Drawing the Word: a partnership project with Disability Arts Cymru

Published Mon 21 Jun 2021 - By Literature Wales

Literature Wales is proud to have worked in partnership with Disability Arts Cymru to deliver a participatory literature project with D/deaf and disabled people in Wales.

Drawing the Word was a pilot project, and an important step in our efforts to transform the country’s literary culture into one that is truly reflective of Wales’ diverse communities. We aim to increase the accessibility and impact of creative writing for participants in Wales to inspire some of our most marginalised individuals and communities through active participation in literature.

Representation and equality are key strategic priorities for Literature Wales, and this pilot programme demonstrates our commitment to delivering targeted projects supporting representative inclusion throughout our activity and encouraging under-represented literary voices. We are aiming to create a national literary culture which represents contemporary Wales.

The project consisted of two taster consultation workshops with D/deaf and disabled participants in December 2020, which explored playing with words and informed the design of a longer six-week project which ran from February – May 2021, led by poet Kittie Belltree.

“Writing is an excellent tool to explore, empower and brighten our lives. This collaborative project gives participants an opportunity to delve into the imagination, play with words and co-create a final piece to showcase our creative selves.” – Kittie Belltree, Creative Practitioner

Kittie Belltree’s debut poetry collection, Sliced Tongue and Pearl Cufflinks (Parthian, 2019) explores fractured connections of self, family, and home. Her poems, short stories and reviews have been published in a range of journals and anthologies including Cut on the Bias (Honno, 2010) and The Brown Envelope Book: Poetry and Prose on Experiences of Unemployment, The Benefits System, Disability, and the Work Capability Assessment (Caparison, 2021). Kittie won the DAC Creative Word Award 2020 and has been a Literature Wales Bursary recipient. She works as a Specialist Tutor for neurodivergent students at Aberystwyth University where she also teaches on the undergraduate Creative Writing programme and is putting the finishing touches to her PhD exploring poetry and trauma.

Sara Beer, Disability Arts Cymru’s National Officer for Performance Arts and Creative Word said:

“Drawing the Word has been a fantastic opportunity for DAC members to develop new skills and have the time to share and discuss their work in a supportive environment. The amount and quality of the work created was excellent and I hope this is the first of many similar collaborations with Literature Wales.”

The poetry collection below is the work of people from across Wales and beyond, celebrating a representative, inclusive, literary Wales: