A collaboration between BasementArtsProject and Leeds Beckett University.
Instigated by Marion Harrison, Alan Dunn and Bruce Davies, '30' evolved from some Community Development Funding secured by Basement in 2012, with the aim of introducing visual art students to a community context, and vice versa.
In late 2013 some students visited the Hunslet Club in South Leeds to chat about a possible collaboration. Hunslet has a fascinating history dating back to the 1940s (including Dr Wylie and the munition runs) but during the meeting it became apparent that they wished this story to be told in film, which was slightly at odds with our more open-ended brief, both for the students and community participants. Basement began contacting other community groupings and during 2014, informal meetings were arranged between six students (Annabel Crosby, Cressida Barrett, Leah O'Connell, Rhianna Mayhew, Rebecca Dyson and Kirtsy Doyle) and the community centred around St. Luke's Church.
Information-sharing events took place and pamphlets produced and these relationships slowly blossomed, including a shared session in Beeston on Remembrance Sunday. Students began to notice the little rituals and routines that people would go through on a Sunday morning and this became the core idea of '30'. An announcement article appeared in the Yorkshire Evening Post and preparations continued, between other studies and projects.
On Sunday 18th January 2015, the six students filmed between 9.30am and 10.00am at six different
locations (30 minutes = project title), with ten different community members, some of whom did their own filming. We then invited all participants
into Leeds Beckett for a day of
editing, overseen by
Jimi Lund of Cut and Splice, towards a suite of six short films. Julian, Leah and Clare sat and discussed faith and
the role of the church; Vicar Alistair perused the almost-finished edits.
Each film is a very genuine and open document, a half-hour slice of time in South Leeds one Sunday. Teeth are brushed, car windscreens scraped, children
dressed and fed, stories shared and days begin. We see close-ups of hands, and backwards dogs, we hear repeated phrases and Gospel music.
We proudly present the six films:
