Unique Creative Arts Network for visually impaired young people
UCAN PERFORM Festival
Visually impaired kids steal Millennium show
UCAN Productions staged the first ever performance festival by visually impaired young people on July 15th and 16th in the Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff. The free event featured drama, body percussion, storytelling, singing, dance and movement performed by more than 100 young people who are either blind or partially sighted.
UCAN members aged from 7 to 25 came from all over Wales. For months they had been looking forward to this chance to show what they can do. “UCAN is fantastic. It gives us the chance to do drama, sing and dance. I love it and wish we could do UCAN stuff every day,” said 15 year old Mared from Ysgol Plasmawr. “To encourage younger members to join UCAN we invited Northwick the teddy bear to the festival. Cardiff based John Sanders has been writing stories about visually impaired Northwick and his friend Frank for ages, but this is the first time anyone has actually met him”.
The two day UCAN PERFORM festival celebrated the culmination of a three year DEW (Developing Emotional Wellbeing through the Arts) partnership between RNIB Cymru and UCAN Productions funded by the BIG Lottery.
RNIB Cymru’s head of education Nicola Crews said: “We’re so pleased to be working in partnership with UCAN. It opens up whole new worlds for visually impaired young people and gives them opportunities to develop new skills and make lasting friendships. We hope that more visually impaired young children will be inspired to join UCAN as a result of this festival.”
Jane Latham, UCAN co-founder, development officer and the festival organiser, said: “We had 102 visually impaired young people attend the festival. We were delighted with the event, everyone had a fantastic time and lots of new friends were made. The kids worked really hard during the festival and I know people were really impressed by their work. UCAN is all about developing their physical and vocal confidence and challenging perceptions about what visually impaired young people can do. But it’s also about having bundles of fun and making new friends, which is always the most important thing!”
