Telling Wellingborough’s untold stories
Telling Wellingborough’s untold stories
A community arts project is telling the stories of Wellingborough's diverse communities in a unique way
If you walked around Wellingborough town centre yesterday you may have been asked to be filmed speaking some lines from a new poem about the town created by Kremena Dimitrova.
Dimitrova’s work (inspired by conversations she had with people inside the town’s library) is part of community-led arts programme Made with Many’s long running Wellingborough Stories project which comes to a close this month with its festival finale.
Throughout its three-year existence the project, which has been funded by the Arts Council as well as the National Lottery Heritage Fund, has delved into, recorded, represented and made art from the rich tapestry of Wellingborough’s different communities.
During lockdown it recorded the stories of some of the town’s first generation South Asian residents, created a quilt telling the stories of the Wellingborough’s Windrush residents and gave a voice to the town’s homeless community during pandemic - creating an illustrated book detailing their personal stories.
During the arts project more than 600 people have shared their own version of Wellingborough and taken part in the variety of workshops and events that have been staged, with respected artists commissioned to tell the town’s stories in a unique way.
Producer Tom Briggs, who has been leading the project with community engagement coordinator Myrle Roach, explains the ethos behind the project.
He said:
“The thing we are really trying to do is to show all the stories in Wellingborough that are from communities and people who may not have been documented before. Since the start of this project we have heard stories where people have relived their memories as children during the second world war, people who were involved in the volcano in Montserrat and young people have given their experiences of their lives today and how they view Wellingborough.
“The response throughout has been lovely. We had one woman who saw some of the projects and said it reminded her of her grandmother - in terms of the turns of phrase that were used.
“As part of this project we have tried to make sure we connected people together as much as possible.”
A highlight for Tom has been the recent puppetry films made by Ruth Piggott. Watch the film Ruth made here about a man who watched bombs being dropped on the town during world war II.
Tom says although this is the final stage of the current project with the festival the culmination of all the work, there is the idea that it may have a further act if further funding can be found.
However what has been created so far will live on as the Wellingborough museum will be taking archives of the interviews and murals created by some of the town’s young people will remain in the Swansgate Shopping Centre.
Here’s the events still to come in the festival:
Thursday, May 25 - Wellingborough on film from 7pm to 9pm at the Castle Theatre, Castle Way, Wellingborough, free entry. Some newly digitised film of the town from the 1960s and 70s will feature in this film night along Ruth Piggott’s puppetry shorts and a Sleeping Radical & RYF Films ‘From Under the Same Skies’ film about Wellingborough’s Romanian community.
Friday, May 26 - Poetry and Print workshop from 6pm to 8pm, at Victoria Centre, Palk Road, Wellingborough, free entry plus refreshments. Emma Matthews will be showing people how to create a unique poem inspired by their community and then they will use this poem to help create a combined piece of art that will share a snapshot of life in Wellingborough.
You can view more of the art projects online and Wellingborough library in Pebble Lane has an exhibition until the end of this month.
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