Utopia Means Elsewhere, Go Happen, Inland Festival, 2016

Utopia Means Elsewhere: The Future of the Here and Now

Go Happen
Inland Festival, 2016

Photos: Artur Tixiliski

Inland Art Festival is a contemporary art festival founded by Alice Mahoney, Cat Bagg and Rosie Allen and produced by Field Notes. It brings diverse communities together in the historic town of Redruth, Cornwall, providing a locally rooted platform for local and regional creative practitioners and opportunities for audiences to see internationally renowned art in unusual locations. Redruth once held the title of ‘richest square mile in the world’, now the monetary wealth has all but gone yet it’s still one of the richest towns we know. The Future Project explored some of the ways these foundations can be built upon to imagine alternative, possible and impossible, weird and wonderful futures. For Inland 2016, the second iteration of the festival, we worked with local residents, artists, academics and musicians, showcasing 120 artists in 21 venues to create a three-day alternative future around Redruth.

Photos: Artur Tixiliski

Utopia Means Elsewhere: The Future of the Here and Now, Go Happen, 2016
Textile banners, photographic works, participants from Redruth School

For Inland Festival 2016 we commissioned Go Happen to create a series of workshops for Art and Photography students at Redruth School, to collaboratively develop new work for exhibiting at the festival that reflected a youth led vision for Redruth to be publicly seen, heard and celebrated.

During the workshops they created:

An urban planning project that created a new map of Redruth, including redesigning local buildings
Flags and banners reflecting the social and cultural aspirations of the students
A town trail
Future events posters
A reinvention photography project that focused on identity

Photos: Go Happen

Over 70 students worked with the festival artists in 24 sessions delivered at the school. They engaged with their hometown of Redruth, working in the community beyond the confines of the classroom - invoking a sense of pride and public celebration which acknowledged the rich history of the town and looked to the future with a sense of hope. Together they explored the town centre, identifying and highlighting areas of importance and interest for them and created a town trail (distributed to all festival visitors) that invited visitors to see Redruth through their eyes. They also created plans for the future of some of the town’s key public buildings (displayed publically at the Cornish Studies Library for 4 weeks) and worked in teams to make flags & banners celebrating Redruth, which were paraded through the town during the festival. As well as developing the pupils pride in their town and community, this project brought their wider families and friends into the town centre to enjoy and engage with the programme and existing resources such as the Cornish Studies Library.

Student work exhibited at the Cornish Studies Library, incorporating models of buildings in Redruth they would change and pupil’s explanations as to why they have chosen to reconstruct them, photos Field Notes

Map of the flag procession route Go Happen devised with the pupils / Student work exhibited at the Cornish Studies Library, photo Field Notes

FUNDERS AND PARTNERS

Inland Festival 2016 was supported by funds from Arts Council England, Heritage Lottery Fund, Big Lottery Fund, FEAST, Cornwall Council and Redruth Town Council, and delivered in partnership with Krowji, Cornwall College, Visual Arts South West, Field Notes, LUX, Falmouth University, CMR Project Space and Back Lane West.

About Projects Artists Engagement Watch | Read | Listen

^{FOLLOW US:}

^{GET IN TOUCH:}