There will be a meeting for all members on the 15 March starting at 5:15pm.
We will be presenting the current situation of the media group and discussing the future.
The Bridge will not be closed April 1-14 as previously stated. The renovation work has been postponed.
Further details will be published as they come to hand.
We have added a new section under Exhibitions for Submission Calls
If you have work you’d like to exhibit check out the links.
If you want to have your Exhibition listed Please contact us on dmg@mediaworkshop.org.uk
We have been able to pick up a good deal on some used Mac Computers.
We have installed Pixelmator which is a cheap alternative to Photoshop.
Also we do have the equipment for film processing available for hire.
So there is an option to do traditional photography with digital darkroom process.
From Paddie's Market by Dave Thomas
It is with great regret that DMG must report the sudden and unexpected death of Dave Thomas on 24th August.
Those of you who had the good fortune to know this good humoured, talented and generous photographer and teacher will want to know the funeral is on Friday 7th September at 11.45 at Darlington Crematorium, West Cemetary, Carmel Road.
See you there.
| A celebration of the Media Group’s time in the Media Workshop.
We will be shortly relocating to The Bridge (Corner of Hundens Lane and Yarm Road) and we thought it only fitting to have a farewell do for the Workshop that has been our home for the last 30 years. There will be food, drink, slideshows and maybe a film or 2. |
29 June 2012 – 1745-2000
Today Darlington Borough Council announced it’s intention to close Darlington Arts Centre, the home of Darlington Media Group for 30 years. The buildings are to be sold to a developer, who is likely to want to demolish them and exploit the high value West End residential land. However, as part of the West End Conservation Area, this may prove difficult. The Arts Centre will continue in operation until July 2012, when it will close for good.
In an email to users the council said:
Recent information suggests that there is serious interest from companies who would buy the Arts Centre building..All the models for continuing with the existing Arts Centre building still required subsidy at a level the Council could not afford and work to the building for which no funding source had been identified, and also had other unsolved practical problems.
However, the council plans to reinvest any proceeds from the sale in a new arts hub:
There is ..an opportunity to create a new arts hub in the town centre, more accessible to all sections of the community than the existing Arts Centre, broadening participation in the arts, with lower operating costs and so a more sustainable long-term future.
Meanwhile, DMG, along with a number of other arts organisations, will need to find a new home in the town. The 6th Form College, a major user of the site, is said to be developing new facilities on it’s own land to replace space rented from the arts centre. But others like the Open Arts Studio and DMG itself, will need to find an alternative venue until any new arts venue has been built.
The scene – a mass cycle ride in the Czech capital, Prague. I’m filming from the back seat of a cargo bike as other participants ride along with me. Suddenly one cyclist comes up to the camera. He recognises me from the screening of our film a few days ago in a city centre cinema.
“Maybe next time in Darlington”, he declares with a strong continental accent and a broad grin on his face. The thought of these 4,000 or so cyclists riding through our small town certainly stirs the soul.
Taking Darlington Media Group’s iconic film about stylish cycling, shot in the north east town and in Bremen, Germany, around Europe, has been a humbling experience. since it’s premiere in December 2009, the film has been screened in towns and cities around the world, from New Zealand to Canada with a fair chunk of Europe in between. It has been translated into Spanish, German, Portuguese and Czech. It’s YouTube site has now had over 100,000 views.
Every week there seems to be another screening being organised by local cycling advocates, conference organisers or transport experts. Last week was the Newcastle Bicycle Festival. Next week it will be the Cheltenham Cycling Campaign. Outdoor public screenings have been organised in Australia and Berlin, activists in Vancouver organised a screening of the film for local councillors, whilst others in New Zealand showed the film to the country’s Green Party. Transition Towns, a worldwide community project which aims to equip towns with the means to deal with climate change and peak oil, have introduced transport solutions via the film.
Interestingly, this global enthusiasm for the Darlington film is very much grass roots. It’s message is perhaps too honest – it identifies both the joy of fashionable cycling and the lamentably inadequate cycle infrastructure that such cyclists are expected to tolerate – for official establishment agencies, whose primary media approach requires spin and marketing. A glance at the project’s Facebook page reveals the global reach that Beauty and the Bike has achieved, and the kinds of grass roots groups that connect with it’s message. The world is indeed a global village.
Beauty and the Bike has not made it to many mainstream film festivals. But in October it won the public prize for best film at the distinctly grassroots 2011 International Cycling Film Festival in Germany. The festival is organised by local cycling activists in and around the German Ruhr Valley, an area not particularly renowned for the quality of its cycling infrastructure.
The core work of the Media Group continues to be to provide low cost access to media facilities and skills for the people of Darlington, and with over 25,000 visits in the last year it has never been as effective as it is today. Perhaps the worldwide recognition afforded to Beauty and the Bike will inspire some of these future film-makers.
