Festival Exhibition at Parbold Library

The Parbold Festival Exhibition is now open. Come to Parbold Library to see Sunny the Dragon and some of the stunning creative work produced by members of Parbold community during the festival.

You can also leave your responses, reflections, memories, favourite bits and suggestions for future festivals on a postcard to Tia as part of the exhibition.

Parbold Festival - a Tall Tale Told.

I can't believe the Parbold Festival was nearly a month ago already. It was an amazing event, with over 8000 people visiting, taking part and helping to make it so brilliant.

There was something magical about the whole weekend. I have met and made friends with some incredible Parbold folk.

Here are just a few photographs. They don't do it justice, but they give a flavour of the community story that was performed over the festival weekend.

The crowd gathered in front of the open air stage behind The Railway pub waiting for the storytelling to begin. Children are holding the spirit guide fish that they made at visual art workshops with Andy and Sharon, the lead artists on the project. In the story, the spirit guides help a little girl, Tia, to search for the dragon who is late for the festival.

The story begins - here is local actor and singer Anna Beaumont bringing Tia's character to life, with help from our puppet Walter, operated by local puppeteer Phil King. 

Three writers from the narrative workshops at the library read parts of the story that they have written. Excellent writing and performing from Izzie, Elaine and Lorraine (I wish I had a photo!) They are accompanied by our fantastic narrator Cath Foxon. The crowd listens in awesome silence, utterly compelled by the storytelling. Magical!

 The procession through Parbold begins. We follow Tia and the spirit guides with flags and banners in search of the dragon.

We find the dragon. Tia greets Sunny the dragon and Parbold folk meet her as we make our way back through the village to the stage where the story of Sunny the Parbold dragon continues with a quest for fruit to feed a very hungry dragon. 

On the final day of the festival, it is time for Sunny to return to her home inside Parbold Hill. We send her off with a lullaby and she makes her way back home via the canal. Wonderful boatman Keith, who is moored up in parbold, offers his boat for the job. Sunny is too big to lie across the top so here she is, her head at the front, and (off camera) her tail peeping out of the back of the barge. The bridge and canal bank are lined with Parbold folk waving goodbye to their dragon. A myth, a tall tale, brought to life in people's imaginations. You can see me in this picture (peeping out on the left), holding on to Sunny on the front, with Sharon and Andy. 

It has been an incredibly special project to work on, with a brilliant team of creative people. I feel privileged to have played a part in the creation of a tall tale that we hope will return soon! The Parbold community is something very special and unique with so many talented creative people full of enthusiasm and ideas.

To see more pictures, see the Parbold Festival Facebook page.

Creative Writing at Parbold Library

I have had the loveliest time this week with a fantastic group of writers at Parbold Library.

Over the three sessions we have explored place and character. We have captured our own stories and memories in words and created new tall tales that feed directly into the narrative that I am putting together for the Parbold Street Festival in September.

The writers were brilliant - the sort of creative people who you give a tiny nudge with a starter idea and they are already writing before you even finish explaining. We talked a lot about the process of writing - how our ideas begin to form and the images or words that lead us into our creative practice. It is always interesting to hear how differently our creativity is sparked. Almost everything written in a workshop is, by its nature and due to the time restrictions, just the smallest seedling of a story; the initial burst of energy... although during the workshops, some pieces written did have a feeling of completion about them. I really hope that the ideas and paragraphs begun during the sessions will continue to grow and develop. They deserve to.

I will be weaving the words, ideas and images written during the workshops into the final narrative and some of the participants have agreed to take part in the performance in September, sharing their creative writing on stage. I'm delighted that their work will get the audience it deserves.

 It has been a privilege working with such a lovely group. I have learnt a great deal from them. It has been a joy to share in their creativity.

I spent an afternoon at one of Parbold Festival's visual art workshops this week. It was brilliant.

The lead artists on the project, Andy and Sharon Shaw are not only utterly lovely they are also brilliant and inspiring artists and teachers.

The last time I did anything properly artsy was probably my art GCSE (where I did a charcoal portrait of my friend with an unfortunate bit of shading on the upper lip...) So I was a bit concerned that my artistic contribution wouldn't be very good. But Andy and Sharon demonstrated some art techniques that all the participants, from the youngest child to the grandparents who brought them, could grasp and experiment with. We worked on some flags for the procession, large banners and posters.

It was also lovely to meet Naomi, a fantastic artist who is helping with the project. More on her reflections on art for the Parbold Festival and her own work here.

Here are examples of some of the artwork we produced during the session.

Work-in-progress. This is watercolour and wax on
cloth. Andy and Sharon demonstrated how to colour wash
and blend the paints to create different effects. 

Work-in-progress. The dragon creature. Each
scale was individually shaded during the workshop
by artist Naomi.

The next visual art workshops are Thursday 20th and Friday 21st August,  10am - 1pm, 2pm - 5pm at the WI in Parbold. We will be creating the dragon creature - a massive sculptural structure that will process through Parbold during the Festival. The session is open to 8 yrs and up and will be inspiring for both children and adults. I'll be there - I can't wait!

Creative Writing Workshops at Parbold Library

This week I am leading three creative writing workshops in Parbold Library. Everyone is welcome! And they're free to attend. We will be thinking about tall tales, myths and exploring stories around Parbold.

It will be fun, friendly and creatively inspiring. However you feel about creative writing - whether you're a seasoned writer or reluctant to put pen to paper - we are all storytellers and this workshop will give you the opportunity to explore your own creative ideas and tales. Dates and times for the workshops are:

Monday 10th August 7 - 9 pm
Tuesday 11th August 7 - 9 pm
Thursday 13th August 7 - 9 pm

The writing workshops will feed into the narrative for the Parbold Arts and Street Festival, which is on 4th, 5th and 6th September, when there will be a procession through the village telling Parbold's tall tale, with dancing and music. It's going to be fantastic. Do come along and get involved. For details of other creative workshops you might like to get involved in, see here for a full programme of events. If you have any questions, contact the Chapel Gallery on 01695 571328.


The Parbold Arts and Street Festival is funded by grants secured by Parbold Community Association and WLBC Arts Development.

Parbold Festival Workshops with Beacon Crossing Retirement Community

This week I'm facilitating creative writing workshops at Beacon Crossing retirement community in Parbold.

The stories and ideas that the participants have been sharing are inspiring, thought-provoking and intriguing. The participants are really open to all the activities and we've done a lot of laughing over the last two days. In one of today's activities we used buttons to spark story ideas. We selected buttons from my button box (every self-respecting human should own a button box, didn't you know?) Buttons are like acorns. With some reflection time and conversation, a tiny button can grow into a garment and then a character with a complete life and personality. We talked about who might wear the garment, where the garment came from, how they feel wearing it, where they might go in it... The characters the participants created were varied and wonderfully rounded. Two characters, a naval officer and a dress maker, even began communicating with each other as we fleshed out the start of an interaction between them.

It's an absolute joy to be working with this group. They just have the best time sharing ideas and stories and have so much to contribute to the project. I feel like I'm learning a great deal from them. We have our final session on Friday - we are writing a collaborative prose poem that explores what sparks our creativity and using clocks as a stimulus to writing memoir and storytelling. The tall tale that I am curating which narrates the Parbold Festival story, about the dragon that lives under the hill, begins with the ticking of a clock, as the villagers await the dragon's arrival. I am excited to find out what ideas, words and images the Beacon Crossing writers come up with that I can weave into the final performance piece.

Parbold Arts Festival Free Visual Arts Workshops

See below for the full programme of workshops available for the Festival through summer. The visual arts workshops with Sharon and Andy Shaw will be brilliant and a perfect family activity. Hope to see you there! For more information contact The Chapel Gallery, Ormskirk: 01695 571328