‘A Soft Rebellion in Paradise’ – SHU’s Chloë Brown seeking 500 women for a Sheffield ‘Soft Rebellion’

Update – 13 August 2018

Chloë was interviewed for both the Sheffield Star and Yorkshire Post last week, describing how her previous work and a desire to address the loss of women’s voices in history has fed into A Soft Rebellion in Paradise. Read the articles here and here.

Chloë Brown, visual artist and SHU senior lecturer in Fine Art, will be making an exciting new film A Soft Rebellion in Paradise as part of the Making Ways arts programme next month. The film will be gifted to the city of Sheffield on completion and Chloë is seeking 500 women to form a large gathering in Paradise Square…

A Soft Rebellion in Paradise reflects on the history of the city as a place of political activism and will look in particular to highlight the voices of women that are so often lost in the retelling of histories around the world.

In recent years Chloë has been working on a series of ‘Soft Rebellions’ in post-industrial cities, first in Stoke-on-Trent, then in Detroit and now in Sheffield. These take the form of a film or an event posing the question: ‘what happens when the economic engines of a city slow down but the people don’t?’ So far these ‘Soft Rebellions’ have involved dancing, eating, meeting and applauding in places where it is unusual to do so.

At the core of this new film is a large gathering of women (up to 500) in Paradise Square who will be filmed doing a number of ‘Soft Rebellions’. Women attending the shoot will be asked to:

• Be silent for a period of time, a reference to the Chartists’ silent protests held in Paradise Square in 1839.
• Applaud in a particular way (The Wigan Clap – the applause used by Northern Soul audiences at Wigan Casino in the 1970’s – This came out of a conversation in Detroit with Motown icon Martha Reeves).
• Perform a poem written by Sheffield-based poet Geraldine Monk that is part song, part chant and part incantation (featuring a very special international performer).

Filming (by an all-female crew) will take place on Sunday 02 September 2018 and anyone identifying as a woman over the age of 16 are invited to join.

A Soft Rebellion in Paradise
Paradise Square, Sheffield S1 2DE
Sunday 02 September 2018, 10AM – 2PM
To get more information and to register interest please sign up on Eventbrite – this will be the source of further information close to the day of filming.

For further enquiries please contact the team here or producers Jennifer Monks / Dana Bruce here.

Chloë Brown is an artist and Senior Lecturer/Course Leader in Fine Art at Sheffield Hallam University, living in Sheffield, UK. She has an MA in Sculpture from Chelsea College of Art, London (1994), and a BA in Fine Art from the University of Reading (1987).