Tuesday 29 May 2012

Open Door in May

During May we have begun another two Open Door projects; one with a women's group and the other with Touchstone - Sikh Elders.  It's early days with both but they're going well with great groups of women in each - bringing a lot of life and laughter to Artlink's building on Mondays and Tuesdays!

The women's group which takes place on a Monday is being led by an established Artlink artist, Milena Dragic.  Currently the group are developing an animation as well as storyboarding and creating the models to act as the central characters to the piece.  They have each produced their own piece of work and will be working towards a combined piece, watch this space as it will be uploaded here!  Due to the nature of the women's situations we are getting flux of different participants throughout, however it does seem to be working well with the overall project.

The Touchstone - Sikh Elders group are working on the project "Picking Up The Thread" together with artists Bryony Pritchard, Musarat Raza and volunteer Amarjit Birdi.  So far the women are exploring a range of different textile techniques and have visited the Royal Armouries to look at the artefacts of the Indian Army collection, taking many photos to be used as inspiration for the forthcoming weeks.  As the groups progress we'll document their progress here.  In the meantime, take a look at the photos from the projects.  Hayley






Wednesday 16 May 2012

Reflecting


Today is a Sunny day finally! Artlink has had a busy week, with two of our new Open Door groups attending the building. Both are vibrant and interesting and both are groups of women who have experienced issues that affect their mental health and wellbeing in various ways. The Asian Women's group are working to create beautiful and vibrant textile pieces and the other group of women are creating animation pieces.

This is the essence of Artlink's work. Engaging groups so that we use the arts in its many forms to create vibrant and excellent art and in the process support those people we work with to feel more confident and enhance their quality of life and wellbeing in the process.

Sylvie Fourcin

Director