Stanley’s Story
Writer’s workshops brief
Background
In 2011 Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum will be closed for a major new build. The
building will provide us with a dedicated learning space, a gallery to show our fine art
collection, open storage, two exhibition galleries and a multimedia facility for younger
audiences as well as much improved shop, lift and other public facilities.
While we are closed we will continue to provide a lively and innovative offsite
programme Off the wall, on the move to maintain our profile and develop new
audiences. Stanley’s Story is part of this programme. Stanley’s Story is inspired by
the painting Village Life or Village Gossip, by Stanley Spencer and is in the
collections at Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum. Throughout 2011, we plan to
engage with artists and the local community in a number of activities to remember
Stanley Spencer’s time in Gloucestershire.
During the Second World War, the artist Stanley Spencer stayed for almost a year in
the Gloucestershire village of Leonard Stanley. During that time he observed village
characters and village life creating several sketch books of life in the village and from
two of these produced the painting Village Life or Village Gossip. (Please see
attached illustration.)
The brief:
We are looking to run a series of five writing workshops for the public, working with
responses to both the place of Leonard Stanley, and the painting Village Life or
Village Gossip.
We are looking for writers to run workshops focusing on poetry and on prose. Two of
the workshops will be aimed at the general public, and two at young people (in the
12-16 age range). The final workshop will focus on performance skills to encourage
and enable the attendees to perform their writing and will include all ages. We are
looking for writers who are experienced writers and performers as well as
experienced at running workshops for the age ranges mentioned.
We are looking to run these sessions as half day workshops (2-2.5 hours long). The
workshops will be delivered in the village hall over the weekend of the 12 and 13
November 2011.
The results of the writing workshop will be published on the Cheltenham Art Gallery &
Museum website.
Objectives:
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To create a body of writing recording and celebrating the life of the village of
Leonard Stanley and the work of Stanley Spencer.
For each participant to create a piece of writing relating the village and/or the
painting
Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum would like to create a digital resource for
their website to accompany the project, including the writings and potentially
recordings of performances in the final session
Evaluation:
We will evaluate the workshop as part of our evaluation for all of Off the wall, on the
move.
This will include:
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gathering information regarding visitor numbers
visitor participation
age groups
previous engagement with the arts
Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum profile
views about this particular project
This will be achieved through the writer writing a short evaluation of the project and
Art Gallery & Museum staff collecting data.
Budget
The budget for the project is £600
Timeframe
Artists are invited to submit a proposal by 30/9/2011
Short listed artists will be interviewed week beginning 10/10/2011
Workshops programmed to take place on the 12 and 13 November 2011