Hi, my name is Jeff Daniels, it's February 2020 and I am at Arnolfini, in Bristol with fellow core group members of the ‘City of Threads’ project. We are here to listen to expert Miranda Rae deliver a presentation about podcast production, the A to Z of ‘How To’. The presentation is going really well, and my mind is shifting gear, maybe going into overdrive… I need to explain a little here. I have been Severely Sight Impaired (SSI) for many years, I have also been an Assistive Technology Trainer.  Are you starting to think where this is going? Yes…  Accessibility? “The...

At PECo we have been working with visually impaired artists and core collaborators for over three years now developing our latest theatre project; an immersive multi-sensory journey into the city from a visually impaired perspective. As part of this we are committed to sharing the learning that we are undergoing around creating inclusive and accessible physical and creative environments for visually impaired people [VIPs]. Below are notes for sighted guiding put together by our core devising group, of whom over 3/4's are VIPs and whose shared experience of VI awareness raising, training and equal...

PECo Theatre's final Dark City session took place on 23rd May.   It was such a special event and we are very grateful to everyone who attended for being so generous with their time and being open and honest about their unique situations as individuals, venues and organisations. We were pleased to be hosted by Watershed through our residency at the Pervasive Media Studio and of course thanks go to the project's funders ACE, BAB and the Quartet Fund. It was a packed 2 hours expertly facilitated by Emma Hughes; Dark City outreach producer, that was peppered with poems about the VI experience...

[image of the universe with the pupil of an eye at its centre] City of threads   There is a city intimately stitched within the city. When you walk your streets, you walk its streets too.   An ancient culture, whose citizens are masters of navigation, of adaption and survival, of using senses other than sight.   But a peril is threatening the city. Whole areas have become impassable voids, once favourite buildings and parks are causing sickness and injury and now citizens are starting to disappear.   Some are organising to resist this threat and...

Redcliffe Present Perfect: Histories of Now was a PECo theatre HLF funded arts & heritage project taking place in the Redcliffe area of Bristol from November 2017 to June 2018. It incorporated: Story collecting – audio recordings of living memory, local history, stories and memories Elders mentoring scheme – a core team of older people learning new arts and heritage skills Workshops - creative sessions translating the collected stories and other themes and resonances from the area into a first draft community play and audio-visual installations Community celebration - community...

Julian Trust Night Shelter Project - A Report. From March to July 2017, funded by the Quartet fund and an additional kind donation from the Atticus fund, PECo theatre worked with Julian Trust Night Shelter guests and volunteer staff in their 30th year of working in the city of Bristol. The aim of the project was to work with those disadvantaged by homelessness as well as those who work to support them, through documenting personal histories, stories and memories and engaging creatively with guests and volunteers around ideas for a theatre piece that might give voice to the life of the night...

We have been volunteering at the Julian Trust Night shelter, helping out, meeting guests and volunteers, documenting their stories and developing ideas for a piece of site-specific immersive performance that might tell the stories of this site in a powerful, imaginative and affecting way. Initially the artistic impetus was coming from our two core artists, Sammy Weaver, poet and Thom Buttery, audio-visual artist, but increasingly we are discovering ways to share and develop the artistic process and ideas development with the guests at the shelter. Below are a selection of poems and poetry...

Sammy is working with us on our JulianTrust Night Shelter r&d we asked her what inspired her in her work. You can read a selection of her poems in our inspire section.   Who are you and what form does your artistic practice take? I am a poet from the Welsh Borders, now living and writing in Bristol.   Why and how did you start this sort of work? I became very creatively inspired whilst studying Anthropology, but felt the output of academic essays didn’t match up to the vibrancy of learning about human ways. After graduating I began exploring anthropological themes...

Thom is working on our Quartet and Atticus funded Julia Trust Night shelter r&d. We asked him a bit about himself and his work.   Who are you and what form does your artistic practice take? I’m Thomas Buttery a Bristol based visual and light artist with an inclination for documentary film making.   Why and how did you start this sort of work? I got really into VJing while in College because it gave me an unrestrained platform to project, manipulate and exhibit my video experiments. At around the same time I was being amazed at festivals like Big Chill and fell...

I joined in these sessions as part of a journey of self discovery. This was to take me out of my comfort zone as I have not participated in drama/theatre type events before, other than being a member of the audience. So the journey began under the directorship of Rachel, providing an overview to stimulate our personal stories about Redcliffe. Stories about St Mary Redcliffe church unfolded relating to WW11. More up to date stories emerged ie Princess Diana's visit to Redcliffe's Guinea street; the filming of Dr Who and his Tardis. many of these stories connected to other individuals in the group....