We will be working with the charity Community Links, within their Create Your Future programme. Community Links is a long established charity and community hub in Canning Town, East London, and their Create Your Future programme aims to develop opportunities and transferable skills for BAME (Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic) women who need assistance overcoming barriers and finding employment to empower them in achieving their life goals.

It is vital that representation in documentary film should extend to the individuals making it - we strongly believe that in teaching the participants of Community Links the fundamentals of filmmaking, we will not be only be providing an education but also the means for unique work to be produced which articulates a different perspective on society, while giving creative confidence to all those involved. Factual filmmaking provides opportunities for underrepresented people to share their own personal experiences through which wider truths about society can be exposed.

We will be leading a 6 week series of workshops, with the goal of developing technical understanding, confidence in expression and the ability to work collaboratively towards a united creative vision, along with other transferable skills needed to create any production from start to finish. There will be one workshop a week hosted by Community Links, each lasting 2-3 hours. Over the course of the workshops, we will address film theory and practice (with the help of some established filmmakers within the industry), before moving onto participants shooting their own footage with guidance from ourselves, before eventually moving into the editing room where they can finalise the work. At the end of the programme we will host a screening of the 4 films made at Community Links; the groups will be able to introduce their work, discuss what they’ve learnt and what they’re trying to express with their films. We hope the screening will raise awareness of the work the charity is doing, and crucially benefit the participants by providing an otherwise inaccessible platform for their creativity.

Beyond this, Foreign Body (ourselves) will commit to establishing an online platform where people will be able to view the work produced by this project, and if participants in our programme find that they have a passion for this kind of work, we will do our utmost to help provide opportunities and access to equipment going forward.