Arts Programme and Cultural Development

Barking and Dagenham Arts Development

Projects, Partnerships, Events and Activities

Past Projects

Inspired by the history and landscape of Barking and Dagenham, this large and colourful textile is on permanent display on the attic floor of Eastbury Manor House. The work was finished in July 2002 following a community arts project as part of the Big March Arts Month 'kick stART', which launched the borough's Arts Strategy.

Workshops took place for around 10 weeks at various locations in the borough involving over 140 people aged from 8 to 88 years old.

Artist Linda Merriman of Splinter Community Arts, who specialises in collaborative textiles, led the sessions with participants from groups based at Eastbury Manor House, The Sandringham Stitchers, Porter's Avenue Resource Centre, Heathlands Day Centre, St George's Day Centre, Thomas Arnold School, Henry Green School and All Saints Secondary School and Technical College.

Measuring 3.3m high by 3m wide, the textile displays a range of techniques including batik, rag rugging, knitting, metal work and 'black work' to illustrate different aspects of the borough, past and present.

Among its features are the Millennium Centre, Ford Motor Company, historic windmills, Ripple Road Library, which was destroyed by fire in the 1960s, and Barking Abbey, as well as self-portraits of the children who took part.

A great achievement, this hanging demonstrates the collective energy and enthusiasm of all those who contributed to the project. We are delighted with the results, which testify to the immense capacity of Barking and Dagenham's communities to create works of art that everyone can enjoy.

Digitise|

Digitise - Video Film and Digital Music Production Training.

Digitise was launched in summer 2002 when we were one of the only London borough's to secure £40,000 of funding from an Arts Council of England initiative, called Creative Neighbourhoods.

It was devised in partnership with the Youth Support and Development Service to provide opportunities for a particular group of disadvantaged young people, in the care of the local authority, who were unaccompanied asylum seekers from Kosovo and Albania, with the ambition to develop the project as a base for training young people from all over the borough in film making and digital media.

The first phase of the project brought the young people into contact with artists and film-makers from film production company, Loud Minority and local participatory arts organisation, Studio 3 Arts. The resultant film, entitled 'Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow' was entered into the London Weekend Television 'Whose London' film challenge, making it into the top 20 long-list.

The film was shown on the London Weekend Television website and at an event to mark the production, to which the general public were invited to see the film and enjoy live music and dance.

The second phase integrated the young refugees with other young people in the area interested in film, who all produced a youth magazine style film called 'Oi!'. This part of the project included digital music with Astaphan Simon and an event for the young people to showcase the film and their musical talents.

The ambitions for Digitise to be an ongoing training opportunity for young people continue and the project is now based at Barking and Dagenham Training, where young people have the opportunity to learn film making as part of the enhanced Education to Employment programme.

This work has informed plans for film development in schools, the partnership with Film London East and the potential for a film festival and school as part of the borough's Creative and Cultural Industries development.

Women's writes

To mark the launch of the Arts Strategy, the borough put together a month of arts projects and events for the community during March 2002, called Kick St-Art.

One of the projects organised was Women's Writes, a creative writing project held at Barking Library and the Vineries Young Women's Project in Dagenham, facilitated by writer Anna Reynolds.

Women's Writes resulted in an anthology of the creative writing, poetry and personal stories, which were also shared with the wider community at a public reading event at the library following its completion.

Copies of this anthology are still available from the Arts Programme and Cultural Development and opportunities to participate in creative writing are available throughout the year at the Adult College or as part of one of our literature development projects, which we have organised as part of Molten or will put together as part of Spread the Word.

We are currently planning to develop a poetry café idea and creative writing club, please contact us and let us have your details if you would like to be contacted about these projects or other creative writing opportunities in the future.

Arts Programme and Cultural Development

Barking and Dagenham Arts Development

Projects, Partnerships, Events and Activities

Past Projects

Women's writes

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