Voice Arts Trust Facilitation

I work as a facilitator for Voice Arts Trust and these are some of the projects that have left an impact on me and my work with the Trust. Here is a link to our website with all of the great projects we have on the go, http://voice-arts.org.nz/

Cap Team Wellington City Council: 

Tenant Drama: D.I.Y Collective: Weekly theatre workshops

This community engagement performance project is designed to connect, celebrate and surprise your community. It brings together people from a range of diverse agencies and organisations that work with and for community. They are staff, volunteers, and clients.  They are guided and supported to create a collection of one-minute stories inspired by their own life and their work in the community. Engaging, surprising, and challenging audiences can expect the unexpected when they come to an In A Minute performance – it is intimate and thoroughly unique. We are delivering this project in Hutt with support from the Hutt City Council.

Workshops with Kaitiaki, CRC's and Gardens team.

A series of workshops developing networking skills, leadership and growing communities. 

Stand Up, Speak Up, Who we are. Neighbours day

This project is a series of workshops with community volunteers from City Housing.  The focus is on speaking publicly and presentation skills. For many volunteers speaking to groups of people is part of their role in the community, and it is a challenge for the best of us at the best of times. We will be building confidence, capacity and skills in this area, and preparing some participants to present at the annual Neighbours Day celebrations.

Workplace team development: 

Each workshop is tailored to the workplace.

• Idea Services Wellington
• Hutt
• MIX
• Thumbs Up
• Te Omanga Hospice

Inspiring Communities

A facilitated workshop as part of the Inspiring Communities Conference October 2015

Celebrating community successes and community networks.

Spring Uprising with Barbarian Productions

Voice Arts Trust presented during the uprising. I was involved on opening night alongside Nicola as we ran a mini In a Minute session on stories of uprising.

Ryman Healthcare:  film about transitioning into retirement villages

Celebrating the stories of adults transitioning into supported living and their families finding their lives dramatically changed, talking about the needs of all concerned. 

In a Minute: Communities from the hear of the Hutt

This community engagement performance project is designed to connect, celebrate and surprise your community. It brings together people from a range of diverse agencies and organisations that work with and for community. They are staff, volunteers, and clients.  They are guided and supported to create a collection of one-minute stories inspired by their own life and their work in the community. Engaging, surprising, and challenging audiences can expect the unexpected when they come to an In A Minute performance – it is intimate and thoroughly unique. We delivered this project in Hutt with support from the Hutt City Council June 2015.

Singing with Soul

In 2014 with the support of Hutt City Council I ran workshops across the Hutt region running consecutively for two groups of participants.

Community singing for 30's and under: ran for twelve weeks finishing with a collaborative performance at Thumbs Up in Petone.

Our final Singing jam with Thumbs up and Hutt Valley Disabled Resources Trust

Agencies involved: Thumbs up and Hutt Valley Disabled Resources Trust.

We jam packed the room with participants and sang our hearts out for an hour and a half, we dance, laughed and had scones.

Led by Claire and John Paul

Community Singing 30 and beyond

Agencies involved: Hutt Valley Disable Resources Trust, Idea Services Hutt including Valley Gardens, Arts on High and The Christie Centre.

Bunched around a piano is the best, singing The Hebrew Cannon, HVDRT

We were hosted at Hutt Valley Disabled Resources Trust and delighted in a morning tea before coming together to sing our learned repertoire as one group.

Led by Claire and Kate

Workplace Singing

Singing for all. Informal group singing. Open to all ages and abilities.

Workshops tailored to the workplace

Just Voices

Informal singing lead by Claire Hewitt and Carol Shortis with district and high court judges from around New Zealand. We are working towards a performance at the Judges Conference in March of 2016.

This is the most amazing place to sing, history resonates off our surroundings

Community Singing

Singing with Soul is one of our community programs, featuring informal group singing, singing for the joy of it. There are no restrictions to the ability of participants and welcome all with the inclination towards singing.

We explore music with our voices, instruments and movement giving a environmental feel to our music

We diversify our classes depending on the needs of the group or environment we are singing in.

Our sessions run for an hour at a time.

Hutt Valley Community Arts Network

Hutt Valley Community Arts Network has been up and running since 2013 I've been involved in the network.

Working alongside Pippa Sanderson it's our place to network with other artists in the Hutt and to grow work opportunities.

We have had several fantastic workshops on marketing promotion and lots of time for networking and socializing.

HVCAN Meets every 6 weeks throughout the year.

Workshop on connection led by me at the gallery at HVCAN

Voice Arts Trust Directing

D.I.Y Collective

Working in partnership with the CAP Team at City Housing, we have created a tenant theatre company – D.I.Y Collective: an open group for any city housing tenants with a burning desire for, or gentle curiosity about performance art.

Having worked over the years with a number of city housing tenants on various projects, we know there’s a huge wealth of creative talent out there and we intend harnessing that talent on and off stage. 

Who are we

The first half of this year we will be working with our Tenant drama group to create a performance exploring the theme “Who Are We!” We will be using spoken word, drama and song to capture stories that explore blood lines, ancestors, those who have gone before.  The group will be performing for the wider community as part of Matariki celebrations.

Stand Up Speak Up

This project is a series of workshops with community volunteers from City Housing.  The focus is on speaking publicly and presentation skills. For many volunteers speaking to groups of people is part of their role in the community, and it is a challenge for the best of us at the best of times. We will be building confidence, capacity and skills in this area, and preparing some participants to present at the annual Neighbours Day celebrations.

What Sustains Us

Our tenant theatre company – The DIY Theatre Collective – is embarking on their second devised theatre project, this time working towards a performance for City Housing’s Christmas celebrations in early December.  Their work will explore the question: What sustains us?

• Community
• Family
• Hope
• Children
• Happiness
• Hope

A devised show with live music and theatre 

He Aha Te Utu: The True Cost

A devised piece of work inspired by the stories of our participants and their families about the roles of women in WW1.

This project was supported by the British Council and the Goethe Institute in the foundation of the project. We were supported by Wellington City Council for taking the show on tour across the Wellington Region