Whaley Bridge Water Festival June 8th-12th 2012

The Whaley Bridge Water festival is a fantastic opportunity for families with children of all ages and makes for a great weekend that includes local bands, dance, stalls, animal and bird shows, a traditional Punch and Judy show, traction engine displays and fairground rides.

This year HPCA took its wonder yurt out to add to the entertainment with local artist Jim Medway who specialises in comic book making and cartoons leading a great workshop getting everyone drawing their very own Whaley Bridge Water Festival Cartoon Character.

The rain came down, but the yurt held up and Jim helped over 150 children and adults create cartoon creatures great and small.

Whaley Bridge Water Festival Gallery

Some of the creatures created at Whaley Bridge, well done to all the budding artists and many thanks to Jim Medway.

HPCA and the Little Giants

If you go down to High Lea Park today, you’re in for a CHAMPION surprise!

Little GIANTS theatre present a special pre Olympics theatre event for children in collaboration with High Peak Community Arts.

Rehearsals for this year’s show “Going for Gold” are taking place in High Lea Park, St Mary’s Road, New Mills, SK22.

We extend a warm open invitation to come along to watch live theatre in the making.

9 professional actors will be creating animal characters in preparation for the show at the Buxton Festival Fringe in July. Charlie Cockerel, Derek the Dog, Liliana Llama, Shirley Sheep, Pippa Pony, Puppy Blaze and Farmer Jack and his wife Jill, and a puppet show.

“Going for Gold” is the inspirational story of Derek the sheepdog’s dream of winning the “Derbyshire Dales Olympics” and introduces the enthusiastic but unfocussed sheepdog puppy Blaze as he learns the skill of good attention, how to be focussed, overcoming obstacles, teamwork and a show stopping puppet show of “The Hare and the Tortoise.”

The theme for the show is how to be a champion.

We will be rehearsing in the open sided ‘Yurt’ tent from 10am – 5pm on Friday 22^nd June, Saturday 23^rd June and Sunday 24^th June and again on Wednesday 4^th July, Thursday 5^th July and Friday 6^th July.

We invite you to join us, just come along and watch or bring paper and draw pictures, a great opportunity for creating stories. No need to book, just turn up.

Little Giants Theatre create logical, engaging, interactive stories enabling children to make sense of their lives and the world they live in, delivered with great care, comedy, music and songs, theatre for children age 3-7.

Nominated for the “Best for Families” award at Buxton Festival Fringe in 2011.

We do hope you will come and visit us at what promises to be a unique opportunity to see live theatre in the making.

For further information telephone 01663 740993 and ask for Kate or Call HPCA on 01633 744516

Buxton Olympic Torch Celebration

The Olympic Torch Relay comes to Buxton on Friday June 29th – passing through from 5pm to 5.30pm.

Are you planning to shoot video, or take pictures you want to share with our Crowd-sourcing project? Click here for your instructions.

We will have a high profile presence and have organised a number of events.

The New Mills Project eARTh group have been busy with artist Ruth Marsden and fabric paint on approximately 30 white umbrellas , and on the day will line the route near the Pavilion Gardens to ‘twirl’ the colourful results as the runner goes by! Afterwards, the painted umbrellas will be on display in thePavilionGardens, near our Yurt.

We will also have our Yurt in the Pavilion Gardens in the afternoon to join in the Olympicnic – with free arts activities to make your own hand held ribbon twirler beforehand, and to provide story telling afterwards (from 5.30pm to 7.30pm)…look out for details

We are also launching a project to capture the moment that the Olympic Torch comes through Buxton. We asked ourselves how many people will be shooting video footage on their phones or digital cameras, to remember the moment in years to come?

We also want to put a call out to gather as much footage as we can from the crowds that witness the event, and use it to create a piece of film to remember the day. You may meet some of the roving reporters from Residents of Fairfield Association Dreamscheme – they will be out and about taking pictures and interviewing people who they meet.

‘Peak Inside’ Magazine

‘Peak Inside’ magazine is now available for you to enjoy, free of charge.

To view ‘Peak Inside’ in a new window click here

Or pick up a copy in High Peak Libraries, Volunteer Centres, other community venues, and High Peak Community Arts’ base in High Lee Hall, New Mills. There are also audio CD versions available, kindly recorded by Glossop talking Newspapers, – so get in touch if you would like one.

Peak Inside is the result of six months of workshops in creative writing, illustration, photography and desk top publishing by members of our magazine project, and reflects their passions, interests and experiences.

Tales in the Tent

Tales in the Tent

Fairfield and Hadfield 2012

Tales in the tent took place in Fairfield and Hadfield on May 12th and 19th, with story tellers Gordon MacLellan and Christine McMahon.

Both events were part of the Derbyshire Literature Festival and were ran in partnership with the Libraries service and with the Children’s centre at Fairfield.

The sessions were funded through Derbyshire Community Foundation, so a big thank you to them, the funding allowed families and children of all ages to enjoy great entertainment, get involved in their community and hear some fantastic stories.

In Fairfield parents and children were transfixed by stories of goblins and monsters, giant rocks and great quests to be won. Outside the yurt the Children’s Centre staff ran cake decorating activities, seed planting and boxercise for children and adults. The Libraries staff helped parents and children create re-cycled books and later on in the day some of these were filled with stories.

In Hadfield, the yurt drew quite a crowd, children of all ages,mums, dads, grannies and grandads and even a curious dog all took part, spellbound by stories old and new. The crowd heard about kings with horses ears, babies that beat up ghosts and fairies who cast magic spell, children asked questions and many added their own ideas and made up similar stories of their own,

So a big thanks goes to everyone who came along to listen take part and be inspired by stories. The events were made extra special by children and young people adding their own ideas, making up their own stories and making books for their own tales with Libraries staff. In all over 100 people came to the two events, everyone had a great time and everyone went home with a tale or two to tell.

Project eARTh, environmental arts and health

This is an exciting five year project for people experiencing mental distress, funded by the Reaching Communities programme of the BIG Lottery Fund.

The project is run by HPCA in partnership with the local mental health teams and High Peak CVS.

Project eARTh holds weekly creative arts sessions, led by experienced artists and supported by mental health workers and volunteers. Participants can meet people, learn new skills, have fun, build confidence, and contribute towards their built and natural environments with works of art. There is no need for any previous arts experience, and we want to encourage people who don’t think of themselves as ‘arty’. Groups meet at New Mills Youth Club on Thursdays from 10.30am – 1pm, and at Fairfield Community Centre on Mondays from 12.30pm – 3pm. The project is free of charge.

How to join in:
Participants can be referred through their GP, Mental Health Team, other statutory or voluntary agencies or simply refer themselves. You can self referral, complete and post to the FREEPOST address on the form.

There are also opportunities for volunteers, participants’ families, neighbours and friends and other community members to get involved. If you are interested, please call Alison at High Peak Community Arts on 01663 744516, Sarah at the High Peak Community Mental Health Team on 01298 22321, or Paula at Glossop Mental Health Project on 01629 532686.

Painted Umbrellas for the Olympic Torch Relay

The Olympic Torch Relay comes to Buxton on Friday June 29th – passing through from 5pm to 5.30pm.

The New Mills Project eARTh group are busy with artist Ruth Marsden and fabric paint on white umbrellas , and on the day will line the route near the Pavilion Gardens to ‘twirl’ the colourful results as the runner goes by!

High Peak Commnity Arts will also have our Yurt in the Pavilion Gradens in the afternoon to join in the Olympicnic – with free arts activities to make your own hand held ribbon twirler before hand, and to provide story telling afterwards…look out for details.

Youth Arts Network High Peak

In 2010/11 the first phase of the Youth Arts Development Strategy concluded, with support from the Future Jobs Fund. Working with High Peak CVS we were able to employ a Youth Arts Network Development Officer, who researched networks across the country, strengthened our local contacts database and made recommendations for the Youth Arts Network High Peak.

This network now links together 10 different groups from permanent institutions, such as Buxton Opera House, to small ad hoc community voluntary arts projects and voluntary youth clubs. It is set up to communicate via a blog site and Facebook page, and from the beginning has aimed to collaborate on practical initiatives, rather than act as a talking shop.

In October 2012 we held our first collaborative event: We Make Our World, 28 October 2012, Buxton Pavilion Arts Centre.

Missing Looking to the future the Network will develop by word of mouth and marketing to include as many groups from across the district as we can contact. Initial research demonstrated a demand for extra support, training and better communication between groups. Development for this year will publicise the blog site and Facebook page, to explore the extent of demand for different types of support.

We want to collaborate again on another performance for October and build the network to involve at least 15 different groups in the area.

Go to the blog for more detail on the discussions from the meetings and the database of youth activities mapped across the district: www.yanhighpeak.blogspot.com

Shout Action Soundtrack

Working alongside the film making group on Monday nights; writing, recording and producing a sound track.

Sampling sounds With links to the group at Longlands Road Youth Club, making the film – the plan is for the two groups to stay in touch, sharing material via the webtool ‘Prezi’.

This is what we’ve got up on Prezi so far – Use the + and – buttons to zoom in and out, then either click on an item that looks interesting, or use the < and > arrows to move through the presentation:

Shout Action Sharing on Prezi

For more info on Prezi click here – takes you to their website – Is it the future of presentations?

Sampling sounds

Back to Youth Arts Hub