Delivering Life-enhancing Services for Vulnerable People

Tim Nicholls, Programme Director

5th November 2008

Who we work with

• London-based charity.

• With hostel residents aged 16-65.

• Refugees and Asylum Seekers.

• Street drinkers and rough sleepers.

• Close collaboration with Crisis.

• The wider public educating them about the challenges facing the homeless.

How we work with them • Forum Theatre Hostels tour. Peer-led support.• Performing Arts workshops in Hostels or Crisis.• Forum for Change projects with young refugees and

asylum seekers. • Support programme. IAG support. • PEARL accreditation recognising ‘soft’ skills and

personal/ social development. • “The grind of homelessness can leave people believing

they are the 'no hopers' many have accused them of being. The confidence gained by participants in Cardboard Citizens projects has far reaching consequences. This is an organization that changes lives.” Jenny Edwards Homeless Link

Danny’s story

The original idea

“The ethos, which from the very beginning has been to make high quality theatre by, for, and with the most marginalised people in our society. Not just theatre where you sit and watch, but theatre where, whether Forum or Shakespeare, our audiences are drawn into the action by their common humanity, by their concern for the issues under debate.”

Adrian Jackson: Founder of Cardboard Citizens

• To use the performing arts as an engagement tool with the homeless.

• To use a theatre technique called ‘Forum Theatre’ developed by Augusto Boal in Brazil to promote reflection, understanding and dialogue between homeless and excluded people and the wider public.

• To present the Arts to the wider social support sector.

• To promote meaningful activity and self confidence for hostel residents, and help marginalised people connect with their ‘hinterland’.

How the idea developed • Cardboard Citizens was founded in 1991, as a London Bubble

project. • For the first four years it toured Forum Theatre by homeless people

to other homeless people, in hostels, day centres, arches, the street.

• Based on the ideas of Augusto Boal and the ‘Theatre of the Oppressed’ in Brazil.

• After Cardboard Citizens became an independent entity in 1995, the company broadened out into schools touring, as well as regular workshops, theatre visits, and large-scale site-specific collaborations.

• LSC/ Jobcentre Plus funding followed by LDA funding. Development of support model. IAG support linked in to engagement tool in hostels/ Crisis other day centres.

• Plays relevant to themes of homelessness and exclusion performed including Down and Out, Pericles, Timon of Athens and Woyzeck.

How we demonstrate our value to funders• A challenge for us. Are we an arts or a homelessness

organisation? • Struggle of explaining in writing who we are. • Need to get people to see our work, then they are

inspired. • Video, DVD’s, Talking heads interviews with participants.

Photographs. Performances • Being honest about our limitations. Building of self

esteem, and confidence, the start of the journey, not the end.

How to turn the spark into a flame

• Consultation with participants. • Identify a genuine need, what is the gap in the market? • Get in good people who share the vision. • Remain authentic to origins, and those you work with. • Ensure the vision is realistic and achievable.• Ensure regular consultation with participants.• Make sure the support offered to participants is sufficient

and appropriate. • Enjoy what you are doing. Enthusiasm is infectious.