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Community Banter | by Nasra

I, alongside other students from Westminster Academy and other schools, joined staff from Grand Junction and professional print-maker Sarah Pimenta, from Social Fabric, for a radical rethinking of what a community project can be.

This opportunity allowed me to contribute to a unique artwork reflecting feelings from the local community; alongside gaining valuable experience as researchers, promoters, designers, curators, artists, vloggers, artists, project coordinators, and budget managers. We decided to do this through collating stories of people in our community regarding their experiences during the pandemic and expressing their key thoughts and feelings in the form of a symbol.

Prior to interviewing people in our local community, we underwent an interview taking workshop where I learnt how to conduct an interview which would enable me to extract the most amount of useful information from a person. Through this experience, I have been able to improve on my communication skills, and in particular, my interview skills alongside my growth in self-confidence in speaking to people who I hadn’t had the pleasure to speak to before.

Another way in which we contributed to creating artwork for the project was through creating a collage full of pictures, symbols, images and words to express our own personal emotions and experiences of the lockdown.

I am excited to see the completed artwork and I am ecstatic to be part of this wonderful journey and opportunity that has enabled me to work with like-minded individuals in such a creative project! I would highly recommend students to get involved in projects such as this due to the positive impact that they would have on both their local community and themselves.