This well-being focused project funded by Arts Council England will engage groups of primary school children, 50+ participants and senior citizens with life experience in SE9 to initiate a dialogue through letter writing to upskill participants in communication, inspire interaction and promote positive relationships. Through workshops led by our professional artists and facilitators, letters exchanged between the two generations will inspire shadow puppetry and storytelling to visualize their understanding of the content of the letters & support their representation of ideas.
Participants will be encouraged to develop empathy and understanding through reading about other people’s experiences and feelings. Many people’s lives are busy and full of distractions from the internet. Handwriting a letter is a deliberate rejection of electronic messaging and requires our full attention and patience. Letters are tangible objects that can communicate more considered expressions of our thoughts and yet writing and receiving handwritten letters has become a rarity.
Creative practitioners will facilitate online letter writing sessions in primary schools to aid literacy, inspire interaction and to promote a sense of identity and locality. They will also engage with senior citizens online to discuss themes of letter writing and inspirations to create characters for shadow puppetry stories.
The project is inviting 50+ participants and young children (4-10 years) to be a part of this creative process. We would like to recruit participants with or without any digital access. The creative offer is open to all young children and 50+ participants in the SE9 and for those who may have links to the area.
Update - 1st May 2021
We are proud to present the final outcome, a short film that reflects the objective of the project.
