For current information about planned events from Lapidus Scotland contact Larry Butler by emailing Lapidus Scotland

Courses

Enliven Your Community
creative facilitator training programme
for volunteers & staff in Glasgow from March to November 2012
Our project will equip volunteers and staff working in disadvantaged areas of Glasgow to facilitate creative words for health & wellbeing activities for local people. The trainees will become part of a creative community and develop peer mentoring skills to keep each other producing work after the project.
Full details at Enliven Your Community training programme (PDF doc) for full details and booking form

Previous events

Peer Mentoring Workshops

See Lapidus Scotland Autumn Events (PDF doc) for full details and booking form

Dates: September - November 2011
Location: Maggie's Glasgow

The Power of Poem & Story

Expressive Writing for Growth & Healing
with Geri Chavis and Liz Lochhead
June 2011
Poetry Therapy expert Geri Chavis will be supported by Lapidus Scotland facilitators
See Power of Poem & Story (PDF doc) for full details



A Lapidus Scotland event
with Michael Williams, Jayne Wilding & Allison Galbraith

Lapidus Scotland Brigid's Fire, January 2011

Big Gathering, February 2010

at Maggie's Glasgow, The Gatehouse, Western Infirmary, 10 Dumbarton Road, Glasgow G11 6PA

Book Launch - Writing Your Self
Transforming Personal Material by John Killick & Myra Schneider

The Trick is to Keep Writing, Glasgow, October 2009

Lapidus Scotland collaborated with the University of Glasgow, VoX, the Scottish Book Trust and the Mental Health Foundation to present a unique programme of literary events at the Mitchell Library, Glasgow as part of the 2009 Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival. The inimitable Liz Lochhead helped launch the Festival at the Film House in Edinburgh on the 1st September, with a humorous performance of her poetry. The theme of the programme wass Writing : Experience and featured writers Jackie Kay, Liz Lochhead, Tom Leonard, Denise Mina, Alan Bissett, Zoe Strachan and Louise Welsh

Big Tent Environmental Festival, July 2009

Lapidus Scotland hosted the Poetry Tent at the Big Tent Festival - Scotland's largest eco-festival - for the second year running. Our venue is the idyllic cherry orchard of Falkland Palace, Fife. The tree were in full fruit!

Further info: bigtentfestival.co.uk

Lapidus's theme was Freedom and Belonging and how writing can empower people to explore, express and resolve the dilemmas caused by these competing needs.

Freedom and Belonging: Roots and Wings, Glasgow, February 2009
Liz Lochead, acclaimed poet, performer, playwright, and Glasgow ’s very own Poet Laureate, and

Paddy Hill, one of the Birmingham Six, writer, and founder member of Mojo (the Miscarriage of Justice Organisation)

Frances Campbell, novelist, journalist and Lapidus Scotland Committee Member. In White Stones, Frances engaged participants in a creative exploration of ‘the white stones’ we can set to create and defend our boundaries in our lives and creative practices

Martin Stepek, poet, politician (ex-leader of the Scottish Green Party), promoter of Polish culture in Scotland , businessman, and teacher. In Absorbing Legacy Martin engaged participants in examining how to source family and related stories/cultures through writing

Margot Hendersonled participants in exploring some of the puzzles and paradoxes of freedom and belonging

Lapidus Scotland Inaugural Conference Hidden Voices, Glasgow, September 2006
Three days of panel presentations, discussions, workshops, readings, and performances celebrating 10 years of Lapidus and the diverse voices of Scotland

Hidden Voices Conference

Writing and Creative Groups

Celebrating Stories of Recovery www.storiesofrecovery.co.uk

Greater Glasgow and Clyde Drug Action Team teamed up with Lapidus writing and storytelling service to work with recovering drug users to write short stories about their recovery process. Twenty stories have been penned and the first ten stories were released in September 2009

Research Project in Glasgow: Writing Geographies for Wellbeing and Recovery:

The impact of the Creative Writing of Place and Landscape for People with Mental Health Problems

This is to be a participatory, action-research project to evaluate the experiential impacts of creative writing for recovery, well-being and the quality of life of people with enduring mental health problems
It will involve 10-12 people with mental health problems from a variety of backgrounds (connected to Lapidus activities) who will form a creative writing group, participate in a residential writing course and produce a book/performance event
The research project will take place over a year and be staffed by Lapidus facilitators and researched by Glasgow university researchers
The group will write about the geographies of their daily lives, routines and imaginations. Participants will write in and of different places (urban parks, woodland, city venues, medical spaces), and about aspects of inclusion, healing and recovery through these different environments
An aim will be to support continued group writing after the project
For further information about the project email Dr Hester Parr or Larry Butler

Resources

Web of Words
The Web of Words is a collaborative writing and performance exercise devised by founder Lapidus member Graham Hartill as a way of celebrating every person's right to speak, and be listened to, regardless of their confidence or experience as a writer. Individual responses to a given theme are encouraged through a series of writing, reading, and listening exercises: everyone produces their own 'verse'. The verses are then threaded together using a chorus and variations devised by the teacher/facilitator to echo the participantsŐ own words and ideas. Graham's technique can be fitted to any timeframe, and is suitable for groups of up to about 20 people. Click on this link to download for your copy of Web of Words (PDF doc).