What does culture mean to you? In the second half of last year, we held zoom sessions with lots of different people who live and work in Keighley to find out just that. These conversations were part of Bradford Council’s 10-year ‘Culture is Our Plan’ project. The aim of which is to re-imagine the whole of Bradford district as a cultural space – our homes, our mills, hills, streets, markets, moors and parks. To recognise that our cultural life is everywhere and in everyone and is vital to our wellbeing, education and sense of pride in where we live.
Our community zoom sessions focused on the hopes of the people of Keighley with the aim of us being able to meet some of these needs over the coming years. One of our studio holders, Naseem Darbey, then translated these conversations into vibrant illustrations. Naseem says: “Zoom is odd to me- we are all together yet so far apart. The sessions often started quiet, but then burst into colour and strong, urgent ideas- I have tried to capture this experience.”
One of the major themes of all our discussions was how the word ‘Culture’ means different things to different people. But what really shone through was how much people want to celebrate this diversity and GET INVOLVED! We’ll be sharing a lot more of these conversations in the coming weeks. And we’d especially like to keep them going – so come on, what does Culture mean to you?
