Cheltenham Trust (2018)

Mar 15

‘Robyn worked with The Cheltenham Trust on a 12 month Heritage Lottery Funded project, split across several partners across the town, to commemorate and think a-new about the World War One Anniversary in 2018. Her project brief was to work with The Wilson Art Gallery and Museum and engage a broad range of community groups, many of whom don't engage with The Wilson and wouldn't come into the building. She was tasked with facilitating workshops that reflected on the First World War, asked bigger questions about war and conflict in a general sense whilst also considering the meaning of the anniversary in the global context we're in today, through the use of our archives and collections.

Robyn not only engaged with the community groups we'd identified but also found other groups she brought into the project. She was entirely self-reliant working with hard-to-reach individuals, social service users and under represented groups in the town, and always making each and every one of them feel welcome and valued, encouraging a high re-attendance rate...Following this she worked with groups to create a final show for our exhibition space. The end result felt very authentic to the workshop process and to the input of all participants. In our final exhibition, 'The Listening Station', she showcased our own archival material, work by participants, political provocations from the consultations and represented a spectrum of viewpoints, all whilst being of a very high visual standard that tied into the propaganda of war. The most gratifying thing for those of us working on the project was seeing the real life stories of community members come to life in the final exhibition, and seeing those participants moved to tears to see their families represented in an exhibition gallery.’

Sophie Wardell

Programme Manager

Cheltenham Trust

Selected feedback from participants:

‘I liked being creative and others being creative too.’
‘I enjoyed looking back, into history as well as discussing and listening to others’
‘The pictures shared were very impressive’
‘I learnt to concentrate harder on what I’m doing’
‘I learnt about food economy and the risks taken by seamen’
‘I learnt to relax’
‘It has been a great opportunity for me and my community to learn about World War One and Cheltenham’s involvement’
‘I enjoyed discovering the wealth of objects and images held-and-hidden within the archive!’