Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol.25 happened on Monday 4 November 2019 on the main stage of Dundee Rep Theatre, hosted by Creative Dundee in collaboration with NEoN Digital Arts Festival. Creative Dundee has hosted PKNs in the city since 2011, which now run in over 1,000 cities around the world!

It’s a simple quick-fire format – speakers show 20 images, each for 20 seconds. Each person chooses a topic – their work, their loves, hates, hobbies or holidays! The night is a great way for people to meet and hear about interesting activities happening across the city and beyond.

Always different, entertaining and inspiring; there is something for everyone at this event which first started in Tokyo in 2003 and has now grown into a global phenomenon. Our regular ‘Pass the Mic’ feature on the night gives anyone the chance to shout out the events and opportunities they have coming up.

Creative Dundee is an organisation which supports creative talent to base, grow and sustain their practice in and around Dundee, by connecting and amplifying the city’s creativity.

A huge thanks to Victoria Sanches for the incredible PKN artwork. Check out her website for more.

Speakers Included:

Alice Black has been a cinema programmer for the past 25 years, focused on bring films and audiences together.  Throughout her career she has created film programmes for local communities, diplomatic & cultural services, national institutions & archives.  Currently Head of Cinema at Dundee Contemporary Arts (DCA), she is responsible for a daily programme of new releases, art house titles and alternative content for their two screen cinema.   And because spending every hour of the working day thinking about movies is not quite enough, Alice is also currently a PhD candidate in Film Studies at St.Andrews University.

Darshana Jayemanne is the author of the book Performativity in Art, Literature and Videogames and a Co-Investigator in the “Reality Remix” project on the Next Generation of Immersive Experiences. He was a jurist for the Independent Games Festival’s 2019 Award in Narrative Excellence and has appeared on BBC Radio 3’s Free Thinkers.

Lynne Campbell performs Scottish folk songs, poetry and stories, and loves doing it in sites of cultural interest. She’s developed and performed work with HMS Unicorn and Verdant Works in Dundee. When she’s not doing that, the day job keeps her busy with helping creatives move forward with their businesses.  When she’s not doing either of those things, she’s probably drinking tea. Ask her about Dundee dressed herrings. @LynneDotM

Stuart Hamilton is a writer, filmmaker, performer and entrepreneur who after graduating from the University of Dundee in 2008 co-founded a small creative agency with the goal of one day producing content for film and television. More a reality now than ever before, Stuart has co-produced and starred in Dundee’s first ever web-series Sons of Spielberg and is now creating short comedy sketches for BBC Short Stuff. Through his new blog Facial hair and other difficult things he shares his enthusiasm for learning, seeking out new challenges and adventures and just generally being optimistic about life. @stuheez

Lynsey Penny is Project Coordinator at Gate Church Carbon Saving Project, a Scottish Government funded climate-action project based in Dundee. Having always been passionate about the environment and then studying climate science, Lynsey started working with the project in 2017, and is a strong advocate of the role of community groups in helping tackle the climate crisis. To encourage existing and new climate action groups to network, in 2018 Lynsey set up the Dundee Climate Action Network. Gate Church’s latest initiative is to help reduce food waste, with the launch of Dundee’s first “Community Fridge” – making surplus food available for EVERYONE.

Dave Close has lived in Dundee for 6 years with his family, moving from Glasgow for the sunshine and to work with Hot Chocolate Trust, the youth work charity based in the city centre at Steeple Church. He has worked with different church/community projects with marginalized communities in Glasgow, Paisley, and several English towns and cities over the last 27 years.  He believes this is an ideal application of years of academic study in language, theology, and literature. @daverjclose

Martin Zeilinger is a new media researcher, curator, and practitioner. With a background in experimental film and comparative literature, his focus is now primarily on the intersections between digital art, emerging technology, critical theory, and activism. Martin is particularly interested in activist art in the financial, political, and environmental realms. He has just taken up a position as Senior Lecturer in Computational Arts & Technology in the Division of Games & Art at Abertay University. Since 2013, he has curated the Toronto-based Vector New Media Arts Festival, and he is now also a member of the curatorial collective for the Dundee-based NEoN Festival.

Maryam Deeni is a recent business graduate from Abertay University and is currently the Learning Co-ordinator intern at V&A Dundee. She is also a member of the V&A’s Young People’s Collective, a proactive group in the decision making process affecting young people and their engagement with the museum. This stems from her deep interest in Art & Design. Maryam has been invovled in the 3rd sector for almost a decade, working with community organisations such as YYI and the Dundee Youth Council. Additionally, she is part of Creative Dundee’s board of directors and panel member on the Dundee Youth Fund.

Morag Smith is a writer, poet and National Development Worker for Glasgow Women’s Library. She studied Literature and Sociology in Glasgow then lived in Germany for some years before returning to Scotland where she worked in community learning and development, adult literacies, creative writing and literature development. She works with GWL’s learning team and a wide range of partner organisations, including libraries, community groups and women’s prison services, to deliver learning and events, and develop access to the library’s unique resources for women of all ages and backgrounds. As a result of her work at GWL and elsewhere, she has an in depth knowledge of Scotland’s bus and rail networks and is passionate about the power of arts, libraries and museums to transform lives. @moraggwl

John Butler studied Drawing, Painting, and Electronic Imaging at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art. He works and lives in Glasgow as a freelance 3D artist/animator. His work has been regularly screened at media art festivals worldwide since 1989. Motion capture and 3D are central to the work, which focuses on “Human Utility in an age of Artificial Indifference”.

Ellie Harrison is an artist and activist based in Glasgow. She has been teaching on the Contemporary Art Practice programme at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design in Dundee since 2012. She creates playful installations, performance / events, writing and political campaigns aimed at investigating, exposing and challenging the absurd consequences of our capitalist system: from over-consumption, inequality and alienation, to privatisation and climate change. In 2010, she became the first visual artist to publish an Environmental Policy. In 2016, she slashed her carbon footprint for transport to zero and made headlines with her ‘controversial’ project The Glasgow Effect, for which she refused to leave Glasgow’s city limits, or use any vehicles except her bike, for the whole calendar year. Her book about The Glasgow Effect launched at the Edinburgh International Book Festival this summer and will be on general release from 4 November 2019.

Lenna Cumberbatch BA MBA FRSA is a Diversity & Inclusion Strategist. Early evidence of Lenna’s interest in equality saw her nine-year-old self running onto the boys football pitch to score a goal in protest that girls weren’t allowed to play football (evidenced by the lack of a girls football pitch).  Her ongoing passion for equality, diversity & inclusion has led her into roles across the diversity spectrum in the USA and UK, across corporate, education and public sector environments. Her exploits have included the creation of King of the Castle, a drag king competition and invitations to speak including at the Women of the World (WOW) Festival at the London Southbank Centre and at the European Commission in Brussels.  She is enrolled in a PhD, is a Patron of Switchboard and a volunteer for Diversity Role Models

PECHA KUCHA NIGHT DUNDEE VOL 25

Date: Monday 4 November 2019

Time: 7 – 10pm (event will kick off at 7.20pm)

Place: Dundee Rep, Tay Square, Dundee, DD1 1PB

#PKN_DND

Tickets: 

Standard: £7

Amps supporters, students, un-waged, over 60s and under 18s: £5

Find out more about our Amps Supporters Network for discount ticket entry. 

Thanks to a generous contribution from someone in the Amps community, we will be able to provide free transport for anyone in Dundee whose disability impedes or makes it harder to attend this event. If that’s you, book a ticket and email us at news@creativedundee.com and we’ll organise an accessible taxi to take you to the event and back!

*This event will be BSL interpreted by Jennifer Ramsay and Linda Duncan. Shoot us an email at news@creativedundee.com if you’d like to be seated in a specific section to see this better.

*This event will be live-streamed, filmed, photographed and eventually shared on the Creative Dundee social media platforms. If you do not wish to appear in any of the images that are made public, please let us know at news@creativedundee.com

Pecha Kucha was devised and shared by Klein Dytham architecture. The PKN Dundee event is organised and hosted by Creative Dundee.