painful at times. At Hawkwood you get three meals a day at set times that force you out of your head and away from your words and allow you designated time to chat to other artists and makers. The food is phenomenal, that’s just a fact. The head space meals provide is integral. That’s a fact too. You can sleep there! you can completely escape life and have a week in picturesque gardens and light studios to just – make!”
Dani Harris Walters
Last year we did a call out to local and national artists in partnership with Everyman Theatre and Hawkwood to commission a brand new piece of Black led theatre or dance. The recipient was the brilliant Dani Harris Walters. Dani and his team spent a week at the Everyman Theatre in Cheltenham and a week at Hawkwood developing a brand new piece ‘Nanny’ before performing a scratch at the All Nations Community Centre (a highlight of our year that you can read a bit more about here). The finished show is coming to Gloucester too so watch this space.
Check out this video of Dani and the team during their residency. 👇
Saili Katebe
We regularly have open calls for artists to share work in progress at our Scratch Nights (find out more). In September 2019 we were lucky enough to have poet Saili Katebe share some of his new spoken word at our scratch night. We were really excited by Saili’s work and wanted to continue our support. Saili applied for a residency and worked at Hawkwood in December alongside other spoken word artists Sean Mahoney, Katie Greenall, JPDL & Grove.
“Day one of the residency was an amazing reminder of how much there is to pick apart and build, and what that time was able to give me to pull apart and bring back together. Having shared a scratch of my work a few times and received some notes and feedback, the time to consider the feedback allowed me to really shape and reshape the project as opposed to piling things on top of what I already had.
“I am excited about where I am with the project and hungry to tuck into it and bring it to life. I’m excited for the team to see the next sharing of the work and I look forward to sharing this creative journey with Strike A Light.
Bootworks Theatre
Bootworks’ new show NINE will star nine local nine year olds, sharing their thoughts, at the midpoint between birth and adulthood. In summer 2020 they’ll be working with young people in Matson, Gloucester, to create the show and in January 2020 had a week at Hawkwood to develop the ideas.
If you are interested in finding out more about how to apply for a future residency then you can keep an eye on our opportunities page or sign up to our artist mailing list.
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Scratch night call out
Have you got an idea for a new show or something in progress you’d like to try out?
We’re inviting artists from Gloucestershire and the South West to showcase new work at one of our scratch nights.
A great opportunity to try out ideas and gain feedback from a supportive live audience. Performances can last from two to twenty minutes and our scratch nights are open to any performance discipline. We provide basic tech, facilitate feedback from the audience and can cover your travel costs.
If you have something you’re keen to share and get support on then drop us an email on info@strikealightfestival.org.uk so we can chat. We’ll confirm a date that works for interested artists, as part of our summer season, May-July 2020.
(Due to the current world crisis dates are a little up in the air. However if you are interested in sharing something in the future we’d still love to hear from you).