A Thank You Letter to Leeds

Dear Leeds

Thanks for having us - you’ve been very inspiring and very brilliant. We know this isn’t the end but we just wanted to take a moment to express some gratitude for the journey we’ve been on over the last year with our second cohort of UpFront Survivors (UFS) emerging creative leaders culminating in our Pop-Up event at the end of March at the gorgeous artist-led space East Street Arts. What a journey!

"We're just delighted to be here - it's the stuff that the dreams you never knew you wanted to have were made of." 
(Kate McStraw, Executive Producer Viv Gordon Company)

We chose Leeds as the location for year 2 of UFS after an invitation by our project partners Visible Leeds, who came to the project launch event in Bristol and experienced the power of peer-led creative community first hand. 

“Not only do we need services to meet survivors where they are … we need to make space for the community to come together and learn from one another, support one another and empower one another and that is the future - and I’m glad the future’s here in Leeds tonight!" 
(Richard Barber, Visible Leeds)

#SpeakUp mural, co-created by graffiti artist Harriet Wood and Getaway Girls

Visible do incredible work to make system change in health and social care services across Leeds (and beyond) putting CSA survivor voices and leadership at the centre of the conversation - check them out.

Leeds is a city with a long history of activism and changemaking - particularly around sexual violence and child sexual abuse - from the first women’s refuge outside London and the first Reclaim The Night protest onwards. It's a special feeling to be a tiny chapter in that story.

Over the last year we’ve been working with 9 emerging CSA survivor creative leaders who have taken part in our UFS Creative Leaders Training - an intense journey with over 56 hours of training where we share as much as we can about holding safe(r), accessible, strengths-based creative spaces for CSA survivors. We also reflect on the experience of CSA survivor leadership - thinking about our own personal skills, choices and access needs, the systems, internalised beliefs and fear we break through to do this work and how to make it all sustainable and not burn bright then burn out.

The course culminates in all the trainees delivering their first creative workshop for CSA survivors and allies into the Pop-Up space - everything from Creative Dance to Playback Theatre to Mini Gel Plate Printing to Badge Making. It’s so beautiful to watch people step into leadership - to be alongside them as their confidence grows, to witness an expanding sense of possibility and most importantly to watch community forming. They say it better than we do - here’s a co-written poem they surprised us with at the launch.

Also at the launch event were speeches from UFS partners Visible Leeds and SARSAS, a Northern Soul DJ, poetry from Clare Shaw and Richard Green and a Wuthering Heights flashmob, part of Clare’s campaign to save Haworth Moor from development. The Open Mic night was hosted by our Leeds born and bred friend, poet and theatre maker Jemima Foxtrot. 14 performers presented a varied programme from spoken word poetry, stand-up and song to contemporary dance - many taking to the stage for the very first time. Award-winning comedy genius Harriet Dyer returned to preview her brand-new work in progress show, SKIN, all accompanied beautifully by our exhibition An ABC of CSA. Illustrator Imogen Harvey-Lewis was with us every day, live drawing in the space. The event ended with a relaxed Sunday Social with tea, cake and more badge-making (we’re obsessed), découpage and zebra nail painting.

Wuthering Heights flashmob

Illustration by Imogen Harvey-Lewis

Illustrated Badge Making with Cat

Since we started UFS in 2022, we have trained 23 creative leaders, facilitated 6 National Creative Social Change Network meetings online and held 3 in person Pop-Up cultural spaces Exeter, Bristol and Leeds. There is a richness to our community coming together, spreading out into these spaces that feels very special. It’s all fuelled by tea and biscuits and a healthy dose of rebellion. 

So - thank you Leeds. Let’s end with a rousing chorus from Leeds’ most famous anarchist punk band, Chumbawamba - after three, everyone 1,2,3…

“I get knocked down, but I get up again
You’re never gonna keep me down”

Love, gratitude and solidarity
Viv, Kate and the UFS team xx

UpFront Survivors is our three-year, Home Office funded programme of creative changemaking, developed and delivered in partnership with SARSAS, The Green House and Coventry University.