Fierce Talent Campaign

two young girls dancing together in an open, green field. Both are in dresses.

This was Jumped Up’s second creative campaign for Peterborough. #1000Moments celebrated local people’s favourite memories of the city. Fierce Talent was a response to city leader conversations which observed how creativity was proving so important during the pandemic, especially for young people. We wanted to tell this story, and build on it. To encourage and inspire more young people to be creative, and to challenge city leaders to support them.

We knew that this campaign would also have to be co-created with young people - who better to know what would be important to young creatives? Our Moving Roots co-created show, Rent Party had been stalled by the pandemic so Fierce Talent would be an extra project with our Sounding Board, which would now be all young people, whom we recruited through our connections with local schools, colleges and arts organisations.

Fierce Talent Film

Our Sounding Board of seven young people, aged 16 - 18, from across the city, shaped the Fierce Talent campaign. They chose and briefed the spoken word artist, Charley Genever, and the film-makers, Reckless Abandon Media, for the Fierce Talent Film.

It was important to the Sounding Board that the film showed that creativity involves hard graft, bravery and failure, as well as fulfilment and success. They wanted to give a platform to a wide range of local young creatives who were successful in their own way - whether because they had 1000’s of followers on social media, or if they supported others to be creative, or if creativity helped them overcome personal difficulties.

The Jumped Up team reached out to youth arts organisations across the city, asking for nominations for young creatives to be in the film. There was also a social media campaign, reaching out to people who work independently or sit outside recognised systems. This campaign also involved profiles in local media about local youth arts leaders, an essential part of young creative’s success. (See below to explore the Fierce Talent Galleries.)

Meanwhile, Charley Genever was running interviews and online creative writing workshops, exploring what young people thought of creativity and their city. The result was a long-form spoken-word piece, which formed the narrative of the film.

Other major decisions by the Sounding Board included having young people say the words of the poem on film (sorry Charley!) and setting it in spaces that were important to them. The latter proved a challenge in Spring 2021; when filming in shopping centres, for instance, wasn’t possible. But we could respond to many young respondents’ love of open and green space by using Nene Park, And thank you also to The Key Theatre and Metal for letting us film in your buildings.

We also want to thank all the young people who took part in the filming, they spent hours repeating their sections so we had a great variety of shots, but they all said they really enjoyed the experience. In fact, one brought their little sister who, after seeing a band leap about in dry ice and after munching her way through bags of crisps, said it was “the best day of my life.”

And special mention must go to Chloe Lorentzen whose music fits so well with the words and emotions of the poem. Thank you all.

four young men holding filmmaking equipment
young man doing street art
filmmaker and a young woman playing the violin

So What Next?

GET INVOLVED: Let’s get Peterborough to celebrate #FierceTalentFilm

A brunette girl sits at a microphone holding an acoustic guitar. She is wearing all black.

Please share the film, and the key messages which the Sounding Board want to convey:

  • There is space for everyone in our creative community.

  • There are opportunities out there, for everyone, be brave and get involved.

  • Young people need support to succeed - or as Matas, one of the Sounding Board has said “Encourage, encourage, encourage.”

And post about your love of creativity on social media using the hashtag #FierceTalent, we want to show off all of the amazing talent our city has to offer! Or tag a creative that you admire in Peterborough and that inspires young people.

Disrupt Festival 2021 poster

The Disrupt Festival

On the Friday 9 July, Jumped Up Theatre and the Sounding Board took part in the Disrupt Festival. The Disrupt Festival was managed by Central School of Speech & Drama at London’s Barbican Centre, and Fierce Talent was one of the featured projects.

At 1-2pm we streamed a discussion about how the Fierce Talent film was made, and what we hoped it would achieve.

[Image: battersea arts centre text logo. each letter is white and each letter is inside a black box spelling out battersea arts centre.]
 

Moving Roots Touring Network

Jumped Up is one of five partners in Battersea Arts Centre’s Moving Roots Touring Network. Over the next three years, we will be working again with Battersea Arts Centre, and partners in Wigan, and East Cardiff to commission and tour three co-created projects. These projects will be made by, for, and with local people and communities.

Fierce Talent and Rent Party was the first year of our part in the Moving Roots Touring Network. The following year’s project was Epic Fail with Kid Carpet.

With thanks to our Fierce Talent partners and funders: