Deptford Storytelling Project: Celebrating One Year
DEPTFORD STORYTELLING PROJECT 2020
Deptford Storytelling Project was launched at Deptford Cinema in 2020 as a community film-making project celebrating Deptford’s rich history and diverse community. People from the local community were invited to come together to take part in a series of filmmaking workshops, starting at Deptford Cinema in early January. Over two months, we came together on our Saturdays to make ten short films, many of them starring friends and family and shot on location in Deptford.
In March 2020, we returned to the Deptford Cinema for the first public screening, followed by a celebration with friends and family. The screening at Deptford Cinema (just before the first lockdown) was a wonderful celebration of the wide spectrum of lives of people in Deptford. The filmmakers used different languages, voices, poetry, dance and ceremonies to tell stories about families, friendships and communities. After the screening we shared delicious Vietnamese food (and donuts) and shared our experiences.
ONE YEAR LATER…
In 2021, to celebrate one year since we screened the films at Deptford Cinema, we came together again to plan an online launch of nine of the original short films. This time the filmmakers created new introductions to their films and reflected on the process. It was an opportunity to get back in touch and share the films with a new and wider audience. On Friday 26th March we came together to watch the films for another time.
“the films seemed to be in dialogue with one another – as if the tapping of Zaida’s dancing shoes did respond somehow to the steps of Margaret’s walking shoes and as if the wild birdsongs could interrupt the later whirring noise in Adriana’s very urban routes!” – Sara Shahwan
In a year which has been difficult for many, it reminded us of the sense of community the project was inspired by. Some of these reflections, as well as poetic reflections on the past year, are shared here in the words of the participants.
Making a film together just weeks before the first lockdown was transformative for all of us.
For us, it was a chance to share Zaida’s story from the Dominican Republic to Deptford. In the early workshops, Zaida had planned to share her moments of arrival in England, accompanied by a pair of shoes she still wears today. However, at the point of explaining this to camera, new layers of memory emerged. We hadn’t foreseen how the process of making the film could itself be a kind of healing:
“The film for me was like a window, an opportunity for me to talk about my feelings in ways I had never done before, especially about losing my brother ... it has taken over 20 years to do that” – Zaida.
Filming was full of constant surprises, as joy and tears collided. We found ourselves looking at Deptford with fresh eyes - the river as a space for reckoning with grief, and developers’ signage the stage for a spontaneous dance.
Sharing our film at the screening at Deptford Cinema, we were lifted by the connection we felt with all of those we had made the films alongside. We were moved by how unique each film was alone, and more so together, a powerful portrait of our area. We had no idea how long it would be before we would feel that energy of a room of people captivated by storytelling again.
Zaida Florian, Lucy Wilson, Hannah Davis
VIDA (2020)
Duthchas Walk Research + Biodiverse Focus = Awe Findings
Thoughts of new rhythms of intense hues and a new normalness day.
Opening of time replaced with focus, by different shared pair-of-glasses
Where windows bring inside/outside …
Sun with the sky, drifting birdsong, leaves of moving psychological hue …
The feet talk … “Take Me Out”.
Well then, on with worn trainers … wafer thin of parting soles.
New varied feelings penetrate straight upwards from underfoot.
Terrain of squelch, angular hard shape shifting stoniness,
Moss of tender soft pad.
Relanguaging Aliveness as Now. Gratitude of Time and Place …
Of being held deep in the World.
Feelings of sparkly stars beaming down out there.
Smell of rich breath of earth as shared history to legacy …
To determined decisions on dying unnecessary habits.
Life held together rooted within the same moment of day …
In the shared spectrum between hues; yellow and blue.
Socks off for extra vitamin D, a dragonfly comes to rest on the right bare foot.
On return to the inside …
Scrape mud off soles built up on door mat.
And for tonight … an organic green leaf salad.
United by Duthchas …carried forth by ancient unity of land,
Embracive of all living creatures, nature and culture.
Margaret Jennings - Socially Engaged Participative Eco Artist
WILD NURTURING: URBAN WILDWAY ROOUTES (2020)
Filmmaking: Moving is a Blessing
‘في الحركة بركة’ is an Arabic proverb that literally translates into ‘movement is a blessing’. It springs to my mind as I replay the first filmmaking experience which I had with Deptford Cinema last year. Continuous movement has been a characteristic of the digital storytelling project and has provided the answer to all my questions. What is a film? How can I make one? What if I get stuck? What’s next? It is all about moving - on screen, around a place, in time, with friends and most importantly moving forward. The spoken word performance ‘مي وضي’ (Water and Light), which Flora and I filmed, could embody the movement found in those elements vital to life. Interviewing the trio of Palestinian artists Farah Chamma, Ruba Shamshoum and Kareem Samara a year after the event, we moved back to the story of how they came together and where the poems and songs originated. Their intention was to create songs in spoken Arabic for children, and this is something to move forward with. At the moment, I am sharing the blessings of poetry and filmmaking with a group of young people at an International school in Turkey. It is heartening to see the project moving ahead with the young people’s participation in the coming multilingual poetry and digital storytelling festival ‘Our Planet’ at Goldsmiths.
Sara Shahwan
WATER AND LIGHT (2020)
ABOUT THE DEPTFORD STORYTELLING PROJECT
Deptford Storytelling Project is a collaboration between Deptford Cinema and Goldsmiths, University of London. Lucy Rogers, a volunteer at Deptford Cinema joined with Jim Anderson and Vicky Macleroy to create the project which builds on, and is part of, the Critical Connections multilingual digital storytelling project (2012-ongoing).
This year, Deptford Storytelling Project was also part of the international online Languages Future Conference (2021), hosted by Language Acts and Worldmaking. This was a chance for the project to be shared on an international stage and viewed by conference participants from around the world.
We would like to thank Language Acts and Worldmaking who funded the project, as well as everyone who helped us along the way. A special thank you goes to Deptford Cinema volunteer Louis Holder, for his editing of the films and to Lenah Susianty, Rob Szeliga and the many other volunteers who supported this year’s event.
Deptford Storytelling Project was available to watch on DC @ Home from Friday 26 March until Friday 7 May 2021.