A City of Villages: Your Past, Your Present, Your Future
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artSites
A City of Villages: Your Past, Your Present, Your Future
7 - 19 November 2005
Venue: Various venues - see below for details
http://www.artsites.org.uk
On Saturday 19 November history will be made when communities from 5 of Birmingham’s villages will come together to share their stories.
artSites Birmingham is presenting A City of Villages, a multi-sensory theatrical experience bringing together people of all ages from across the communities. Over the last 6 months artists and local people have been collecting stories to create a new performance exploring the lives and history of people living in the city through the course of the twentieth century up to the present day.
On Saturday 19 November from 7pm onwards, a transformed section of The Mailbox will take audiences on a travel through time with theatre, music, soundscapes, lights and film. Stories collated from interviews and research about Great Barr, Sheldon Heath, Castle Vale, Aston, Handsworth, and Sparkbrook will be played and performed: A City of Villages promises to tell the stories direct from the people of Birmingham.
The artistic and production teams have involved local people on every level from performing to production with people of all ages helping with set, costume, technical, stewarding and filming for the project.
As Artistic Director Jon Morris explains “The main aim of the project is to bring people together in a celebration of all of the things that we have in common that bind us together regardless of who we are and where we come from in a time of uncertainty and division. This is an exciting artistic project and a community building exercise that we hope will have a lasting legacy for all of the people of Birmingham.”
As a lasting legacy the project will leave behind it a permanent archive of stories, images and sounds that will be made accessible to the people of Birmingham as well as to all those involved.
In the build up to the event there are local launch events at the artSite venues:
Monday 7 November, 7.30pm – Castle Vale School & Leisure Centre
Tuesday 8 November, 7.30pm – Perry Beeches Secondary School
Wednesday 9 November, 7.30pm – Golden Hillock Secondary School
Thursday 10 November, 7.30pm – Sheldon Heath Secondary School
Friday 11 November, 7pm – Rookery Sports & Arts Centre/Primary School
Saturday 19 November from 7pm onwards, The Mailbox, Severn Street
This project is part of the Urban Fusion programme and part funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.
Contact Lucy Jones at artSites Birmingham on 0121 440 5213 for further information or tickets.
