Over the hills and under the trees, Wyldwood associate artists Chez Dunford and Adam Blake got busy collecting stories from across the Forest. Through a series of community engagement workshops, ideas and tales were fed into a performance in 2018.

Part of Foresters Forest programme, the workshops began as part of Wye Valley River Festival. The first community engagement project was with Lydbrook School and The Combs, Orders of St John Care Trust, in Coleford. Over several weeks Chez and Adam worked with Years 3 + 4 exploring their curriculum theme 'Our Forest Rocks!'.

The sessions involved sharing stories with the residents from The Coombs and creating new stories which formed a new performance at the school. Excitingly the cast came back to create a beautiful and engaging scratch performance for a fundraising event for Lydbrook Primary school which saw the pupils take part in the show too (impromptu!).

Hazelhurst Nursing Home, Sydenham House Care Home and Blakeney Primary School were the next on the journey. They shared old stories and histories of musical careers, Welsh songs, poems, lots of laughter and found common language in tea! The next stop was a final session at the sculpture trail. These sessions were delivered as part of the Mindscape project with Artspace Cinderford.  

On the 7th July at Scarr Bandstand, Chez and Adam celebrated the wonderful stories, songs and experiences they gathered from their workshops with the local community. There was also a scratch performance of the work they've created in response to their time in the Forest. They were joined by Steph Kempson, Jean Bono and friends, for more music and storytelling throughout the afternoon. This event was part of the Coleford Festival of Words. 

Credits
Supported with funding from Heritage Lottery Fund, Forestry Commission and Arts Council England.