The Full Story
A Poets Background As A Project Maker
"I make projects" - Zena Edwards
I began making projects in 2009 which started as a one-woman show's continuity project. You can see the impact of this experience in the following theatre productions below. In theatre mode I would have to devise an education package to go along with the show. It just made sense as there was always a reason to discuss the themes within the production further.
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This was the beginnings of me seeing the 'structures' of project making creating space for more poetry and spoken word to be express - for poets to learn about craft and to fully experience themselves as poets, and all the challenges and joys that entails.
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From conception to building the websites, I am the project founder of the initiatives, below trademark TM and copyright©
Poets Built It
PBI is a dedicated space for new and established Poets and Spoken Word Artists internationally, to share the common experience of becoming and being a poet. Born 2022
"I created Poets Built It to unpack the complexity of feeling I had around being a ‘Poetpreneur’.
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Poets Built It Online Community is an opportunity to be together in one place, be inspired, and look out on the world with the ‘clearest poetic lens’ possible. It is a space for joy in the craft of writing, reading and performing poetry and spoken word."
Nature Persists
Nature Persists is a menu of in-person and online courses designed to encourage reconnection to the quiet power of nature in urban environments and inspire gentle & determined creativity. Born 2021.
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Cities can be exciting places. However, busy crossing energies & hectic lifestyles can lead to sensory overload, overwhelm & disconnection.
Nature Persists poetry & creative programs explore how you can reconnect with the your natural defences against urban fatigue."
The Poetic Debaters Project
PDP takes the best elements of slam poetry and debate to deliver a lively audience interactive performance which is thought- provoking as well as entertaining and educational.
I devised a series of workshops and events that encourage emerging poets and young people to engage in more depth with important societal issues and current affairs which concern them and their future.
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Synergy Slam Poets
Synergy Slam Poets is a poetry, spoken word and film competition ​that educates and nurtures and sparks new EcoAwareness. Born 2023.
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Born out of the ethos of Nature Persists but for the dynamism of competition, the immersive writing and performance programmes offer a unique opportunity to explore creative expression with an environmental conscience.
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Each 4 module program is based on a theme. To date we have explores Water, Soil & Earth and Trees. Poetry and the Synergy Between Natural World & The City.
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To Be in synergy is when separate and different elements combine their collective strengths to achieve more than when they work alone.
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Voices That Shake
For 10 years, Zena co-devised an co-devised and co-designed a space where young people aged 16-25 could work together as equals with established artists for collective creative campaigning practice.
SHAKE! participants engage in dynamic workshops (Poetry writing & performance, Film Making, music) & follow-up mentoring to pursue creative campaigning & events production.
SHAKE! was initiated by PLATFORM and is a collaboration between ©Verse In Dialog, Liquorice Fish, Demand the Impossible!, Hi8us South, Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust, Bernie Grant Arts Centre, African Writers Abroad, Afrogroov, Chocolate Films.
Funded by Arts Council England, Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, Big Lottery Fund, European Union.
"I believed in the dramatic demand of performance in the orator's practice."
- Zena Edwards
The Full Story
A Poet's Background In Drama & Theatre-Making
As a theatre maker, her works — Security, a one-woman show and youth workshop program; Travelling Light, an experimental performance lecture and education package; and The Fury Project Monologue, an arts installation and education initiative — have toured internationally. These tours have included stops in Winnipeg, Johannesburg (South Africa, in partnership with the British Council), Amsterdam (Netherlands), and the Shizuoka Festival at Mount Fuji, Japan.
As a dramaturg and director, Zena has worked and collaborated with for Contact Young Creatives at Contact Theatre, Manchester, and with Botis Seva for the Redbridge Drama Centre.
Security
A comical and moving tale about four extraordinary people with stories of resilience and evolution. A fusion of performance poetry, hip hop theatre, movement and song.
Born 2006
​“Convincing, raw performance full of passion and conviction.” The British Theatre Guide
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“A deeply original, dramatically dexterous portrait of London’s bewildering kaleidoscope of difficult, defiant life.” Time Out​
The Fury Project
Born the reflective findings of 'travelling Light' The Fury Project is an interdisciplinary arts and digital exploration of the emotion of anger, seeking to tell stories that carve paths to justice, transformation and empowerment. It deconstructs the ancient Greek mythological tale of "The Three Furies" and reconstructs it for 21st century notions of Womanhood.
Born 2012
Travelling Light
A one woman show and autobiographical rite of passage into womanhood with a workshop series exploring the power of feminine energy in the 21st century.
Born 2010
