FOR TISH
Stroud Film Festival, 9th March 2023
Stroud Valleys Artspace, 4 John Street
Film screening and discussion 3.30pm, flash residency-in-response 5:30pm.
Tish (2023, d. Paul Sng, 90 minutes) is a tender portrait of Tish Murtha (1956–2013), a woman photographer from South Shields, whose work has been marginalised by dominant histories. Challenging the socio-economic inequalities of 1970s-80s Thatcher’s Britain, Tish’s political and intimate images chronicled the precarious and beautiful lives of the working class Tyneside communities she knew. In this documentary, the artist’s daughter, Ella Murtha, shines a light on the importance of Tish’s photographs, archive, and legacy; questions why Tish’s work has not received the critical attention it deserves.
For this two-part event, Tish will be screened in the bar followed by a discussion with the curators, a local collective of visual practitioners (Hatty Frances Bell, Alice Butler, Anna Gormley, and Kelly O’Brien) working with expanded photography, film, and writing.
Afterwards, the collective invites you to join them in the gallery, where a collection of works (and works-in-progress) made in response to the film and Tish’s life and practice will be shown. For this flash residency, Bell, Butler, Gormley, and O’Brien will activate the space with images, writings, interventions, and conversations.
THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID
Stroud Film Festival, March 2022
Stroud Valleys Artspace, 4 John Street
An evening of short films completed in the previous two years by female directors working across the South West. Curated with the intention of celebrating female talent, this collection of shorts offered fresh perspectives and unique, creative visions articulated amid the unparalleled times. From cosmic voyages to genre bending documentary interrogating our reality, our hidden worlds and identity.
LOCAL/GLOBAL COMMUNITIES OF CARE
Films, Words, and Conversations
Stroud Film Festival, SVA, March 2023
Co-produced with writer Alice Butler, Local/Global Communities of Care was an evening of short films by women and gender-variant filmmakers, both local and global, which explore anti-capitalist practices of care, repair, and solidarity across human and non-human worlds. Reflecting on the connections formed in making across spaces, disciplines, and communities, with a close focus on the surrounding area, the event also featured live readings and conversations with writers and filmmakers.