LouDeemY Productions create and deliver unique and innovative multimedia performance, comedy, drama, poetry, film, photography and workshops. Although their work is meaningful and hard-hitting, it is also centred around humour and compassion.
From young people and mental health services users to the unemployed and over 50’s, LouDeemY aims to involve their audiences and participants in order to evoke response and thought as they believe that creativity and art has large role to play in the learning, healing and change process.
Alice Perry, a second year English student, spent her summer gaining work experience at LouDeemY Productions in Birmingham. We spoke to Alice as well as the creators of LouDeemY - Louise and Nadeem – about their experiences this summer.
I found LouDeemY appealing as they are a local organisation which invites people from various backgrounds to create and watch art on their own terms. The aspects of community and inclusion in the arts were especially interesting.
Over the summer, I attended and helped out at workshops for a comedy project for participants with physical disabilities. These workshops ran twice a week for five weeks and they offered a range of activities from role-playing to writing and discussion.
I have learnt more about teamwork and creative ways of thinking - I learnt a lot about the practicalities of running a workshop and the concept of ‘leading’ without enforcing hierarchy or exclusion.
As a naturally quiet person, I initially found it challenging to put myself out there, but I worked on this alongside the other participants and my confidence has really grown.
My favourite aspect of the placement was the final open-mic night. It was great to watch everyone get up and perform a stand-up routine (I even did it myself!) and it was a wonderful conclusion to all our hard work.
This experience has given me an insight into how local, smaller organisations work and how they are a great place to encourage new attitudes and approaches to the arts.
My advice to other students would be to thoroughly research the company you are applying to. Always look at smaller, local organisations as well as big names, because it’s these ones which can often offer some really interesting opportunities.
As a growing company, we are keen to engage with schools, colleges and universities. Part of our philosophy is to encourage and facilitate new learning experiences for people and we feel that work experience is a good way to support students.
We look for people with an open-mind, who are passionate about working creatively with people on issues which are often marginalized by the wider community.
Alice was keen, polite, reliable, enthusiastic and supportive. We also had another UoB student and it has been great to work with such motivated and interested young people who care about our values and aims.
For more information, please visit www.loudeemy.co.uk