A community-based organisation in Bedford Park in London Boroughs of Ealing + Hounslow, with all group members living locally, we're committed to
* PROMOTING pride in the community's artistic heritage as a centre of culturally diverse arts/creativity through
* HONOURING - with a major Yeats-inspired public artwork - the life of Nobel-Prize-winning poet WB Yeats (brought up here by his migrant Irish family, Willie attended local schools + went on to create a revolution in modern drama, write some of English Literature’s best-loved poems + start the cultural revival that led to Ireland's independence),
* INSPIRING interest in poetry, drama + the visual arts
* CELEBRATING the local progressive, cosmopolitan, artistic/Bohemian, ambience of 19th-century Bedford Park (the world's first garden-suburb, which, with its networks of actors, architects, anarchists, poets, playwrights + publishers, many of them exiles + migrants, fostered Yeats's unique literary genius)
* RECOGNISING London as a cosmopolitan capital + creative hub which has brought out the best in migrant communities allowing us/them to develop our/their own culture, add to a shared culture, + give something unique back to our/their home places + to the wider world
*ENHANCING Bedford Park’s prominence (60% in Ealing, 40% in Hounslow) & West London’s generally, as the go-to place on London’s cultural tourism map, attracting local & international visitors to an area of small shops, cafés + local businesses
*IMPROVING local amenity, enhancing the environment, making more attractive the public spaces we’ve all come to rely on more since the pandemic
SUPPORTERS include Rowan Williams, Roy Foster, Jimmy Page, Michael & Edna Longley, Bob Geldof, Fergal Keane, Polly Devlin, Phyllis Logan, Ciarán Hinds, Marie Heaney, Jeremy Vine, Kevin McNally, Tom Paulin, Carmen Callil, Gillian Clarke, Martin Enright, former president of Yeats Soc. in Ireland, plus Royal Academy, Irish Embassy, Josephine Hart Poetry Foundation, Dukes Education + WB Yeats Societies worldwide…
WORK-TO-DATE has involved registering as a charitable organisation, creating Yeats/Bedford-Park information website, exploring public artworks + artists, leading literary walks, giving lectures locally & internationally & raising, through those routes & local donations & gift-in-kind some £30K to cover planning approval costs + raising £135K to commission Conrad Shawcross’s #EnwroughtLight
