Open Storytellers
Circles of Imagination
Artist: Esmé Patey-Ford, Jenna Herman, George Williams & Tom Spencer
With: Open Storytellers
Open Storytellers is a place where people with a learning disability find their voice and then use it. From their base here in Frome, they offer routes to self-expression, identity and creative community. Open Storytellers offers an adult day service four days per week, plus a drop-in day each week.
We love working with brilliant peer organisations, so we were thrilled when our favourite local charity Open Storytellers suggested a collaboration. They were working on a project looking at how their artists (everyone at Open Storytellers is an artist) connect with the charity’s wider vision. They asked us to help with a sort of ‘creative audit’ - to sit in on their work and reflect back what we experienced.
Four Terrestrial artists worked in residence at Open Storytellers for four weeks. Each Terrestrial artist became involved in supporting a distinct small creative project – these emerged organically from conversations and explorations amongst the groups.
Jenna Herman supported the group to create a book that delved into the detail of Mary Ann, a woman from Wells in the Nineteenth Century who lived at times in the Asylum the group had researched for their latest performance.
Esmé Patey-Ford supported the group to create a short film, focused on the details of hands and gestures - with a soundtrack also created by the artists.
‘Early on, I witnessed a Lead Creative Facilitator and an Artist’s physical interaction with an egg shaker. I was powerfully reminded of the work of Buster Keaton whilst watching their beautiful, sensitive engagement… The way they listened to one another, in their eye contact, their physical attention to one another, and their responses, was compelling. They were modelling improvisation and a truly ‘live’ approach to performance… and the trust that is characteristic of all the work I encountered at Open Storytellers.’
- Esmé, reflecting on experience at OST.
George Williams worked in residence every Friday. Fridays at Open Storytellers often seem to be full of sound, with lots of singing and music making. This made for a fitting collaboration with George as a composer and performer. Inspired by a conversation about the previous day’s TV, the group fell into an improvised performance. This was added to with musical instruments, makeshift props, voice and physicality, and became the beginning of an epic adventure. George edited the group’s sound work into an audio odyssey.
The Wednesday group introduced themselves to Tom Spencer by detailing the things they enjoy most about taking part in activities at Open Storytellers: dance and movement, puppetry, character creation and creative writing. As a writer and storyteller, Tom was delighted to witness the freedom of the group’s approach. Together, the group created an epic, sweeping story that blended nature observation (following insects underground and birds up through the trees) with wild fantasy – transporting everyone to a magical place in the stars: Golden Land.
Roots are telling their own stories
Travelling out so the tree can grow up to the sky
Climb up
Past the birds in their nests – singing away
Past the bats in their hole
Past the butterflies – wings flapping
Looking down at people gardening below
Digging a tunnel – moles and badgers and hedgehogs
Leaves blown by the wind
The stars feel like magic
- Extract from Wednesday Group’s collaborative creative writing
Terrestrial passed on our reflections of this experience to OST through a series of artworks (film, audio, story, illustration) as well as a written report.
Image: Open Storytellers at work - illustration by Jenna Herman.
