- Volunteer with the Spirit team at the 4th Feb BAC Community Fair
- Come along and register your interest
The Spirit of Bridport team are calling on all townsfolk and visitors to attend the special Community Fair Day on Saturday 4th Feb to register interest in this year’s Spirit of Bridport Festival of Culture. The Festival takes place in August and celebrates all that’s best about Bridport life.
The 4th Feb Community Fair Day is held at Bridport Arts centre from 10am – 1pm. Young and old are invited to explore the range of community groups and activities on offer in the town and the planned Festival events taking place in August.
Liz Murray, Event Manager at the Spirit of Bridport said, ‘We’re really looking forward to welcoming you to the special Community Fair day. We want everyone to tell us what you would like to see at your Festival of Culture in August. The superb 16-day Bridport festival, runs between the two Olympics, from 11th – 27th August and showcases the very best of Bridport: with Bridport’s answer to the Edinburgh Fringe, open-air music, al fresco dining, theatre on Millennium green and much, much more. We’re excited to welcome the whole of Bridport’s community to join this special Festival and celebrate the uniqueness and SPIRIT of our town.’
Volunteers are also widely needed: ‘If you want to get involved either as a steward, part of our team of organisational volunteers or helping with a specific event, please come and sign-up at the Community Fair Day. We’ll be having a special information session for volunteers in the next few weeks, so anyone who would like to be involved please come and register your interest on the 4th Feb.’
The Spirit of Bridport was set up to celebrate the town during the 2012 Cultural Olympiad and for years afterwards. This year it culminates in the 16-day August Festival of Culture championing all that’s great about Bridport life: be it performing arts, music, food, sports, art, literature, heritage or film.
The February 4th Community Fair Day encourages cultural, heritage and sporting organisations across Bridport’s community, to share exciting details of their 2012 events with the public. There will be a number of excellent stalls in the BAC Theatre with displays, demonstrations and workshops.
The special day welcomes the reappearance of the Bridport Heritage Forum who will be talking about their six-week interactive exhibition on Bridport’s rope, net and sporting heritage for the SPIRIT OF BRIDPORT Festival of Culture in August. Meanwhile, Transition Town will be reporting on Bridport’s journey of transition from oil dependency to resilience; reducing local energy consumption, encouraging local
production and consumption. The Spirit of Bridport team welcomes you to come and share your views and ideas with their team.
There’s also the chance to visit BLAP & BLAST, Bridport’s Local Area Partnership (BLAP) – an active collaboration formed by Bridport Town Council with ten neighbouring parish councils and more than eighty local organisations and individuals working for the economic, social, environmental and cultural wellbeing of the area’s community. BLAP will be joined by BLAST, Bridport Local Area Skills Training. The Youth Council & Rights Respecting will also be at the Fair outlining their projects.
One of the key aims of SPIRIT OF BRIDPORT in 2012 is to engage with the whole community, which is why the Spirit of Bridport team are involving a Community Health stand at the Fair. Raising awareness and discussing health issues at the event will be provided by members of Bridport’s Mental Health and Sexual Health units.
The Unitarian Chapel will also be joining in at the Community Fair Day. They have exciting plans for the converted Methodist chapel during the Spirit Festival of Culture. The Chapel will act as a rejuvenative sanctuary with holistic therapies and the contemplation of spirituality through poetry, music and talks.
There will also be a number of new stands including the newly established St Michael’s Enterprise – set up to try and save St Michaels Trading Estate from corporate development. They’ll be on hand to outline the developer’s recent proposals and what can be done to show community reaction.
If you are feeling peckish, local catering company, Henry’s Beard, responsible for the Bridport Arts Garden Cafe, will be cooking delicious hot food on the Arts Centre Forecourt; it’s a special and appreciated gesture for the Fair.
Excitement is growing about ‘HOME’, the stunning photography exhibition led by Robert Golden which will be exhibited during the Festival of Culture in the Arts Centre’s Alsop Gallery. Whilst HOME is being exhibited, Robert will be running a project to help the people of Bridport tell their story via film, photography and art culminating in exhibitions of the community’s work throughout the town. HOME will have a stand at the Fair explaining more about the ambitions for the project and there will also be a HOME workshop running on the 4th in the BAC Theatre between 2pm-5pm. To join this workshop please email info@spiritofbridport.org
To generate wider community involvement, there will be Community Information Walls to post information about any events, projects or thoughts you have for Spirit of Bridport 2012.
If you would like to be a volunteer of SPIRIT and share your talent with the community, then please come and visit Liz Murray at the SPIRIT stand on the Community Fair Day.
