Stomping Ground was formed amongst the sea spray, peatbogs and remote wilderness of the Shetland Islands. Between 2013-14 we partnered with Shetland Arts and multiple schools to deliver a range of creative projects for young people and communities.
Below are the highlights of this wild adventure:
Beginners
Beginners was an ongoing term time drama project for 7-12 year olds in Shetland, run by Stomping Ground in partnership with Shetland Arts. It ran from September 2013-December 2014. Our weekly workshops explored a range of theatre making skills, development of confidence and essential skills, and of course having lots of fun! Our focus was always on enjoyment and imaginative play, and the term culminated in a performance for friends and family.
After Sian (our Creative Director) moved back to England, Beginners classes ended in December 2014. Shetland Arts have continued our model, and now run drama classes for the same age group on Saturday mornings at Mareel.
Make a Scene
For two years in a row, Stomping Ground and Shetland Arts ran a summer project of theatre making, game playing, character creating and storytelling.
Testimonials from the project:
“The children had a great week – everybody did, judging by the performance on Friday, which was brilliant. No suggestions for improvement, except more of the same.”
“Absolutely excellent week at the Garrison, and the show on Friday was witty and entertaining. I hope that there are more workshops in the near future.”
“The children had a wonderful time and were so excited… It was great for them to feel included as we are just visiting Shetland. One of them has based her holiday homework (the best event of the summer) on her week at the drama.”
Earth Hour
Watch the film of our Earth Hour event here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGxQg-26edc
On 29th March 2014 we created a pop up, promenade performance for Earth Hour. The event featured our Beginners drama group, Aestaewast community drumming group and Shetland musicians Sheila Henderson, Donald Anderson and Alan McKay.
At 8.15pm we took over Mareel, with singing, dancing and torchlight!
Earth Hour is an annual global initiative and is the largest of its kind as a mass participatory event. 152 counties turn as many lights off as possible for one hour, to highlight issues surrounding climate change.
http://www.earthhour.org/index.php
http://earthhour.wwf.org.uk/
Writing the North
We collaborated with Shetland Museum and Archives to create four brand new short films for Writing the North, a project which explores writers from past and present who have connections with Shetland and Orkney.
We worked with four schools to reflect upon writers from Shetland’s past, specifically Hugh MacDiarmid, Robert Alan Jamieson, Sir Walter Scott and John J Graham. We discovered their world through their writing and through exploring how life would have been for them in Shetland. We visited relevant locations, spoke to local communities and re-enacted parts of the writers’ works.
Using this information as well as drawing from our own creative instincts, we created four short films in response to our writers’ work, lives and the world in which they lived. Our films were shown as part of the Writing the North exhibition at Shetland Museum and Archives.
Schools
We worked with a range of schools on both mainland Shetland and outlying islands. Projects included residencies, after school clubs and workshops to support the curriculum. Each project included performances shared with fellow students, teachers, friends and family.
