Young people share what it is like to be LGBT and growing up in Chesterfield in new film

Their contributions are part of a project to celebrate diversity, community, culture and place within the East Midlands.

Heading up the regional initiative entitled Our Place, the Chesterfield based charity Junction Arts commissioned movement and theatre director Chris Yarnell and writer Simon Marshall to work with the Derbyshire LGBT Youth Group during a creative residency.

Throughout the summer more than 50 participants have worked with 27 artists around the East Midlands to produce new work involving textiles, VR, filmmaking, dance, creative writing and music video production.

The results have been brought together in a feature-length film broadcast by director Chris Bevan which will be premiered online.

Paul Steele, managing director of Junction Arts, said: “The project is about connecting people and places. After a hard year of dealing with lock downs and

restricted activities, what better way to bring back local communities, by celebrating the people in them and sharing the unique cultures and talents with others.

“We know what it feels like to be ‘in this together’ and we’ve taken that feeling of connectedness and built it into a project where people from across three counties are uniting to share what it means to live in a place in this moment and time.”

Junction Arts were inspired by the first global TV satellite broadcast conceived in 1967, entitled Our World which ended with the Beatles performing All You Need is Love for the first time, during the height of the Vietnam War.

Their partners in the project are High Peak Community Arts, People Express (Swadlincote), Surtal Arts (Derby), Soft Touch (Leicester) and The Hub (Sleaford).

The celebratory web broadcast will be shown on September 9 at 6.30pm. Go to https://junctionarts.org/our-place-broadcast/

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