Our final digital story from Celebrating Change #2 is from Dawn, who has put together an incredibly beautiful and ambitious stop-motion film featuring the drawings and textile skills that make up her own personal practice. Following the thread of her own life, her mother's struggles and her own experience of motherhood, she takes the image … Continue reading Life Lines by Dawn Foster
Author: Kirsten Luckins
Poet, performer, creative producer, creative practitioner. Artistic director Tees Women Poets. Writer-in-residence - Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (2019-20)
Facilitator - Celebrating Change community digital storytelling project (2018-2020)
Publications - The Trouble With Compassion (Burning Eye Books, 2016); Utterly Otterly (Bx3, 2018)
Theatre shows - The Moon Cannot Be Stolen (2014), The Trouble With Compassion (2016)
Behind the scenes at a ship launch with Jan Winward
During our year of workshops in Middlesbrough, Jan has been a staunch participant with many interesting memories of her working life in the heyday of industrial Teesside. Never one to sit easy with the more poetic side of our writing exercises, Jan elected to film an interview for her digital story and tell us how … Continue reading Behind the scenes at a ship launch with Jan Winward
Ally’s Digital Stories
Today we're bringing you three short digital stories by Ally O'Neill, one of our workshop participants who has been learning how to combine her writing with filming and editing skills. She is deeply motivated by her love of Nature, and feels it is her mission to show people how connection with the earth can be … Continue reading Ally’s Digital Stories
Growth by Katharine Jones
Katharine's digital stories are strongly formed out of her faith, and her work with refugees and asylum seekers who are supported by Stockton Baptist Church. This first piece turns a pantoum poem into a prayer for closeness with God - please enjoy her charming stop-motion animation and beautiful photographs taken along the banks of the … Continue reading Growth by Katharine Jones
My Rainbow Alley by Sandra Falconer
Sandra is back with a fascinating look at social history, seen through the singular lens of the Back Alley! Celebrating the recent changes made by her local community, that have brought the abandoned back alleys into communal use once more.
Landlocked by Oz Hardwick
Landlocked The wood is polished walnut, warped by wind and waves, polished by sun, then jerry-rigged into place to make a built-in bunk, a low bench, a fold-down table, and bookshelves filled with paperbacks bought in newsagents and railway stations. A circular mirror reflects brass-rimmed portholes onto suburban shrubbery, and a gilded cage holds a … Continue reading Landlocked by Oz Hardwick
Celebrating Small Things by Joyce Skinn
We're so proud of the workshop participants from this second year of Celebrating Change - although we only ask them to complete one digital story, they are now flying ahead with the skills they've learned, and are making more and more films! Here's Joyce Skinn, back with another beautifully lyrical piece about celebrating small joys.
Mania from Caoin by Fran Lock
Our final poem chosen by Jane Burn for her 'Surviving Trauma' series is by Fran Lock. Fran Lock is a sometime itinerant dog-whisperer and the author of seven poetry collections, most recently the pamphlet Raptures and Captures (Culture Matters, 2019) in collaboration with collage artist Steev Burgess, and Contains Mild Peril (Out-Spoken Press, 2019). She is an associate … Continue reading Mania from Caoin by Fran Lock
A digital story by Margaret McClure
Margaret's film is one of hope. Like many others, she has experienced fears and dark times in her life, when newborn family members were struggling for survival and when parents fell ill. She has translated her very relatable experiences into a meditation on how there is always light at the end of the tunnel, and … Continue reading A digital story by Margaret McClure
Everywhere is always full of holes by Denni Turp
Please welcome Denni to the blog, with a poem that speaks simply and eloquently of how normal is forever altered by trauma and loss. Everywhere is always full of holes The pier at Southwold with the water clock we watched so long to see the hour, the amusements, and the beach huts bright and neat … Continue reading Everywhere is always full of holes by Denni Turp
Our Heather by Sandra Falconer
Some of you may have read Sandra's verses kept as a Lockdown diary, which we featured earlier this summer. Sandra is a member of our monthly workshop group in Teesside, and she has put together this very moving tribute to a much-missed daughter. Thank you for watching this, it was created from love and faith.
Why She Fell In Love With Doors by Helen Kay
Why she fell in love with doors is a poem that brilliantly works the idea of an eternity of opening and closing. Living with trauma is an eternity and though we might feel it more or less strongly on certain days, it remains there, like the poem’s wolf, lurking behind our everyday life. ‘She must … Continue reading Why She Fell In Love With Doors by Helen Kay
