Video still from ‘Many’ by Sandwell College Students (Video 1 or 5)
Many Hands Make Light Work
Moving image work
Running time 16min 24 secs
2022
Commissioned by Arts Connect for British Arts Show 9 Schools Program with Hayward Gallery Touring.
In association with Arts Council England, The University of Wolverhampton. Wolverhampton Art Gallery
Many Hands Make Light Work is a collaborative project involving five schools across Wolverhampton and the Black Country. Each school and college co-created a multidisciplinary moving image work based on each word of the phrase “Many Hands Make Light Work”, students collectively developed their own unique story, alongside building the props and art works for each film. The film's five stories were inspired by West Midlands based histories of collectivity alongside contemporary issues such as food insecurity, care work and the Climate Crisis, in conjunction to the ideas and processes utilised by artists exhibiting in BAS9. Local musicians studying at Wolverhampton University were also commissioned to create unique music compositions for each moving-image work, utilising sound recordings created by each school.
Each moving image work seeks to present how one phrase or story can be interpreted and presented in a multtude of ways and perspectives, with collaboration and collectivity at the core of each work. The project aims to move away from the linear narrative of history and the ‘lone hero’s’ arc of storytelling in order to co-create stories rooted in the concept of polyphony. A practice used predominantly in music and literature, which aims to include a diversity of simultaneous points of view in storytelling, to create a cacophony of voices and perspectives.
‘Many’ by Sandwell College Students
‘Hands’ by Thorns Collegiate Academy Students
‘Make’ by Wolverhampton Grammar School Students
‘Light’ by Phoenix Collegiate Academy Students
‘Work’ by Dudley Sixth at Dudley College Students
Due to safeguarding student names are not included
Music Compositions by
Luke Bendall
Seb Jarvis
Teachers and Technicians:
Rupinder Sandhu
Leon Woodcock
Angela Sutton
Emma Bowater
Jason Piggott
Hannah Hannon–Worthington
Kevin Petford
Thea Brown
Jackie Mason
Diana Dziedzic
Gillian Worley
Arts Connect:
Rebecca Thompson
Support From:
Georgia E Adamson
