By Tara Sachdeva and Nia Evans
Formed back in 2007, Compass Presents is run by Tara, Charlie, Donna and Nia; all passionate about the power of art and public performance to transform people’s perspectives and connect them to each other, frustrated by the fact that, too often, these experiences are not accessible to everybody.
The company creates expanded cinema experiences, bringing together multiple artforms to bring archive cinema to new audiences. It also creates interactive, theatrical experiences in cities and heritage sites, as well as installations and stages for festivals. Over the years, it became clear that in order to create powerful, high quality artistic experiences that speak to a range of diverse audiences, people from different backgrounds need to be involved in the work from the very start. This became key to our process. Our expanded film events often connect audiences to each other through immersive, unusual, and playful invitations. At our events, it doesn’t just matter what people see or hear, but who is in the audience, and who has framed the way they interact with the art.
In all our work, we prioritise relationships; supporting people from different communities to input as much as possible into our process, and from this we find that high quality work naturally follows. Tara, Compass co-director, has over 15 years’ experience in community development, which has informed our personal, down to earth, trauma informed, and accessible approach. Nia, creative producer at Compass, also works at Play:Disrupt, which specialises in using playful methods such as model making, theatre, and games, to engage the public in decision making and co-design. Together, they bring a sense of playfulness, creativity, and willingness to adapt to new ways of working depending on the groups we engage with.
The best way to share how we work is through examples, so below are a few case studies of our work with communities, and how we are embedding this work as a core part of our organisation.
Image from Compass Presents’ Around the World in BS5, credit: Jana Rumley
In 2023, we received funding from Bristol City Council to run a series of events to increase footfall to businesses along Stapleton Road. We hit the ground running (well, walking) and walked up the length of the road, speaking to over 80 different businesses about their history, their stories from the business, and what they would like to be reflected in the events. We went back again and again to speak to business owners, staff, and their regulars, gathering recommendations for artists to work with along the way. We then worked with local artists and a director to weave together everyone’s stories of the street, to create an experience that immerses audiences in the histories, cultures, and personalities of Stapleton Road.
From these conversations, we formed ‘Around The World in BS5’; a promenade performance experience exploring the cuisines, cultures and stories of communities from across the world. Small groups of participants were led on a tour along the street, starting with Nadine’s Caribbean cafe, which hosted a local poet, Muneera Pilgrim, who performed a poem about the street where she grew up. Audiences visited over 12 different businesses for food, music, and dance, before ending with a party at African Palace, with DJ Gbemi on the decks and Jackie providing delicious Nigerian puff puff. We had originally envisioned an entirely different type of event, but by starting with conversations and curiosity, we found a new format that meant every business owner and performer could be involved in the way that felt right for them.
Image from Compass Presents’ Cycle Cinema event, credit: Jana Rumley
That same year, as part of Bristol’s Summer of Film takeover, we formed a group of community curators to collaborate on an outdoor screening in front of City Hall. We began by creating clear, accessible flyers and images to recruit people from Bristol who felt underrepresented in the city centre’s cultural events. These reached people through our community networks, including Babbasa, Knowle West Media Centre, BoomSatsuma, Off the Record, and Filwood community centre, and dropped in to youth club sessions and community events to speak to people directly about the opportunity. Tara and Nia then ran a series of workshops that introduced the team of community curators to each other, to Compass’ work, and to the role of curator. Together the group discussed their ideas and chose four titles to screen as part of the Cycle Cinema weekend.
Once again, what we envisioned might be the outcome at the beginning was turned on its head when working with the group, highlighting how important their perspectives were in changing the shape of the event. While Compass would usually tend more towards screening established cult titles, many of the community curators favoured lesser known independent titles, for example ‘Rocks’ and ‘Whale Rider’ that spoke more to their own experiences and interests. Climate change and the natural world became an important strand within the programming, and we were surprised and delighted by the way the group encouraged our work to become more bold and ambitious. This knowledge exchange is a key part of our work with communities; while we share our knowledge of curation and event production, local people share with us their expertise gained from lived experience, and their understanding of local audiences.
This grassroots, adaptable, and personalised approach to working with different communities has proved invaluable for creating artistic experiences that connect with people. We have also adopted this approach when working on projects across the UK, partnering with community organisations in 5 different locations for ‘Dockyards, Demos, and New Directions’, where we worked with local people in each area to select archive footage showing key moments of social change in their cities’ past, and created an audio tour featuring their own personal memories of the city’s history.
Compass Presents’ 16mm film workshop, credit: Jana Rumley
These are all projects that we are very proud of, but what’s coming up next? We are really excited to announce that we are expanding our work with communities in Bristol and across the UK, as we launch a new focus group model to inform how we work. We have recently been awarded a grant from Bristol City Council’s Imagination fund to set up a focus group, whose members will represent audiences currently underserved by the city’s cultural activity. The focus group will provide members with an opportunity to enter the creative industry, to receive paid training in topics such as sustainability and curation, and to co-create events in the city that reflect their own experiences and interests.
We are forming this focus group to receive guidance from those who don’t feel included in Bristol’s mainstream cultural provision, and to form events together that better speak to them. They will get the chance to collaborate on all of our upcoming projects, including our SPIN labs commission, to create a public facing experience that explores themes of secrecy, power, and ignorance. As part of this work, we are also formalising our existing paid internship schemes, aiming to provide more ways into the creative industry for those who face barriers, including people from underrepresented groups who lack industry experience.
Once we have our Bristol focus group up and running, we are then aiming to expand this model to include four other locations across the UK, giving local people paid opportunities to shape expanded cinema experiences, and make them relevant to audiences where they live.
We are really looking forward to developing and formalising our work with communities, and to see what surprises and opportunities come from working with our focus groups.
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