Our Future Our Past, Whisper It To Me
Independent Film
Our Future Our Past, Whisper It To Me, 2024, 60min, Commissioned by Cement Fields as part of This Must be the Place public art programme.
Synopsis:
A lyrical essay; Our future Our Past, Whisper It To Me, features residents of North Kent who deliver spoken word poetry to camera expressing their sense of belonging, home, and their vision for the future of the area as it undergoes a period of rapid regeneration.
Written by the participants, their powerful performances are captured against the shifting rural and industrial landscapes, swaths of new build housing, and epic views out across the Thames. Through intergenerational conversations, the film examines the concerns facing post Brexit, post pandemic society. Often marginalised voices are given creative agency to express their thoughts as old meets new, and imaginations are encouraged to run free.
The film consists of six 10min chapters each featuring an older and younger participant and can be screened as a single channel 60min film, or individual chapters can be screened separately.
Screened at:
London Short Film Festival, 2025,
Swedenborg Film Festival, 2025
Braziers International Film Festival, 2024
Women Over Fifty Film Festival, 2025
BLOC Queen Mary's, London,
TACO! Gallery, London, 2024
Hackney Art week., London, 2024
Installed at: Gravesend Library, Ebbsfleet International Station and community venues throughout North Kent.
Commission details: The film was commissioned by Cement Fields as part of, This Must Be the Place, public art programme which explored the opportunities and challenges presented by the new housing development at Ebbsfleet Garden City, and how these challenges can be re-examined and countered through youth and art-led creative placemaking. The programme aimed to develop new methodologies for research and placemaking with young people at its heart, informing national learning and creative models.
https://cementfields.org/projects/this-must-be-the-place/
Credits:
Director: Charlotte Ginsborg
Producer: Michaela Freeman
DOP: Charlotte Ginsborg, Gabi Norland, Jason Ellis
Editor: Charlotte Ginsborg
Composer: Jane Watkins
Sound Design: Ned Sisson
Colourist: Sebastian Buerkner
Writer / poetry consultant: Zena Edwards
Drama workshop facilitator: Sophie Austin
Participants: Naomi Ajie , Aleyna Ali, Jay Andrews, Margaret Bobby, Lorna Cross, Kenny Davis, Jonny Flood, John Hall, Lesley Howes, Ivie Ljewere, Derek Parris, Tony Rayfield
