A Dream of 20 performance is the culmination of the Cumbrian part of an international project to help build resilience with young people called STORYsilience. With young people at the helm, STORYsilience aims to uncover stories authored by lesser-heard people in our communities, reinterpreting them into arts performances, and touring the work in cultural institutions (theatres, galleries, libraries, heritage sites) in different locations. The partner organisations in the project are Global Learning London, Cumbria Development Education Centre (CDEC) and Lakeland Arts (UK), Povod, Institute for Culture and Development of International Relations in Culture (Slovenia), DEM Experimental Training Centre (Turkey).
Over several months in collaboration with Global Learning London, Roisin McLinden from Lakeland Arts and Gabi Lipska from CDEC worked with Queen Katherine School students to develop their stories into performances, through physical theatre and creative writing which they presented as A Dream of 20 at Windermere Jetty Museum on Sunday 5 February 2023.
STORYsilience combines two words: STORYTELLING & RESILIENCE.
This project has been collaboratively produced to help guide young adults in telling and retelling their stories and experiences around COVID-19. Lockdowns, reduced social contact and the ongoing presence of the virus have affected society as a whole, with impacts especially noticeable on younger people. This project set out to help build capacity to cope mentally or emotionally through challenging circumstances, like the pandemic, using creative experiences. For the participants, the project aims to support personal growth through the ability to adapt to the new reality and any future stresses in their lives, at home, school or in the future world to come. Through the process of engaging young people in arts and theatre practice, these stories started to become performance pieces including visual, auditory and experiential art.
Roisin McLinden, Creative Producer Lakeland Arts, talks about why this process has been so important. “The learnings from life under COVID extend to any crisis we are likely to encounter as a human race in the future. If we can harvest lessons learnt, transform them creatively through embodied storytelling it can provide a way of both documenting and processing complex lived experiences.”
Creative Writing
Roisin goes on to explain how creative writing was used as a tool in the weekly workshop sessions with the students. “Uncovering and unpacking experiences of COVID was a challenging task. Creative writing was a valuable tool for the young people to express themselves openly without judgement and dig up traumatic memories in a safe space. Stream of consciousness, letters, prose, writing as a coach to yourself, erasure poetry, haikus, and other exercises were dotted throughout the rehearsal process to slowly uncover the stories we wanted to tell.”
Trip to Turkey
An important element of the STORYsilience project is the idea of cultural exchange and creating an opportunity for young people from across Europe to share their experiences. As part of this the company went to Turkey in November 2022.
“This was a big step in the project, which involved the young people meeting other participants from across the globe, participating in various workshops and performing a “scratch” of their work so far. It was particularly ground-breaking for our group, as a couple of them had never been abroad before. The experience provided an opportunity to build international friendships, participate in an array of creative and resilience building activities, as well as bond on a deep level as a group.” Roisin McLinden.
The Company
Gabi Lipska
Gabi is STORYsilience project coordinator for Cumbria. An educator and cultural anthropologist, she works for CDEC leading projects on community cohesion, collective leadership and democratic dialogue that involve participants from diverse backgrounds. She has particular interest in emerging practices that support a more heart-centred, embodied and connecting learning.
Roisin McLinden
Roisin is a Creative Producer at Lakeland Arts and Artistic Director of ‘A Dream of 20’. She works closely with children and young people to nurture confidence and creative expression. With a background in theatre and youth work, Roisin is enthusiastic to engage lesser heard young people in co-creative processes that offer growth and joy.
Ethan Brown
“I’ve thoroughly enjoyed this process. A key part was about the people I’ve met and the stories I heard along the way. STORYsilience has been an important part of my life for a while now and I’m going to be devastated when it finishes.”
Byron Connell
“My favourite part of STORYsilience was making friends with all the lovely people who I’ve done the project with. The process has been a rollercoaster and I have learned how to do so many new things. My happiest memory was doing a “Lightning walk” and going to Turkey.”
Drew De Silva
“STORYsilience has helped me gain so much confidence over the past few months, not only in the way I present myself but also the way I see myself, and my self-worth has increased. I’m really going to miss these sessions with such talented people.”
Olivia Jones
“This project has been extremely enjoyable and unique for me. I made new friends and grew closer to the friends I already knew. I have always loved writing, but now I am a creative mover too!”
Oli Smith
“STORYsilience has given me much more confidence around my peers, I have really loved making friends on this journey. Flying on a plane for the first time was amazing! And being creative every week – particularly writing poetry – was so enjoyable.”
Watch the full performance
Q & A
Thank you
This project has been such an inspiration to everyone involved. When creativity and wellbeing are championed, people are given space to heal and grow into authenticity. Thank you to the project partners for recognising this need to process traumatic times and find creative expression to cultivate resilience. A huge thank you too to Queen Katherine School, particularly Jane Brierly (Deputy Head) and Michael Massey (Head of Performing Arts) who made working so closely with this group of young people possible.
