Our volunteer Anna Cheung spent a day at the A View from Here workshops: This blog is about what she saw, heard and felt in her high rise experience
Blog by Anna Cheung, volunteer blogger
As the proverb goes, ‘Home is where the heart is’.
But what if you were told that your home was under threat of demolishment?
That the fabric of the community into which you have been knitted over the years was to be torn apart; that the very memories which echo from the stone and mortar of the building were to be dismantled, brick by brick, due to the changing housing landscape in Glasgow?
This is where Scottish Refugee Council’s arts and heritage project, A View from Here, sets off; to gather the gems of social history from the high rise blocks in Gorbals and Knightswood before they collapse into dust.
As a volunteer, visiting the project for a day in mid-October was an opportunity for me to adjust my panoramic lens to take a closer look at the thriving activities of A View from Here within the Knightswood community.
Morning workshop
Upon arrival at St David’s Parish Church in Knightswood, where the creative workshops are held, I was introduced to a group of friendly faces which consisted of visual artist, Jan Nimmo, theatre director Carrie Newman, photographer Iman Tajik and film-maker Basharat Khan along with various members of the community.
The group brainstormed ideas for the script performance which included stage directions, costumes, screen projections, artwork, photography and sound. The main structure of the script is revolving on residents’ stories of living at the high-rise blocks in Lincoln Avenue, Knightswood, and Kingsway Court, Scotstoun; from local Scots expressing the importance of a community, to a refugee’s integration journey, to the dawn raids experienced not only by asylum seekers but by the community as a whole.
When discussions on the script were completed, Jan facilitated the arts and crafts workshop, were participants contributed pieces of personal artwork for exhibition.
Afternoon documentary
In the afternoon, I had the privilege of following Bash’s film crew up to the Kingsway Court flats to interview one of the refugee residents for the documentary for the project. We were further accompanied by another resident; Noreen Real (awarded Scotswoman of the Year for her anti-dawn raid activism along with her neighbour Jean Donnachie).
The experience provided me with a rare ‘behind-the-scenes’ insight into the everyday existence of asylum seekers and refugees at Kingsway Court and the tireless pledge of their neighbours to help them fight for their basic human rights. The interviewee’s narrative provided an emotional landscape for the documentary, ranging from the dark end of the spectrum to the powerful, brighter side – from fear, isolation and trauma to optimism, compassion and life-long friendship.
My perspective
So what was my perspective of a View from Here after my day’s shadowing with the project?
I witnessed a bunch of extremely passionate people with a strong sense of community – a community sealed with a bond stronger than the bricks and mortar of Kingsway Court.
Even if the high-rise blocks are under threat of demolishment in the imminent future, the bond will be preserved in the archives of social heritage forever thanks to A View from Here.
