My journey with KUWG

This is challenging, enjoyable and interesting. Working with KUWG (Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group) has taken me on a journey that I shall continue for some time. As an embedded member of the group, I have negotiated a space for me as an artist. Limitations of original group ideas have been compounded by individuals need for anonyminity but interstingly, these limitations have added many different layers.

Beginning the journery with KUWG.

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The idea and empahsis was mainly on the interaction without having a script, but the group allowed me to capture these interactions. Some members are ok with their faces to be shown, some are not. We experimented with filming songs members have made, in the meeting room and outside of the leafleting points we attend weekly, such as Kilburn Job Centre and Lisson Grove Job Centre. But as the creative thinker here making the decisions, I feel that the unconscious actions work much better, whilst singing is a regular thinng of the group, and certainly music playing at leafleting sessions, I felt this distracted people from the real sense that the group do give the public and those that need support or whom they consult with.

Technically, my equipment, DSLR camera and my GoPro, doesnt have a microphone, and my technical ability with Premier Pro was limited.

Even so, from the beginning of the work, I started discovering interesting objects, interactions and reflections that could easily add interesting layers to the film or films.

Reflections on window panes, the tannoy speaker, banners, and other memorabilia that is associated with the members and the group.

Whilst filming, I am often taking stills too, I also screen shot stills from the films for the group. We share our photos and members forward me them to collate into a file and present onto YouTube or their Facebook group and Blog. Also at Christmas parties we share our talents, singing, poems, a reading, and I share the photos and a few minutes film footage from different locations of the group.

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Here is Alan the KUWG blogger, poet and all rounder, also someone that is often at the leafleting sessions.

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The leafleting sessions is an information exercise, to make sure local people know where we hold our meetings and signpost them for more help in the area.

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One of the group ideas was to repurpose the Inclusion Cards we use at the meetings so everyone gets an oppurtunity to talk. Especially helpful for the quieter members. These new Inclusion cards were made specifically for the vulnerable in the NW6 area and surroundings.

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