Welcome to Eye Matter Matters issue 13. This is a fortnightly publication where Eye Matter shares news and information about events and activities, members’ experiences and other items of interest. Unless otherwise indicated, all articles have been contributed by Fiona Musgrove. If you would like to contribute an article to a future edition, please contact Fiona at: fiona@eyematter.org.uk
This edition includes:
Eye Matter Zoom events.
Eye Matter Outings
Highlights include:
- Eye Matter’s New In-Person Grief Counselling and Mental Health Wellbeing Blogg
- Eye Matter Group Grief Workshop
- Katriona Taylor at Piano Smithfield
Special features:
- Eye Matter Matters’ team grows
- Eye Matter Trustees join Visionary Zoom with RNIB Chairperson
- Grief Counselling Workshop Focuses on Dealing with Anxiety
- Eye Matter’s Choir “Zooms” Into Action
- Revolutionary Personal Hygiene Device for VI Women
- Eye Matter at Dancing City 2024 with Festival.org and VocalEyes.
- Part 2: The delivery of audio description and training into UK theatres.
Eye Matter Zoom events.
Keep up to date with our activities here.
Eye Matter Outings
Find all our events here
Highlights include:
Eye Matter’s New In-Person Grief Counselling and Mental Health Wellbeing Blog
The inaugural face-to-face grief counselling session will be held on Saturday, September 28, 2024, at Somerstown Living Centre, King’s Cross, London. Members are invited to venture out from behind their screens, to meet and continue the discussion. This session will be facilitated by our regular therapist Jo Williams, in a safe, secure environment.
Volunteers will be available to escort attendees from King’s Cross Station, and refreshments will be provided.
These sessions have been kindly underwritten by the Marway family and Natasha Cazin, to allow blind and partially sighted people the opportunity to explore a range of topics related to sight-loss.
To book your place or receive more information about this event, please email with the subject” King’s Cross therapy”.
Please click here for our new blog supporting this project and our regular Zoom sessions.: https://www.eyematter.org.uk/eye-matter-blog-by-joanna-williams-psychotherapeutic-counsellor-specialising-in-grief-and-loss/
Eye Matter group grief workshop
Saturday 28th of September 2pm
Please pay a £5 voluntary contribution
Meet and Greet at 1:30pm at St Pancras Station
For more information or to book your place contact Suzie
Suzie@eyematter.org.uk with subject ‘Grief’
At this very special in-person meeting, we’ll be considering the subject of giving and receiving help.
Why can it sometimes be so hard to accept that we need help, and even harder to ask for it? What is going on for us inside when we need help? What buttons does feeling ‘helpless’ press?
How can helping others be therapeutic, and how do we recognise when it’s too much?
Katriona Taylor at Piano Smithfield
Thursday 17th October 8pm
Piano Smithfield, 14 Long Lane, London EC1A 9PN
These tickets were generously reduced to £12.75 for Eye Matter until the 1st of October.
Meet-and-greet at Barbican Underground Station at 7pm
For more information or to book your place contact Suzie
Suzie@eyematter.org.uk with subject ‘Jazz’
Our member, outstanding jazz vocalist Katriona Taylor premieres her uncharted melodies at Piano Smithfield.
UK vocalist Katriona Taylor premieres her new unreleased original songs and some of her hits from her highly acclaimed albums “Daring Dreams” and “Blind Passion”.
Katriona is famous for her sultry, smooth vocals, and funky vibes, and these original songs expertly blend a fusion of jazz grooves.
Katriona and her musicians will light up the stage and you’ll hear a remarkable hit of instrumentation and musicianship.
Katriona is at home on the intimate stages of the UK’s top jazz clubs like Ronnie Scotts and 606 or at large International festivals. She has opened for the legendary George Benson and the James Taylor Quartet amongst others. Her 6 albums have received multiple plaudits & airplay and rave reviews, as well as being featured on BBC National radio and JazzFM.
The bar sells pizza if you wish.
If you’d like to come, email suzie@eyematter.org.uk with subject ‘JAZZ’ or call Suzie on 07968722664
Please keep up to date with our activities on our Facebook page: https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid02wFmBPyPqoVHQgMMwjUPp4BKtp9gcjK8BGKgViyXHavTZkUY4KZ8jDxXSHJEXwdJfl&id=100064088379673
and join our members of Eye Matter group.
Special Features
Eye Matter Matters’ team grows
We are delighted that Maggie Rosen will help with editing. She will be ensuring the t’s are crossed and I’s are dotted!
Eye Matter Trustees join Visionary Zoom with RNIB Chairperson
On September 4, 2024, two Eye Matter Trustees participated in a Trustee Forum Zoom session organised by Visionary, a charity that in turn, supports small, local sight loss charities. The session’s guest speaker was RNIB Chairperson Anna Tylor. She described the challenges of operating in a difficult economic environment; her role in supporting the RNIB’s CEO Mat Stringer; and ensuring that Trustees have the right information at the right time to enable them to make decisions.
She confirmed the RNIB’s commitment to increasing employment opportunities for blind and visually impaired people within the organisation with a range of new projects. Currently only 16% of its workforce are VI.
Eye Matter are disappointed about the RNIB’s decision to close their Technology For Life project, despite a petition that received over 1000 signatures protesting the closure – and especially in light of the RNIB’s stated aim of increasing its VI staff. The charity has yet to explain how it proposed to support the VI community’s technology-related needs.
Grief Counselling Workshop Focuses on Dealing with Anxiety
On Monday 9th September, 14 members engaged via Zoom in a grief counselling workshop to discuss the concept of physical reactions to anxiety and coping techniques. The conversation covered how anxiety can cause subconscious reactions; the importance of relaxation; the stress of restless sleep; and coping techniques.
Regular exercise and a healthy diet were highlighted as important habits for facilitating a good night’s sleep as they can reduce symptoms of anxiety.
Eye Matter’s Choir “Zooms” Into Action
Twenty members from across the UK joined Zoom for the first of 12 weekly rehearsals for our Christmas concert, scheduled for November 30, 2024. Eye Matter member and choir director Rachel Bowden led singers through a range of vocal warm-ups and two of the eight songs selected for the programme.
Eye Matter’s choir takes place every Monday from 6pm. It is a fun, social practice for everyone to enjoy.
Please email Suzie with the subject title “Choir”.
Revolutionary Personal Hygiene Device for VI Women
On September 10, 2024, Eye Matter hosted a presentation by Muna Daud, multi-disciplinary designer and inventor of FlowSense which is a new device that may change the lives of blind and VI women of menstruating age.
This project will engage with blind and partially sighted women to develop a new piece of equipment to assist with monitoring menstrual flows. Over a number of months, the women will examine new ideas and technics which will eventually lead to the development of a working prototype. Eye Matter is actively recruiting more members to participate in both in-person and remote sessions exploring the concept and functionality of FlowSense.
Muna explained that she developed FlowSense in response to the profound challenges that many blind and VI women face when it comes to addressing their menstrual health. In the absence of adequate eyesight, “every period is not merely a routine inconvenience but a formidable battle for dignity and independence.”
If you would like to take part in this project or would like more information, please email: suzie@eyematter.org.uk
Eye Matter at Dancing City 2024 with Festival.org and VocalEyes.
On Saturday September 7, 10 Eye Matter members attended a live, audio description-assisted route through Dancing City 2024 Stratford, organised by GDFI2024 as part of Festival.org. This annual event celebrates outdoor dance, showcasing exceptional home-grown and international talent in outdoor spaces across Stratford, in the new East Bank and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. 426,400 people attended Dancing City across the 10 different shows which were performed 2 or 3 times in the day. Eye Matter was a very small group when compared to the numbers of visitors around us including Land Empathy 333: Patois 1000: Frock 260: Synergy 400. The various acts were situated around Stratford Park on the iconic area of London 2012 Olympics. This spirit was very much in evidence from the energy of every performance. It was truly amazing how much was packed into just 15 minutes.
The “Land Empathy” piece was an apocalyptic image of the result of human neglect of the environment. As part of the touch tour, we were encouraged to play with pots of slimy clay the dancers used in the performance. Although we had the fabulous audio description coming through our headsets, it was still nice for those of us with a little sight to be able to see the blurred images of the dancers moving so close to us.
In contrast to the grey sparseness of “Land Empathy”, we then moved to the bright colours of the “Patois”, the touch tour of which took place on stage before the show. The performance, “reawakens the unwritten language of Patois, telling a story of culture, lost languages, longing and belonging”, from a movement of a large group of people in the 1950’s. We were delighted to be introduced to the show’s British Caribbean choreographer Jeanefer Jean-Charles MBE, who, alongside Kate (from VocalEyes), described the many differently- shaped and multi-coloured trunks and suitcases used by the performers. Jeanefer explained how the costume and set designer had gone to great lengths to ensure authenticity of the colours and textures of materials used on stage, to reflect the bright colours of their homeland: For example, the backdrop was made from gently rippling chiffon scarves of blue, white, yellow and black, symbolising the flag of St Lucia. Laughing she recounted how the brightly coloured luggage had tempted a toddler, who tried to wander off with one of the smaller pieces. Likewise, the female lead dancers wore brightly coloured skirts, shorter at the front, to allow them to move around the stage and then changed into clothes in muted colours, to reflect their opinion of their new home. With the beat of the music in our chests our feet soon started tapping along with its energy. Eye Matter members are renowned for their love of music and dance and were delighted to be invited to join the performers on stage at the end of the show.
We very much appreciated that the cast of “Frock” met us before their performance. In turn, they introduced their characters and described in great detail their costumes. They had swapped the stereotypical clothing used to distinguish male from female, possibly reflecting the challenge of not letting disability be a barrier to dance. Indeed, their movements and synchronisation were so well incorporated that the ability – rather than disability – of the performers was in the spotlight. I loved the way Kate described the agility of one dancer, who was spun around by a performer in a wheelchair, who used his chair as part of the routine. Each dancer also had their own distinct teacup and saucer as a prop to perhaps portray conformity vs uniqueness.
The final piece, “Synergy”, was a futuristic, almost balletic show about embracing the wonders of our universe. Dancers used their bodies to engage with this theme – with one dancer swirling her crutches around her, before leaving them behind, (This reminded me of my earlier dancing with my white cane on stage.). As their set ended, the dancers changed into some rather desirable bomber jackets reminiscent of astronaut gear.
Eye Matter would like to thank Access Producer Kat Gill and her team for all the care and consideration shown to our members throughout the day. Likewise, we would like to show our gratitude to Kate from VocalEyes, without whom we would not have been able to understand what was happening during the performances.
Please click here to our Facebook page to view the photos kindly supplied by Emmanuel Cole: https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0WxXbLZ734Zjq3dLBxzrPa1qXKs7FUXxEVCsyi7bfs81bhvq4mHnNtVn1jRxM2kPzl&id=10006408837967
If you would like to find out more about Eye Matter or join one of our events please email: suzie@eyematter.org.uk
Part 2: The delivery of audio description and training into UK theatres.
The first part of this episode will concentrate on the contributions made by Extant. How it continues to ensure access to the Arts is maintained and its engagement with its service users as part of this process.
Extant was founded in 1997 by visually impaired Maria Oshodi. Currently it employs seven people (of whom two are visually impaired) and engages with a host of freelance audio describers / facilitators. They strive to ensure visually impaired people are at the heart of their management, training and opportunities. Aswell as providing artistic development for blind and partially sighted people in the theatrical sector, they run several different training programmes including, a ‘Pre-Enhance’ session for a theatre company to work with a visually impaired facilitator (for up to 5 days) on various stages of the production and incorporating the embedding of audio description (AD) into the whole creative process. ‘Lunch and Learn’, is a more informal programme (with limited capacity) where the group discuss related concerns and are provided with an introduction to the Social Model of Disability and Equality Act (2010).
Led by Caroline Jeyaratnam-Joyner, Enhance Training Manager (at Extant) they are currently delivering their ‘Post Enhanced’ Training to a Paul Hamlyn Foundation funded series of projects across 6 UK venues (2024-2026). These training sessions will involve the whole company (including front of house, stage workers, production and actors). All these programmes incorporate participation in their Visual Impairment Awareness Training (VIAT) and will receive a recognised “Enhanced Mark” which can be used in the theatres promotional content.
At a recent Extant Connect meeting (a monthly Zoom session for artists, creators and writers) members discussed the need to increase audio descriptions into live productions such as the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Extant highlighted, “A response to the sobering fact that only 17 shows are listed with the Fringe Society as having audio description in 2024. Although this figure increased to 27 AD shows (0.7%) out of 3,984 shows available Extant felt it severely discriminated against the needs of blind and partially sighted people. The Edinburgh Fringe Festival has been operating for 75 years and boasts its commitment to inclusive access. Last year 2.5 million tickets were issued yet only 0.6% of shows offered any form of AD.
Louisa Sanfey (Artist Development Manager at Extant)
explained, “It’s frankly outrageous that in 2024, VI people are almost totally excluded from this major celebration of arts and culture. So Extant decided to do something about it! Along with our Scottish friends at VICS (Visually Impaired Creatives Scotland), we approached the Fringe Society to request a crisis meeting, the Fringe Society being the organisation that underpins the Fringe, selling tickets, supporting performers and assisting audiences. We also got in touch with ZOO Venues, one of the leading venues at the fringe, to set up an Open House for artists, venue staff and interested parties to discuss the situation.”
If you would like to find more about Extants work, please click here: https://extant.org.uk/edinburgh-fringe-event
Next time we will explore the work of VocalEyes and how this record-breaking organisation continues to develop access into the arts.