I thought I’d blog about how 2012 has gone for me. It’s sometimes confusing being a creative person, as the ‘personal’ and the ‘professional’ easily gets mixed up. My ideas, which are sometimes personal, become something I want to write about, then make work from. Anyway, this is a run down of what I achieved this year, and there have been a lot of ‘firsts’ for me. In January I ran a 7 week workshop at The Orpheus Centre, teaching filmmaking, and...

Having been inspired by the Paralympics paraphernalia of London 2012 as an audience participant in the Opening Ceremony and watching the Closing Ceremony on TV.  Subjected to relentless coverage of inspirational stories and super humans doing amazing things, we were all suffering from the Paralympics one way or another.  I certainly was inspired by the tremendous atmosphere of the Olympic village and the 'hype the public'  tactics to increase viewing figures. So when I was...

Now that euphoria of the Paralympics, and the more subdued excitement of Unlimited, have gone away, I'm looking back and trying to see it all for what it was. What was it? Did Channel 4 achieve the predicted paroxysmic shift in society's attitude to disability? Or was it ephemera on a grand scale,   a blip in which disability became temporarily interesting? Who knows? Winning is a transitory state. Disability is (usually) permanent. Medals, I’m guessing, can’t be...

What a wonderful summer it was! The Paralympics! Unlimited! Wasn’t it fantastic? For the first time in sporting history the Paralympics got its own Open and Closing Ceremonies, putting the Games on the same level playing field as the Olympics. The Paralympics Opening Ceremony had everything – a fly past, Stephen Hawking, the Big Bang, umbrellas, a giant blinking eye, Newton’s apple, Miranda from The Tempest, over 140 deaf and disabled artistes and volunteers. It was fab. And...

Can we dare to believe it ... According to a report in the Daily Mirror on-line, outraged athletes have lined up to slam PM David Cameron and his beleaguered Chancellor George Osborne in a storm that threatens to taint tonight’s ­ Paralympic closing ceremony. It claims that Team GB’s Paralympic athletes have launched a furious attack on the Government over ­savage plans to slash vital disability payments. Last week George Osborne was booed as he appeared in front of an...

The Company was neither part of Unlimited or Liberty, but! What a Great summer for SDC! Our international tours with Ana Desetnica and The Lent Festival in Slovenia, with Salvia  and The British Council in Estonia, plus tours to The USA and Austria's Kulturwerkstaat were great! We were selected for SHOWTIME - The London 2012 Festival which covered both the Olympics and Paralympics. We were also lucky to work with TOGETHER! Fest in Newham so we were very much in the picture we...