Liverpool Irish Festival is proud to announce that the Irish Government’s Emigrant Support Programme has confirmed support of our new project: Lockdown Lights from its Covid-19 emergency Response Fund. This involves you! We need your stories, 2D artworks and archive materials to help us build up a picture of our community.

The idea is to crowd-source submissions for our ‘Lockdown Lights’ project, which will categorise the stories under the following chapter headings:

1. City heroes – your stories
2. Irish impacts on the city – have you got images or tales of buildings, statues, places or times that affect the community that we can help people understand? Yes? Send them in!
3. Lockdown responses – has someone in your community helped on the frontline of lockdown and do you want to honour them? Have you got images or tales of heroism; community engagement stories; artistic responses? Get them over to us!
4. In memoriam – is there someone you would like to see remembered within and by the Liverpool Irish community? They could be from any time, but we will compile their images and stories in to an In Memoriam chapter where you can see them remembered
5. Stars of the Future – do you know a dancer, teacher, doctor, artist or musician who you would like to hedge your bets on now? Do you want to see them celebrated? Then tell us about them.

The Festival will sort your entries in to online chapters and provide credits for each of the works. We will use our networks (including CARA, Irish Community Care and the Liverpool Irish Centre) and social media channels to gather stories for Lockdown Lights. We hope to celebrate you, your families, the work you have done and the life we have created in Liverpool. We want to leave a legacy from lockdown that helps us to understand our Liverpool Irish family better, remember those we have lost and celebrate those we think are going to be the bright sparks of our future.

So, if you are feeling a bit low (or are stuck for something to do) in lockdown think of a loved one or a funny experience you had at the Irish Centre and send it to us. Perhaps you are undertaking your family tree in lockdown and have found something interesting? Let us know. We want to share!

Key areas of interest for the Festival include: incredible In:Visible Women, dual heritage lives, stories about exchange, creativepursuits and accomplishments.

Submissions can be made via post or email and can include (but are not limited to)

• photos or scans (by email only)
• post cards and/or 2D artworks (non-returnable unless you can collect) – physical or graphics based
• your poems and stories (handwritten or typed)
• children’s art work (non-returnable unless you can collect)
• MP3s and MP4s (MP4s preferably in landscape and good quality).

We encourage you to include something visual if you can – a passport photo or a signature; something to accompany a written piece. People love images and your story will gain more interest if people have an image to draw them in.

If emailing your submission please send it to [email protected] with the subject ‘Lockdown Lights‘ and if it is a large document, please use WeTransfer. If you are posting a submission, please send it: FAO Lockdown Lights. FF9 Northern Lights. 5 Mann Street, Liverpool L8 5AF.

Tips for filming MP4s/recording MP3s

• Run a quick test on your camera, DSLR or phone, computer to make sure your speech can be heard and/or the image is as clear as it can be. When filming, try not to sit directly in front of a light, which will either put you in silhouette or bleach you completely!
• Check you are filming in landscape and at the highest resolution your equipment allows
• Make sure your microphone is picking up your voice and not too much background noise. If you find you are getting a lot of hissing or white noise, you may need to go somewhere less noisy or with more ‘padding’. Cushioned surfaces can help with this
• Start by addressing the camera/microphone with your full name and current location
• Focus on the story your are telling and the emotions it generates for you. If it’s sad, that’s ok – be free to share a tear -or a laugh- with us. It makes all the difference. We’re here to listen to you
• Once recorded, please send your MP3 or MP4 to [email protected] via WeTransfer, with your name, age (in the case of minors), location and email, so we can credit you appropriately.

Deadline for submissions = extended Fri 28 Aug 2020 to Sun 13 Sept
Deadline for all work to be uploaded and shared: extended from Fri 4 Sept 2020 to Thurs 15 Oct 2020 at the Festival launch.

General terms and conditions

1. This is a community art project intended to provide a positive and creative activity during Covid-19 social restrictions. We are not trained counsellors or mental health service providers. We would ask -for your wellbeing and privacy- to limit stories to those you are comfortable sharing publicly, for yourself and those involved. Criminality will be reported. If you need to share a personal story that does not fit this criteria we recommend contacting CARA on +44 (0) 151 237 3987 to identify the most appropriate service for your needs. Those of you with arts projects relaying deeply personal, long-form stories should contact us with your proposal, as outlined in our creative call, here.
2. All submissions must come with a named credit to be selected. This is for safeguarding and due credit if work is selected for press purposes
3. The Liverpool Irish Festival will assume you have the right to use any imagery, likeness or art work sent to us. Please ensure you have these rights
4. We will only accept and display respectful work and the Liverpool Irish Festival has final say in determining what this means. Our intention is to limit work to that which can be reasonably shared with all ages, without causing upset or alarm or triggering safeguarding or decency concerns. Content which flouts decency regulations will be reported
5. The Liverpool Irish Festival reserves the right to use these entires online (web and social media); in our printed publications and our promotional materials. We will not sell your work or share your contact details without direct liaison (e.g., if a national publisher wanted an interview with you, we would contact you to permit contact).

Featured image: taken from the Liverpool Irish Festival‘s Its the travelling Life exhibition, 2018, made with the Liverpool Irish Traveller community. The image was taken by Margaret ‘of day-to-day life at home’.