Rohan tree by Vicky McWilliams

Rohan tree a collection of poetry from Vicky McWilliams

This poetry is not afraid to confront our horrors and our nightmares. More importantly it dares to look beyond, to imagine a better world. It knows that we have to look out for one another, the old adage is true: "united we stand, divided we are lumbered".

£5.50

Available from the online Lifecraft book shop www.lulu.com/lifecraft
Or directly www.lulu.com/content/2692460

Calling all

Members,
artists, musicians, poets, stand up comedians, jugglers, magicians, song writers, playwrights, tap dancers, cartoonists, bird impressionists, contortionists, basketball and plate spinners, sculptures, painters, daubers, drawers, rock bands, blues brothers, soulful sultry singers, abstract expressionists, neo classicalists, story tellers, after dinner speakers, jokers, clowns, ballet dancing belly dancers, the lovers of fame, the voice in the wilderness, the ranters and the occasional ravers.

We need you

For the second Lifecraft arts festival.

On the 25th July we are planning an evening of entertainments at the School house, St Barnabus church, Mill road
And on the 26th and 27th July we are holding an arts exhibition in the Bath House.

If you would like be part of either or both of these events please
leave your name and what you would like to do at Lifecraft
or Email arts@lifecraft.org.uk

We will be having a meeting much nearer the time to sort out the details.
I will post up details on our new Arts project notice board (by the Lifeline office) and on the arts section on the Lifecraft website www.lifecraft.org.uk/arts

Coast Exhibition

COAST: Cambridge Outsider Arts Team is looking to provide a platform for artists who have been affected in anyway by mental health issues and who also have connections to the Cambridge area.

Would you like to exhibit your work?

Call for submissions to an exhibition of art & craft born out of inner necessity, possibly exploring the themes of spirituality, madness & creativity.

At the
Michaelhouse Centre, Trinity Street
August 31st - 28th September 2008

£250 prize voted for by the public at the exhibition

We want to include as many forms of creative expression as possible including: painting, drawing, illustration, photography, sculpture, carving, crafts, needlework, creative writing, ceramics, computer design and music on CD/DVD.

Free entry
All entry forms to be submitted by:
7th July 2008

Please contact us by email at
coast@live.co.uk
For more details and an entry form.

We hope this exhibition will become part of a rolling programme of events, and are currently booking Art & Craft market stalls from May 2008. Please contact us as soon as possible if you are interested in being involved and/or having your work for sale on a stall.

We want to showcase the maximum amount of work possible, however due to space limitations we may not be able to show all entries so priority will be given to early entries. Work may be included in a catalogue, posters, postcards, on the web site and in local magazines and newspapers.

Name the baby

As part of our expanding arts project we are developing a brand new website to showcase the wonderful art work that is made, sung and written at Lifecraft.
Before our little bundle of joy is born we need a name for the wonderful little thing.
Please send any ideas to thewebboy@lifecraft.org.uk or leave a suggestion in the information office.

Life songs CD

We like to sing songs from different vocal traditions which are rich in harmonies and rhythms and are sung by ordinary people throughout the world - work songs, play songs, dance and party songs, songs of peace, love songs and protest songs all of which celebrate the joy of giving voice - and sharing our voices.

Avaliable from Lifecraft
For £3.00
£2.50 for members.

Lifecraft Launch new CD and Poetry Anthology

Lifecraft Launch new CD and Poetry Anthology
The Old School House, St Barnabas Church,Mill Road, CB1 2BD
Doors open 6.30pm for 7pm startLive poetry and music performancesEntrance free all Lifecraft members and supporters very welcome

The Craft Of Life

At the end of 2007 we launched our first poetry anthology The Craft Of Life.

The great thing about this collection is that it proves yet again that the worst that this world can do to us can be overcome once we know that it can. Only then can we stop destroying ourselves and start to build, to build on the solid foundation of our centre. One of our contributors in his first collection reminded us that the pathway into the darkness is the same as the pathway out. All we have to do is to change direction.Creativity connects us to the Cosmos, to ourselves and to each other. The famous line of Seamus Heaney: "we must rhyme to see (ourselves), to set the darkness echoing" speaks for us all.Writing begins with self discovery, commanding us to know ourselves, to commit to growth and development from whatever starting point we occupy, knowing with Bob Dylan "he who ain't busy bein' born is busy dyin". Everyone in creative writing at Lifecraft can also affirm with Kathleen Raine that "the work of the artist is to heal the soul".Writing in this group and others like it is no mere hobby but a matter of life and death very often, a strategy for survival and possible transformation, all the more remarkable when one considers what so many have come through already in terms of trauma, abuse, invasion and abandonment. Miraculously their writing allows them to laugh at themselves and their often tragic-comic life situations, listening to and supporting one another through crisis, bereavement, loss or tragedy.These writers know life as few people can, breaking through trials and tribulations, celebrating awareness and triumph in the midst of all. Long may they continue.

Foreword by Tom Sheerin

Available from Lifecraft
For£5.50
£5.00 for members.

The Craft Of Life is also available direct from our online book shop http://stores.lulu.com/lifecraft

Or at many of the events that we are planning for the current year.