Portsmouth based artists collective announce a successful ACE funding bid!

_{Photo courtesy of Angela McMahon}

Portsmouth based artists collective one000plateaus announced a successful funding bid to the Arts Council England National Lottery Project Grants scheme. The project funding will enable the organisation to deliver an 8 month-long series of activities exploring Portsmouth’s relationship to the sea. Culminating in a 3-day event at Portsmouth Cathedral in November the project starts during Portsmouth Bookfest 2022.

Producer Roy Hanney said, “this is an exciting opportunity to not only create a large scale arts event at Portsmouth Cathedral but to get a conversation started about our relationship to the marine environment”. The project will invite people living in the city to get involved as writers, makers, designers, actors and more. The funding enables one000plateaus to bring in experienced, internationally recognised artists to mentor local creatives through the process of creating events and activities for the project.

Originally inspired by the writing of poet Becci Louise, and staged as a commission by John Sackett for the New Theatre Royal’s Festival of the Sea in 2019. The story world for the project will take her book ‘Octopus Medicine‘ as a starting point for an exploration of the ways in which the city not only threatens but is threatened by the marine environment as global warming brings danger to us all. It asks us all to consider how we can think differently about the environment and what we can do to ensure the city has a long term sustainable future.

Everything will start in February 2022 during Portsmouth Bookfest when Becci Louise will be running young people’s writing workshops in the city’s libraries. At the same time, story consultant Alison Norrington will be working with a group of experienced local writers to generate a new storyline for the project which will then be further developed over the coming months through a series of creative workshops.

The project will officially launch on Wednesday 23rd February at The Front Room, a popular spoken word event at The Loft above The King’s public house in Albert Road. You can join us for a reading by Becci Louise from Octopus Medicine along with other spoken word artists performers. Sign up for our newsletter via the website, follow our socials and stay in touch for more information coming to you in the new year.