Digital Drama are working with Tim Wells and Speaking Volumes to produce new digital media with the original Ranting Poets to accompany a series of performances, discussions, film screenings and workshops in 2015.
Go to www.speaking-volumes.org.uk/SUS for further tour details or click here: Stand Up And Spit Flyer
Digital Drama received a grant from the Magna Carta Trust to create the Magna Carta Young Curator Badge as part of the 800th Anniversary Commemoration.
The Magna Carta Young Curator Badge Project engages young people in the history and cultural legacy of the Magna Carta through the creation of online media including blogs, video and animation for the Magna Carta Channel on Makewaves, the social network for schools. Students are rewarded with a Magna Carta Young Curator Badge as evidence of their learning and participation.
The Magna Carta Young Curator Badge was piloted with the Runnymede South Confederation of Schools between April and June 2015. The schools performed in the Great Charter Festival on June 15th at Royal Holloway and at the Magna Carta anniversary commemoration at Runnymede on June 16th.
Prince William greeted the performers and eight giant puppets, representing people who had campaigned for liberty and freedom over the last 800 years. Students tracked the progress of rehearsal and interpretation of the themes of liberty and freedom via videos, blogs and animation. This accompanied a specific focus on the history of the Magna Carta and its impact on communities across the world.
A selected group from Buckingham Primary School who had completed their Young Curator Badge were selected for a visit the British Library to see the Magna Carta exhibition.
Following the main activities, the roll out phase of the project involves working with Makewaves to promote the Magna Carta Young Curator Badge to their community of schools (4,000 worldwide) and young users (70,000 worldwide). Digital Drama has created links for teachers of specific project resources and ‘how to’ guides for the open badge to tie in with the Key Stage 3 curriculums for history and citizenship. Digital Drama filmed a question and answer session from students and a Magna Carta expert Professor Nigel Saul from University of London Royal Holloway that has been uploaded to the Makewaves channel as a free resource to mark the 800th anniversary.
Over 60 programmes of students’ media made for the Magna Carta Young Curators Badge can be seen here: www.makewav.es/digitaldrama/c/magnacarta
Commenting on the award, Kate Valentine, Director of Digital Drama said:
“We are delighted to have received the support of the Magna Carta Trust to roll out the Magna Carta Young Curator Badge on Makewaves. The project will enable young people to engage in the legacy of Magna Carta through creating media inspired by the themes of freedom and justice and be awarded for their achievement by the Magna Carta Young Curator Badge.”
Digital Drama are recording memories of V.E. Day to form part of an audio installation at Rose Theatre Kingston in May 2015 marking the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in Europe.
‘V.E. Day Remembered’ will feature personal recollections of V.E. Day from the community. A selection of images, recorded memories and a street party for contributors will conjure up V.E. Day at the Rose Theatre on the 8th May 2015.
All memories gathered will be published in a booklet to mark the occasion.
V.E. Day was the official celebration of Victory in Europe Day, the public holiday to mark the end of World War II in Europe. In the UK millions of people celebrated in the streets on 8th May 1945 to mark the end of the European part of the war.
The project will focus on preserving and sharing the personal memories of members of the community who experienced V.E. Day first hand. Their reminiscences of such an extraordinary moment in world history will help to tell the local story of the official end of the European conflict. An installation of local streets and wartime garden complete with an Anderson Shelter will feature the recorded memories, which will also be available to listen to online via www.digitaldrama.org from May 2015.
‘V.E. Day Remembered’ will be a free audio installation open to the public on the ground floor of the Rose Theatre, running from 28th April-21st May 2015.
If would like to share your memories of V.E. Day, please get in touch with Alison Ramsey on: alison@digitaldrama.org / 07525 205148.
A great evening for the opening of audio / visual exhibition Galsworthy and Human Battles on the Home Front, produced by Digital Drama for The Rose Theatre. Ken Smith, Mayor of Kingston, spoke of Galsworthy’s humanitarian campaigns and the South West London Military Wives Choir sang for guests including the exhibition’s local contributors.
Four stars for the exhibition from Alexandra Sims of The Upcoming:
“The exhibition not only unearths the much-forgotten philanthropy of one of London’s greatest author’s but also, through local stories, connects us to an event that a century on can feel extremely distant. The combination of personal tales and Galsworthy’s biography all framed within the context of the war creates an exhibition large in scope, yet with intimate and meaningful layers that speak to us today. Small touches such as the diary excerpts and letters, written by local soldiers and the embroidered postcards written with messages of love from the front, give an intimate touch making their sacrifices seem all the more devastating.
The audio element is particularly moving, as hearing the voices of soldier’s children and grandchilden as well as their undergoing rehabilitation at Headley Court make the exhibit all the more poignant. Affecting and absorbing, Human Battles is a touching tribute to a local experience of war.”
Click here for full review and here for the Galsworthy project page.
Galsworthy related images courtesy of Cadbury Research Library and Special Collections, University of Birmingham.
Digital Drama produces First World War Exhibition and Audio Tour for the Rose Theatre, Kingston.
Author and Nobel Laureate John Galsworthy is best known for ‘The Forsyte Saga’, which dramatised social class and life in Edwardian England. However, his campaigning for injured servicemen from the First World War has gone almost entirely unnoticed, until now.
Born on Kingston Hill in 1867 and although too old for active service in the First World War, Galsworthy worked for a time as a hospital orderly in France. This contributed to his determination to argue through essays and articles for rehabilitation of wounded servicemen.
Commissioned by the Rose Theatre, Kingston, Digital Drama’s latest audio-visual exhibition draws on the collection of Galsworthy archives; letters, poems and journals which are narrated alongside recordings of local residents of the Borough of Kingston remembering their family stories from the First World War.
Galsworthy and Human Battles on the Home Front runs at the Rose Theatre, Kingston from the 1st September – 25th October 2014. Guided tours are available between 12-4 pm. The audio trail is available to download for free via the ‘Rose Theatre Projects’ App on iTunes and Google Play.
For more information on the venue, times and special offers go to the Rose Theatre’s website.