Wildhead is an exploration of new and old forms of storytelling - performance, writing, film making and sound recording. Our philosophy is to make storytelling more accessible - to provide new opportunities for all to create and share stories. We are particularly interested in finding new ways of 'unearthing' stories and telling them in unconventional and fresh ways; especially stories about people in the present and past who have had no voice or have not been heard. We are also interested in the 'gaps' between conventional approaches such as bringing traditional oral storytelling into the digital age or exploring the space between the theatre and film industries. Our projects are often about areas of life that the arts industry ignores such as normal day to day life or our relationship with the natural world or with our past.
Our approach
We begin by talking to people including those who wouldn't normally become involved in arts projects, for example historians or scientists or local communities. We also explore places; about how they are now and historically. Often from this, stories emerge. After this we ask how best to bring these stories to life; through the written word. performance, film or sound or some combination of these and then dive deeper to enable the stories to grow.
Projects and ideas
At present, we are working on a number of stories in different forms; a story called King of the Birds as a stage play accompanied by a children's story book, also a stage play/film about the relationship between the poet John Clare and superintendent William Knight at Northampton asylum. We are also working on a book about the lost lakes of the Fens - the stories of the people who worked and lived there.
News
Throughout 2022, we worked with the Word Garden on a project funded by the Heritage Lottery called The Adventurers - a new exploration of the archive - in which we transcribed and shared archives about the drainage of the Fens. Before this, we received an Arts Council grant for a project called Lost Voices, working with local and professional historians to tell lost stories from the past. We are now developing a new funding application to the Arts Council; centred on a stage play about the the poet John Clare and his relationship with health worker William Knight in Northampton asylum.