Giving A Voice to the Voiceless : Film and Music
A series of intimate portraits of homeless and vulnerably housed people who share their own unique stories with us, presented through film, music, sampled sounds and a dynamic visual installation. These are extraordinarily candid and moving accounts of life lived out in the open.
Out in the Open was conceived as a project in the summer of 2011. Dorset based musician and composer Kathie Prince was commissioned by the Solo Trust, a Dorchester charity, to create a performance piece with members of the local community. The decision was made to focus on homelessness and base the project around the Hub drop-in centre for rough sleepers in Dorchester.
Dorchester is a county town in rural Dorset, surrounded by beautiful countryside and steeped in history . It is a destination for holidaymakers and those escaping the hustle and bustle of the big cities to experience the rural idyll. It also has a homeless and vulnerably housed community. Some pass through the town, including the so called Road Men, whilst others sleep rough for longer periods of time, often going unnoticed by the wider community. This is a precarious existence with its roots in marital breakdown, unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse and chronic mental health issues. In the last few years several members of the homeless and vulnerably housed community in Dorchester have died, including two of those people involved in our project.
This performance is dedicated to them and all those people affected by homelessness. The situation is getting worse in the UK. It could happen to any one of us.
OUT IN THE OPEN: The Project
Due to the transient nature of the people involved, Kathie Prince chose to work with film, recorded sound, music and visual art. Bridport film maker, Clive Whaley came on board, as did sonic artist Adrian Newton and later on in the process Peter Snelling joined the team as visual artist in residence at the Hub. Their brief was to give a voice to the voiceless. To bring the issues of homelessness out into the open.
Kathie Prince and Clive Whaley spent several months getting to know the staff, volunteers and those people using the Hub. It soon became clear that the nature of the project was to go with the flow and capture on film, digital recorder and paper, impromptu songs, tunes, poems and thoughts as they happened in the Hub and on the streets of Dorchester. Clive then began the process of filming and very quickly gathered remarkable interviews with people forced to sleep rough for many different reasons around the town .
Sonic Artist Adrian Newton and Kathie Prince worked together, collecting and sampling sounds and spoken words for the live devised and improvised music which will be played in response to the film. They worked members of Viva! The Dorchester Community Choir, devising and recording vocals based on interviews with homeless people who appear in “Out in the Open.” And they joined forces with other musicians Iain Aird and Martine Hardy to create the live musical element.
The result of the project is a series of intimate portraits of homeless and vulnerably housed people who share their own unique stories with us, presented through film, music, sampled sounds and a dynamic visual installation. These are extraordinarily candid and moving accounts of life lived out in the open.
We would like to thank the staff and volunteers at the Hub for their energy and support. We are particularly grateful to all those who feature in the film for allowing us into their world. Thank you.
A huge thank you to the Solo Trust who made this project possible.
Clive Whaley is a Bridport based film maker. After a 20 year career in sports management and consultancy Clive bought a video camera simply to record a family holiday and then became fascinated by the film making process. He progressed from family videos to corporate DVDs for clients such as the National Lottery and Honda and eventually, television documentaries. His film about West Dorset farmer Jim Armstrong: “Dorset Days: a year in the life of Longhorn Jim” has been shown eight times on BBC FOUR. His most recent full length work is an ‘operamentary’ called “Lonely Boys” staged at Bridport Arts Centre in 2011. Combining documentary interviews with the ‘3 ages of man’ on film and Clive’s original songs on stage, “Lonely Boys” played to packed houses and standing ovations.
Clive has undertaken the filming and editing of “Out in the Open” and is extremely grateful to all those who feature in the film for allowing him into their world and for their openness and honesty on camera.
Adrian Newton, Sonic Artist
Adrian is a sound artist who has contributed to a number of festivals and other sonic arts events in Dorset and beyond, including the Sonic Arts Expo, Inside Out and Hubworld. He has also regularly contributed site-specific soundworks to performances by Wimborne Community Theatre over a number of years. Previous projects focusing on homeless people have included ‘Home from home’, commissioned by Poole Arts Development Unit in 2007, which was the focus of an installation in the Lighthouse, Poole.
Kathie Prince, director of BUZZ Music Projects, is a musician, singer and composer who has worked extensively throughout the UK, Ireland and abroad. She has many years experience facilitating and managing youth and community projects, working in schools as a music/voice specialist, performing and devising in mainstream and experimental music theatre and collaborating with dancers, musicians and visual artists.
Projects include directing “Sounds Unusual,” a major experimental music festival on London’s South Bank, composing and performing music for the BBC children’s TV, cross community work in Belfast with Opera Northern Ireland, experimental theatre in Assisi, Italy and performing as an actor musician at the Lyric Theatre , Belfast and Druid theatre, Galway,Ireland.
Peter Snelling a graduate from the National Film and Television School also came on board, and over the period of Dorchester Festival worked with users of the Hub to create a mural in Dorchester, based around their feelings about being homeless
To see his work visit www.mypockets.co.uk
Out in the Open
Tuesday 18th December
Bridport Arts Centre
7.30pm
