A Re-Introduction

Little Grebe Creative CIC was founded to serve artists, writers and filmmakers in Wales creatively and professionally, while simultaneously serving its community members through offering educational and experiential learning, sharing and socialising in the same areas of literature, illustration, media and film making.

Broadly, through community projects we will create work opportunities for our local creatives and opportunities to connect for a diverse demographic of community members across West Wales.

Our current project Love Through Literature has been funded by the National Lottery Community Fund. £20,000 will offer a years worth of free creative writing and filmmaking workshops for the whole of Pembrokeshire. Of the money £3000 will go to local filmmakers, £3000 to freelancers teaching the workshops and a large portion of the remaining funds is going directly into the pockets of the local venues we are hiring and local marketeers helping us to promote the project. A final £2500 is set aside to publish a short story anthology collated from all the members of our community involved in the project along the way.

The film budget will fund the creation of a documentary telling the stories of the diverse members of west wales we meet throughout the 12 months. This is potentially something we could recreate every year bringing together a broad spectrum of age groups and geographical areas bridging gaps between generations that may otherwise not cross paths.

As our publishing arm grows we would like to offer a franchise book selling opportunity together for members of our community in need of a career boost, or change. In the form of mobile bookshops we aim to emulate the Big Issue’s model of creating steps into entrepreneurial mindsets. This is particularly important in rural Wales where job opportunities are limited to tourism, care, and retail. Work in arts and literature is extremely limited here.

Through fundraising we hope to change this. So far we have published a middle grade novel Anwen and the Island, this month sees our second publication, a young adult novel A Different Way of Knowing written by Diana Powell. Cover artwork for this project was created by local illustrator Fran Evans.

We are coming into contact with other new writers through our community work all the time. Part of our fundraising initiative includes a subscription book club which will promote literacy, socialising and focus on creating broader changes through the collective sharing of fiction with heart. Any funds taken from this initiative will be shared between a local charity and one charity in foreign territories as the project grows. With this spectrum of activity we hope to create a circular culture of supporting our local arts, artists and fellow community members and friends.