Community Projects

Bailiffgate Museum and Gallery undertakes a wide programme of community outreach projects, many of which are listed left. Please click on those that you are most interested in for more details.

Video still courtesy H Henderson

Through these projects we aim to connect people with their heritage at a very local level: working with them to explore local memories and “tell the stories which have not ordinarily been told”. The outreach projects are led by volunteer teams, with support from professional consultants as required. Each project will leave a lasting legacy that supports ongoing learning, celebrates our heritage and engages people for many years beyond the end of the activity itself.

To generate awareness of and interest in these projects we have approached individuals and key groups ( both existing partners and new ones). We have held public meetings in venues near to where people live, leafleted areas and run activities which could be models for future projects. For example, we recently delivered a St Paul’s Memory Share event in the Museum where our volunteers worked with the public giving local people the opportunity to contribute memories and giving volunteers a taster of what their involvement could be in future projects.

Our guiding principle is always to do what the community wants in terms of celebrating the heritage that matters to them.  Many of our projects include some element of intergenerational work and we have formed partnerships with Age UK and Gallery Youth to both facilitate access to communities of elderly people and to provide training for our volunteers on working with these target groups.

Each project will have different activities and outcomes but some features are likely to present in all at some time or another in some degree. Thus digitisation of photographs and other documents, audio recording and filming activities and people will be common to many. Our plan, based on sound advice from specialist  film makers and community film makers, is to train volunteers to use the kits of technical equipment safely, skilfully and carefully. We will invest in robust but easy to use equipment that will produce quality results.

If you would like to become involved in any of the community projects already running and detailed in this section, or have ideas for future projects, do please contact us using the form below.