Introducing Wells Art Contemporary 2020. For obvious reasons the exhibition had to be online this year and the challenge was to integrate footage of the Cathedral with some of the works of art that had been submitted. I worked with experienced drone pilot Marc Williams and cameraman Dan Gale to create a 2 minute introduction to this year’s exhibition. Some amazing art on view - in all media. Big thanks to Marc Stringer and the talented musicians and singers at Wells Cathedral School for their rendition of Geoffrey Burgon’s Nunc Dimittis.
With backgrounds in nature conservation, Melvyn and Sally set up their new horticultural business in the Somerset village of Godney to provide fresh local food for local people as sustainably as possible. Their aim is reduce food miles and work sympathetically with the local environment. Sally is a regular sight with her bike and trailer delivering fresh local produce to homes in the village. Using LED lighting they can produce salad crops in February.
Established in 2011, the Community Farm grows and sells locally-sourced, seasonal produce that’s 100% organic. They work with organic producers and local farmers, and their box delivery service supplies hundreds of homes throughout Bath, Bristol, The Chew Valley, Frome and Weston-Super-Mare. Their profits are used to provide learning experiences for local children, adults and vulnerable people. A Somerset Local Food film, celebrating the diversity of local food producers.
Plotgate is a small scale low impact food producer based near Barton St David in Somerset. Offering a weekly fresh produce box scheme to their members, as well as encouraging participation, feasting, skill building and a deepening awareness of food growing and agroecology. One of a series of short films about local food producers in Somerset forming part of a research project with Plymouth and Coventry Universities.
I came across Kay’s stunning art at Birmingham’s NEC and contacted her to see if I could film her. We agreed a filming date at her lovely cottage high in the Welsh valleys. On that day the wind blew hard from the north and the rain barely stopped. It was an honour to meet her in person and see her magnificent work. We shared a simple lunch of soup, bread and cheese. Her work reminds me of Jackie Morris and Catherine Hyde - multi-layered, weaving history, mythology and shamanic glimpses with a profound love and respect for the natural world.
Sam Smith left school without qualifications and was advised that a career in supermarket shelf stacking awaited him. Luckily, a guardian angle stepped in and recommended a two-day forge course. He now runs his own forge, teaches students in the art of blacksmithing and creates beautiful knives from old car springs and worn farrier files. Passionate about his craft, and ever keen to learn new skills, he is a blacksmith / philosopher in the making.
A film for Circles South West’s Young People’s Service. Circles work towards there being ‘No More Victims’ by reducing emotional loneliness; modelling appropriate adult relationships; supporting their safe integration; and holding the individual to account for their behaviour.
The Circle represents a community engaging with, rather than rejecting, someone trying to live without harming, putting local volunteers at its heart.
A life in the day of one of Somerset's most experienced copywriters - Jim O'Connor. If you're looking to brighten up the copy on your website, update a business blog, promote your service or products with sparkling prose, you're going to need Jim's expertise. ‘Businesses need good copy because in today’s world it is much easier to reach people, but it is much harder to engage them’.
The Black Horse canters into town, unaware he is spotted by two eagle eyed cowboys who alert the Deputy. The Black Horse says he only has twenty seven customers left in Glastonbury which is why he is leaving. The Deputy challenges him and takes him outside to show him how many Glastonbury residents still need a bank in town..........
In December 2011, eight monks from Tashi Lhunpo Monastery in Southern India visited Glastonbury in the UK and created a beautiful sand mandala over four days. In this film Tim Knock and I were keen to record the impact of their five day visit on the Glastonbury community and the process of the creation and dissolution of the mandala. Normally this ceremony is conducted behind the closed doors of a monastery.
Forget Diamond White 'cider' concoctions. You can practically taste the orchard in a bottle of real cider. Small Somerset farms like Sheppy's have been making real cider for almost two hundred years. This short film follows the farm through their year's work of pruning, growing, harvesting, fermenting and bottling. The narration is by James Crowden who has been described, quite rightly, as the 'Poet Laureate of Cider'.
An introductory video to the Order of Bards Ovates and Druids including clips from OBOD camps, the annual Summer Gathering in Glastonbury, along with footage of the evening's Eisteddfod, and the wonderful ceremony on top of Glastonbury Tor. There are also some lovely interviews with OBOD members about how their Druidry has influenced their lives.
Seven days of Yearly Meeting Gathering in Bath compressed into 6 minutes, 28 seconds. This film was made and edited in Final Cut Pro during the Gathering and screened back to 1500 gatherers in the Big Top during the final session on Friday afternoon. We hope it captures the joyful spirit of this amazing gathering. Go Pro and 2 HD cameras
A film montage highlighting Somerset's beautiful countryside and its many visitor attractions. One of a series of 13 films commissioned by Somerset County Council to encourage people to explore our county. Shot over a summer with music by Alex Plowright.
Guinness Care and Support enlisted Storyteller Stu Packer and photographer Kevin Redpath to gather and record Digital Stories. Their aim was to record audio from the Elders in three of Guinness Care & Support's homes. Both were involved in the post production, weaving their stories together. The finished film was screened at the Guildhall in Bath.
Root Connections provides the only Direct Access Accommodation based in Mendip for rough sleepers. It helps Mendip citizens on their journey to sustainable accommodation. The residents cook and eat together, and as part of their activities a community garden was developed enabling volunteers from the local community and residents to come together and farm produce together.
Wendy Andrew has painted and drawn since she was very young. She attained a degree in fine art at Cheltenham in 1979. In 1989 her professional painting career began and she produced many beautiful wildlife paintings during this time. Gradually her love of The Goddess, mythology and the ‘old ways’ found expression in her work. In the last few years she has become internationally recognised for her exquisite Goddess and mythological paintings.
Hannah Willow shares the story of how she became an accomplished artist and jewellery maker. She explains why her art is full of animals, hills, woodlands, primeval places, moons, stars and constellations and how this instils a feeling of place, of time and of magic in her work, connecting to the hidden knowledge held deep within the land. She talks about the importance of twilight and the significance of blue and gold in her paintings.
Glastonbury, Somerset campaigned against the closures of its two remaining banks. Here is the spirited version of Jerusalem! A huge thank you to everyone who contributed to our Last Bank Standing campaign film - our residents, visitors and the wonderful businesses who bring so much colour and economic vitality to our town.
Discover what Quakers are doing in the South West of England and find out how their Quaker faith inspires them. This film was produced, on behalf of Quakers in the South West, to welcome everyone to Yearly Meeting Gathering at the University of Bath in August 2014.
Climate change is happening now in the South West and we are already vulnerable to extreme weather. We need to plan for both current and future vulnerability. This film, made in conjunction with the Environment Agency, highlights the potential impact of climate change on tourism businesses across South West England and the steps they are taking to combat its effects.
To celebrate the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids’ 50th Anniversary in 2014 we were commissioned to make a short film about the film about the Order, to mark what was an amazing year.
With one of the highest tidal ranges in the world, the Somerset coastline is vulnerable to extreme weather conditions. This film explores the environmental and ecological aspects of coastline management and the pressures placed on it by tourism and business development. With contributions from a Maritime Historian, a Fisherman and a Coastal Engineer who explains what is being done to protect the low lying land of Somerset and the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust explain the bold habitat creation programme for the fragile Steart peninsula.
For centuries, from the country potter to the mass-production of the factory-made, the ceramic vessel has been used for commemoration, marking life's rites of passage as well as significant historic events. Kate Wilson uses this tradition of commemoration not only to acknowledge but also to quantify the loss of British armed service men and women during the conflict in Afghanistan. Individually made from 300 grams of porcelain (the average weight of the human heart), each loving cup represents a life lost from the British armed forces since 2001 indicated only by the age they fell. Audio / stills photography
Speaking at a Royal Society of Arts evening in Frome to explore community prosperity in the 21st Century. I was asked to tell the story of Glastonbury’s Last Bank Standing campaign and how we used a mixture of flash mobs, political engagement, filming, mainstream and social media to raise the issue of a market town faced with the loss of all its banks. Apple Keynote
England in the late 1960s. The country is tired and a bit forlorn. Tea is 6d a cup in a landscape of umbrellas, shingle, rain, beauty parades, deckchairs, and fish and chips. You can almost hear the crunch of shingle or the slurp of ice cream in a Tony Ray-Jones photograph. I discovered his work in the early 80s and was astonished by his skills of composition, timing, boldness, and by his innate curiosity. Above all, it was the dignity he accorded his subjects that really moved me.
His book ‘A Day Off’ was published posthumously in 1974. Soft-back editions are now selling for £300 and hardback editions can reach £750. So, it was an absolute joy to discover RRB’s new edition of Tony Ray-Jones’ photographs. His photographs have been exquisitely re-printed, to a far higher standard than the Thames and Hudson 1974 book, and reveal all the detail his Leica faithfully recorded fifty years ago. It has the bonus of a biographical essay by the brilliant Liz Jobey and a lovely, generous introduction by Martin Parr who has done so much to champion his photography over the years. All photographs are the copyright of Tony Ray-Jones and the Science Museum Group: https://www.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/
One of my earliest memories was standing on the edge of a platform, holding tightly onto my grandmother’s hand, as we waited for the train bringing my grandfather home from London. It finally arrived in a huge cloud of steam and hissed and clanked to a halt right beside us. The driver and fireman leaned out of their cab and asked my grandmother whether I’d like to be lifted up onto the footplate. But I was far too nervous and have regretted not accepting their invitation ever since.
Meanwhile, the Beeching Report had arrived on the Government’s desk. It had a huge influence on the drafting of the Transport Act of 1962 and within a few years 5,000 miles of railway track had been ripped up, 2,500 stations closed and 67,000 staff were made redundant. Many rural communities were cut adrift from the mainline network as their branch lines were axed. The sense of loss, at a time when the ownership of private cars had not reached the saturation it has today, was palpable.
Luckily we were living in a time when two peerless observers of our cultural life, Michael Flanders and Donald Swann, were at their creative peak. Between them, they composed an elegiac lament to the railway closures, which poignantly articulated the sadness felt by so many people. I’ve tried to reassemble the soundscape as I remembered it and I’m extremely grateful to Gary Ladds for generously sharing his brilliant line-side recordings via Freesound.