… and after looking at the photographs of 30 years-worth of Watershed’s monthly programme covers on Facebook I realised that I’ve had connections with this Bristol cultural landmark for 25 years of those three decades. These programmes seemed a good vehicle for reflecting on the journey we’ve been on together and the role we’ve played in each others’ lives. Continue reading
Category Archives: Work
Curzon Cinema, Clevedon – photography workshop
The wonderful Curzon Community Cinema in Clevedon has won some funding from The Prince’s Foundation for Children and the Arts to run a film-making project with some lucky primary schools in Clevedon as part of the Start Programme. It’s a big project that runs over several months working with the excellent Bristol-based production company Calling the Shots. However, not every child will be able to take part in the film-making process so the Curzon’s Education Officer, Cathy Poole, arrived at an ingenious solution to ensure everyone has a chance to participate. The solution was to create a team of project documentors who would track all aspects of the project with photographs. Continue reading
The Ballad of Bournville
Theatre Orchard is North Somerset based project which is “shaping the arts landscape in North Somerset. Theatre Orchard seed performing arts projects throughout the region to grow community, creativity and skills.” I’ve been involved with the project since 2007 documenting many of their productions [links to come], designing publicity material and advising as a Board member. Continue reading
It’s Electric December time – a personal reflection and celebration!
Every Electric December I have ever worked on, 2003 – 2006, + 2008!
Today is the launch of Watershed’s online advent-style calendar Electric December. Though I’ve only been involved in ED indirectly this year I’ve had various connections with the project for a long time so thought I’d add a post about this now fondly anticipated feature of Bristol’s cultural landscape! Continue reading
Watershed: Part-time employment
For 2 days a week I’m the Development Co-ordinator for ‘RELAYS at Watershed’ – a SW Cultural Olympiad project organised by Universities SW and focused on activities for young people. Watershed’s contribution to this programme is to work with young people in a range of settings to create projects that explore the meeting of sport and media/culture.
Activities I’ve been involved with over the last year include a short film project Short Cuts, Media Literacy Workshops for schools – just starting to plan these for 2012 – and a citizen journalism project that’s leading up to taking a group of young people to the Olympic sailing and cultural events that will be taking place in Weymouth in 2012. I’m also covering the developing phases of this citizen journalism project in a blog.
Here’s an audio slideshow that gives a flavour of the Media Literacy strand of this project and demonstrates the enthusiasm that can be sparked in teenagers when you put them into a new setting with some interesting challenges and stimulating people! I took the photographs and recorded the audio during the series of workshops we ran in 2009 with local secondary schools and put them together in Soundslides to help promote future workshops to schools in the Bristol area. The workshops were led by David Goldblatt and assisted by volunteer production staff from the BBC.
Producing digital stories for M Shed
Hartcliffe and Withywood Dad’s breakfast Club / Champloo B-boy and B-girl
I’ve been working on some freelance commissions for Bristol’s new museum and produced two sets of short films/digital stories sporting and family stories… Continue reading
National Trust – ‘Tyntesfield through the Lens’, September 2010
A section of the montaged artwork created from photographs taken by young people from Westhaven and Aschcome schools for the ‘Tyntesfield through the lens’ project.
I worked with the National Trust’s learning officer at Tyntesfield (in conjunction with the North Somerset Find Your Talent initiative) to devise and deliver a workshop over 3 sessions at the house and estate. The participants were Year 6 children from Ashcombe Primary school, and GCSE Photography students from Westhaven special needs Secondary school who were to mentor the younger pupils. The older students came on their own for a first visit to see the house and gardens, learn about some of the history and take photographs of their own, but with our support they also planned how they would guide the younger pupils round the house and estate on the following visit and help them to use cameras to create a ‘portrait’ of Tyntesfield. Continue reading
Performers and performances
A strand of work that’s parallel to documenting artists and makers is photographing actors, dancers and artists’ performance-based work in the Bristol area – some examples follow…
For Theatre Orchard Project – ‘I Peaseblossom, I Caliban’ on tour in North Somerset, 2011 and 2012.
There are lots more photos from this lovely tour over on The Theatre Orchard’s flickr site, here, here and here, Continue reading
Theatre Orchard – Storyshed, July 2010
I’ve been involved with Theatre Orchard Project for several years as photographer/designer and as a member of the Board of Trustees but in February 2010 began a 6 month project as Co-ordinator and workshop facilitator with Clodagh Miskelly and Paddy Uglow, on a two-part project with a Digital Storytelling Workshop as the first component and a related mixed-media installation as the other. Continue reading
‘Eighteen Summers’ – European Digital Storytelling Workshop, Watershed
Digital project it may have been but due to EU funding, multiple paper documents had to be sent back and forth, but that did result in a lovely stamp collection!
What is digital storytelling?
Once upon a time we sat around the fire and told each other stories, now “young or old” we can do it with computers. We call this Digital Storytelling and it’s made possible by the new tools of media production. Daniel Meadows, BBC Capture Wales.
In the early 1990s Joe Lambert and Dana Atchley were experimenting to combine multimedia
and autobiographical performance in a theatre company in Berkeley California, USA.
Explorations about how personal narrative and storytelling could relate to and make use of the
emerging new digital media tools led to the development of the digital storytelling process and
the founding of the Center for Digital Storytelling. Continue reading
Liz Milner 