Call for young West Midlands film-makers to show work at Glastonbury 2010

The West Midlands Culture Programme for London 2012 is looking for films in two categories which reflect both the spirit of Glastonbury and the Olympic movement. Welcome the World is a call for silent films with a purely visual narrative which celebrate the values of the Olympic Games including friendship, determination, inspiration and excellence.  Hug the Planet is supported by Natural England and is an open call for films which again have a strong visual narrative on the themes of biodiversity, healthy living, climate change, waste and inclusion.

The team in the West Midlands are also inviting adult film-makers the opportunity to submit short films for After Dark which will show the seamier, sinister and darker side of life and animations or ambient films including time delay, abstract work or art film of up to ten minutes long to be shown at the Festival.

The Village Screen is a unique collaboration between the UK's creative agencies and the BBC. The screen will be used to showcase the work of some of the best young film making talent, digital artists and developers from the West Midlands to thousands of people at Glastonbury. 

Paul Kaynes, West Midlands Creative Programmer said:  “This is a brilliant project and an excellent example of how the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad is bringing creative and cultural experiences to new audiences right across the country who wouldn’t ordinarily have the chance to see this work. It’s great for our region as we have such a fantastic film and screen talent based here in the West Midlands so I look forward to viewing the submissions.” 
  
Films should be submitted in DVD format and be accompanied by a completed submissions or permissions form by 23 April 2010. These forms plus terms & conditions for entry can be found in the related documents column on the right of the screen.
Please send your film and completed form to Paul Kaynes, West Midlands Creative Programmer, West Midlands Culture Programme for London 2012, The Arts Council, 82 Granville Street, Birmingham  B1 2LH.

One film-maker in each category will be chosen to receive a pair of tickets to attend the 2010 Glastonbury Festival.

For more information please contact Moira Rawlings, Editorial Content Producer, West Midlands Culture programme for London 2012 via email: Moira.Rawlings@artscouncil.org.uk or mobile 0787 241 2806

(via Shropshire and Telford Arts Partnership e-news)

Citizen Journalism and the General Election

With the announcement today of the date for the General Election (May 6th in case you impossibly missed it) there's an excellent and informative post on Blogging the 2010 election by Talk About Local who ran the citizen journalism workshop at the Festival. It gives details of online resources that give this election, above all others, that extra interactive twist, enabling you to interrogate your local politicians directly on pressing issues, dig into their background, share their thoughts, offer yours,  not to mention exploring the betting odds. Whether more digital equates with with more democratic remains to be seen.

In addition, official Election Artist, photographer Simon Roberts, commissioned to document campaign activity in the run-up to the General Election, has made The Election Project a collaborative enterprise by inviting members of the public to contribute photographs of political activity in their area. With some affinity to the Mass Observation project of the late 1930s that, using volunteers, set out to document by various means the day-to-day life of ordinary people in Britain, it claims to be the first UK citizen journalism political photography project ever.

View the online gallery here

Upload your photographs here