Covid19 restrictions meant the March Can’t Sing Choir weren’t able to meet and sing together. Sally Rose, singer and music leader wanted to find ways of overcoming social isolation so the group could sing together again.
Following National Guidelines and with limited group numbers, Sally and the choir committee set up the Trinity Church Memorial Rose Garden for a socially distanced sing-along and choir rehearsal.
The positive effects of singing on mental health is a major focus for the choir and it was obvious that the singers were thrilled to be seeing each other and singing once again.
The group are still in touch with one another and Sally discovered that small groups of 6 were actually a very positive way of singing together in a different way.
As part of Creative Conversations in Isolation programme, artist Michelle Brace proposed that she wanted to to explore the use of spoken word and aural stories during the Lockdown period. We were drawn to the simplicity of the idea.
Members of our Creative Collective (a group of people who inspire events to happen in their towns) chose an object they felt represented them. Their objects are the ones below, taking pride of place on our Mantelpiece.
Click on an object sound file below to hear their stories…
As part of our Creative Conversations in Isolation commissions programme, photographer Regina Ray, was commissioned to make portraits of key workers in Newmarket, during the period of lockdown.
Regina is a medical photographer at Addenbrooke’s Hospital and working during the Pandemic, she was inspired to ask the question:
‘If this was a chapter in your life, what would the bold print be?’
‘The WHY is obvious – because we love stories. We love to tell them and we love to hear them. We are fascinated by other people’s life stories and these stories help us define ourselves. But moreover, in times as unusual as these, when no one has prior experience, the sum of collective experiences will contribute to knowledge wealth and potentially makes us much more adaptive and prepared in the future. Storytelling is a way of collective learning and my aim is by telling individual stories to contribute to the collective survival knowledge base.’ Regina Ray.
As part of our Creative Conversations in Isolation commissions programme, we commissioned artist Kaitlin Ferguson to make a series of ‘make along’ videos showing simple creative ideas to try at home, all inspired by the unique landscape and environment of the Fenland region.
We were delighted to support the first “Celebrate the Fens” Day on 20th June 2020, which was hosted by @FascinatingFens by sharing the first video.
If you live in or near the Fens, take a walk, follow Kaitlin’s suggestions and when you’ve got something to share post it online with the hashtag #ArtAndTheFens. We’ll be hosting pictures and artworks in the growing Fascinating Fens online gallery.
If you don’t live in or near the Fens, then explore the landscape near you, take a walk, look out your window or find some lovely landscape pictures online and ‘make along’ with Kaitlin.
During lockdown in May, we worked with artist, Marian Savill to make four short ‘make along’ online workshops to help you create your own Art Journal with materials you have around the house. As Marian says, ‘ANYONE can do it!’
Marian had been running Art Journaling workshops with the Meet Up Mondays group at The Barleycorn Cafe in Mildenhall. This video series offered an online alternative when the workshops were stopped due to Covid-19.
The workshops were posted in a Facebook event here, and on the Barleycorn Facebook page every Monday at 10am. Afterwards participants were encouraged to invite friends and share photos of their creations via social media, tagging the Barleycorn Cafe, Mildenhall and MarketPlace.
Make your own Art Journal along with Marian, watch the Introduction to get started.
Marian’s Introduction to Art Journaling
Monday 27th April
Marian introduces the artform she ‘loves loves loves’ to share with everyone, Art Journaling.
Marian presents the first of her Art Journal creative workshops – explaining how to get started with the making of a journal from a surprising variety of papers, envelopes, magazines and much more.
Marian presents her second workshop in her mission to get everyone art journaling! This week we take a look at backgrounds and how we can use different mediums to create colour and texture.
For her fourth and final workshop in her Art Journaling series, Marian talks about FRIPPERIES – decorating, embellishing and bringing your pages to life with artistic flair and little tricks that will make your journal a unique reflection of your thoughts.
Just a couple of weeks before lockdown we opened our exhibition Conversation at Babylon Gallery in Ely. The exhibition celebrated the work we’ve done with communities across Fenland and the Forest Heath area of West Suffolk in Phase 2 (from 2018) of our project.
When lockdown happened we shared as much as we could through photos and videos posted online. Click here to see our coverage on social media and visit our Flickr gallery here to see all of the photos of the exhibition.
Pictured above is the exhibition space at Babylon Gallery, Ely. The floor and wall spaces we connected using coloured tape, illustrating the market towns we work in and the projects that we took part in from 2018.
Chatteris was represented through the yellow tape. Working with the Youth Club, we helped created art inspired by the 80’s as part of their Midsummer Parade.
Newmarket was represented through the blue tape. Street Meets Henna was a collaborative project with graffiti artist, Si Mitchell and a group of Henna artists. The Street Art project was a series of workshops with youth & community groups in Chatteris resulting in the fantastic, large graffiti art pictured, which now permanently lives at the Racing Centre in Newmarket Town Centre. The wonderful illustrated case study was created by artist, Maryum which was inspired by her participation in the Street Art Project.
This drawing by Rebecca Osbourne, who creates graphic recordings of conferences and meetings, resulting in a visual record of the discussions.
Rebecca created this piece for us in response to the Artist Development workshop day we held in Wisbech at St.Peter’s Lodge, where Fenland practitioners were looking at new ways of working and devising projects for ongoing work in the ever changing business world that is the arts.
Pictured above are the exhibits for the projects Tales and Trails in Brandon (left), Mildenhall’s Meet Up Monday’s (middle) and March’s St George’s Day Fayre.
Tales and Trails Festival was an arts and environment day for the whole family at Brandon Country Park on Saturday 21st September 2019.
MarketPlace supported Brandon Creative Forum to stage the one-day festival of art and activities celebrating the forest. We worked with artists and the local community to create a packed programme including newly commissioned artwork and creative experiences. The activities were themed around a sense of place and the natural environment, offering a range of things for visitors to see, hear and do. The event was free to attend, and we ran a festival shuttle bus from Brandon to the Country Park.
The event was really well attended by families and local residents, and we got some fantastic feedback from visitors. Check out our photo gallery here.
The event showcased 4 commissioned artworks:
– Keeping and Open Mind to the Unexpected – an immersive experience by Art at Work
Click here to see coverage of the festival in press and social media. We really enjoyed the day, and the feedback we’ve had since suggested that visitors loved it too! Well done to everyone who took part, contributed, created and supported this community-led activity.
In April 2019, we worked with 7 artists and the festival committee to create the ArtZone as part of The St George’s Fayre, an annual festival in March town, Fenland.
Watch the video from the day here:
The artists worked together on the year’s theme, Dragons & Vikings, to create fun art activities for all ages to have a go at!
Hilary Cox Condron encouraged families to make and decorate a scale for a 3D Dragon of the future sculpture. Penny Sobr made fun & scary dragon masks with children of all ages. Caitlin Howells created a large dragon egg and families made smaller dragon nests to take home, and Dan Donovan got local people visiting the Fayre painting to create two large murals, one Dragon & one Viking! Everyone enjoyed stories with story teller Chip Colquhoun inspired by Scandinavian Vikings, and the odd dragon too!
Roaming stiltwalking Vikings, trying to find their way back to Norway, entertained the crowds and pointed people towards the ArtZone, handing out our creative passports along the way too.
