Do you remember that time when....

Montgomeryshire residents are being asked to relive their carnival memories so they can be recounted for centuries to come.

 

The Oriel Davies Gallery is currently recruiting volunteers to help collate the information for its ‘Carnival Memories’ project which has received a Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) grant of £20,500.

 

The Newtown-based gallery will target people of 60+ who are resident in Montgomeryshire along with volunteers of all ages to find and collect oral histories and written accounts relating to local fairs, festivals and carnivals in days gone by.

 

Commenting on the project, Jennifer Stewart, Head of the Heritage Lottery Fund in Wales, said: “Heritage is not all castles, museums and old buildings. Capturing memories and stories is an important and popular way of learning about our past and sharing this with future generations.

 

“This project will help create an archive of the carnival traditions of Mid Wales thereby preserving this unique heritage and bringing it to life in the words of the people who experienced it. With the approaching of the 2011 carnival season what better time to seek out the wealth of hidden stories of earlier generations?”

 

The idea was inspired by photographer Dave Lewis’s exhibition Field Work at Oriel Davies Gallery in 2010. Dave spent time with members of local communities, taking particular interest in photographing people enjoying themselves at local events, such as Llanidloes Fancy Dress.

 

Material collected as part of the project will be digitised and archived. A bilingual publication with an audio CD will also be produced and a touring display will be shown in venues across the county.

 

Volunteers interested in collecting stories will be invited to take part in a one-day course, run by the British Library Sound Archive and the Oral History Society. These informal and practical sessions will provide an introduction to oral history interviewing, and give an opportunity to handle recording equipment and discuss some of the issues around collecting oral histories, life stories and memories. The courses are free, and no previous experience of oral history is required.