Asylum Monologues

And here we are with Actors for refugees and their brilliant performance that will take place at the Ten Feet Away International Festival on Saturday at 8:00pm, We are really looking forward to it!!

Asylum Monologues is an account of the UK’s asylum system, told first hand by the people who have experienced it. With personal testimony at its core combined with public opinion, political statements and statistical fact, this production will disseminate what it really means to be displaced in the UK.

Critical Mass - Streetwise Opera

We are two one day away from the festival, St John’s church is becoming a different place and we’ve been working a lot for the last three day, on saturday evening Streetwise Opera will put together and exiting performance…
Review
Celebrating its fifth anniversary, Streetwise Opera performs an excerpt of Critical Mass, a collaboration with Almeida Opera [...]

Festival Program

Hello everyone, I must tell you all, we put lots of effort making sure that there would be plenty of activities, performances and opportunities for everyone. We really hope you come along to the festival and have a great time; it has been a year of work and preparations to make this happen and finally it’s SHOWTIME!!! I also want to say thanks to all the people who in one way or another contributed to make this possible. But there is one person I have to mention here and that is Julia Farrington for having that vision and believe this event was achievable.

Please click here and check out the festival program, if there is something missing please leave a comment, if it is urgent give me a call +44(0)7795430152.

Ashigara San (2002) Dir: Motoharu Iida

Director/Producer/Cinematography/Editor/: Motoharu Iida
Music: Kazutoki Umezu

Screening at TEN FEET AWAY INTERNATIONAL

Friday 3.00pm @ the screning room

“Ashigara-san” (Mr. Ashigara) is a homeless man who has been living on the streets for more than 20 years. He eats food that he finds in garbage bags. He does not talk much, and he does not associate with others. One day the director saw him smiling and decided that he would like to get to know Ashigara-san better. That is when he started filming him. He has listened to Ashigara-san’s words and become very close to him in the very situation that has changed time and time again. During the 3 years of filming, a unique sense of trust has developed between them, which led to unexpected changes in Ashigara-san’s life. Watching Ashigara-san as he begins a new life gives us hope and makes us smile. This film quietly asks us many questions, such as, “What is life?”, “What is hope?”, and “What is the connection between people?”

Director’s profile: Motoharu Iida was born in 1973. From 1996, he started helping homeless people as a volunteer in Shinjuku, Tokyo. Currently he makes images and films as a freelancer. This is the first work he made in the long piece documentary movie as independent production.

E-mail: motoharu@mse.biglobe.ne.jp
“Ashigara-san” website: http://www5f.biglobe.ne.jp/~ashigara/

WHY HAVE A MASSAGE?

Holistic massage stimulates the body’s innate ability to heal itself, promotes physical, mental and emotional well-being and a sense of harmony within the self.
It will treat many of our modern-day ailment such as stress, lack of energy, lack of concentration, sleeplessness,fatigue, PMT, headache, backache, cellulite, eye strain, stiff neck and shoulders, various skin problems and [...]

Streetradio from Straatnieuws

Straatnieuws (Dutch homeless streetpaper) vendor Martijn borrowed an Ipod and a 5 dollar microphone and went on the street asking innocent bypassers what they think of the local media. Journalist Femke Rongen assisted and our megamedia experts Robert van Dijk en Paul Wolterink added some licks and groovy tunes to make it Hollands first radiopodcast [...]

About Amsterdam Alan…

Alan is a born speaker and an accomplished bard. His dark-brown voice sells the Stratford-on-Avon poets opulent sentences, like a shrewd farmer his best cabbages.

“For God’s sake let us sit upon
the ground
And tell sad stories of the death
of kings”

Everybody is listening, captured by Alans piercing yet smiling eyes and applauds enthousiasticly when the last words have sounded and the silence has set in.
Alan and his dog having a drink

Alan continues: “Well, they wanted us to know a lot of Shakespeare, but also Marlowe of course, his contemperary. And the romantics, Hopkins….” He peeks at his vehemently nodding tablecompanion.: “You are farmiliair with Gerard Manley Hopkins?” The other guy nods a little sheepishly: “Well, that is to say….” But Alan is already lost in thought and stairs at the glowing point of his fag.
Then he starts again:

“My aspens dear, whose airy
cages quelled
Quelled or quenched in leaves
the leaping sun
All felled, felled, are all felled”

Without a hesitation Hopkins …. verses roll across the table. The rythme of the sentences is more important with this nineteenth century poet than with any other poet, but Alan knows it perfectly. When the poem is over he looks at the group with siny eyes and a big grin. The “hear, hear” can be heard from everywhere.
“Off course”, says Alan, “I also write poetry myself. But I have no sense of rythme. So no rhymes for me. I write parlando poetry.”

“You know, when I try to sell Z, the streetpaper, I don’t start with a “wussy” good morning, or some small-talk about the weather. No, I come up with some lyrical masterpiece, something they remember, for the next time they see me.” Alan winks, stretches and remarks that the great Shakepeare also sold his poetry, simply because he had to eat.
Well, bard, thank you. And darn…. you’re right!

Z magazine, 10-23 Feb 2006

Alan will be performing and exhibiting drawings at the Festival in London.
Portrait and video by Gerrit S.

Flowers Don’t Grow Here (2005)

Director: Shira Pinson

Producer: Sarah Tierney

Editor: Nigel Galt

Original Composition: James Burrell

Production Company: Clarity Productions Ltd.

Think you know Europe? Think again… Much of Eastern Europe has been devastated by the rapid transition from communism to capitalism. Fifteen years since independence from the former USSR, the Ukraine – Europe’s second largest country – is struggling to regain economic and social stability. One little-known consequence is the estimated 1,000,000 children currently living homeless on Ukraine’s streets…

“Flowers Don’t Grow Here”, told through the eyes of a gang of Kiev’s street kids, offers an intimate and uncompromising portrayal of young people paying the ultimate price for political reform. Young mothers, united siblings, close friends and sworn enemies form a troubling underworld of society, governed by their own rules, and haunted by prostitution, crime, violence and murder… modern, developed “New Europe” are about to be shattered…

The Ukraine, the second largest country in Europe, has been striving for economic and social stability since its independence from the USSR in 1991. The rapid transition from communism to capitalism has left 60% of the population living below the poverty line, facing unemployment and severe poverty. The resulting state of economic fragility and fatigue has produced widespread alcohol abuse, crime and, in many cases, the disintegration of families. One of the most startling and troubling consequences is the disproportionately high level of child homelessness. Current estimates are show that there are currently 1,000,000 children living on the streets in Ukraine alone…

“Flowers Don’t Grow Here” was filmed undercover over four months in Autumn 2004 and tells the story of an eclectic gang of street kids in Kiev, the capital city of Ukraine. Criminals because oftheir social status, these children receive no medical care, shelter or education. Substance abuse, prostitution, crime and violence are commonplace. And yet, within this underworld of society, is a community who defy all stereotypes. As young parents, united siblings and close friends, they form a strong and structured community.

Gnawing Solitude

Loneliness is eating from inside
Even the world around is opaque, airtight, freezedried
Those mouth corners sagging dryly
Desire swallowing lifeforms whole
A look away, a look down, look through
Blank, Absent
Robots with nerve endings,
Puppets under a spell
Drama Queens and Kings.
Ah! Walking among hundreds,
Maybe thousands
Yet no one is here,
Earthquake Isolation has hit again,
Emptiness is reigning
Madness crawling nearer
I crumble like snail [...]

The Elastic Band

Join us for the Launch of the Ten Feet Away ~International Festival, the event will be launch with the Elastic Band.

The Elastic Band is a blend of musicians of all styles of music however we mostly play Irish folk music. The band has been playing for nearly 15 years on and off with musicians coming and going. The name “Elastic Band” comes from Mitch Mitchell who plays many instruments but mostly plays fiddle also we have other talented musicians who we can call’ and if they are free, they are welcome to play with the Elastic band. The whole idea been to allow musicians the freedom to come and do their own thing. We are all one big happy family with a bit of insanity thrown in’ and the odd tantrum.

The Band on the day is a surprise with special guests!!