Sensoria Film and Music Festival
Sensoria is a festival based in Sheffield that celebrates all things film and music. It presents a unique mix of live performances, film screenings, installations, and exhibitions plus music and film industry activity at venues across Sheffield.
At this year's festival we supplied some footage to SensoriaPro, which is a gathering of composers, filmmakers, music publishers, music supervisors, games developers and festivals all under one roof, discussing the latest innovations in music and the moving image.
Our footage was involved in the Scoring Contest, where composers would submit their music to a specifically selected film clip with the winner voted for by a selected panel and the audience.
The clip we supplied that was up for grabs alongside an archive Vietnamese film clip was an edit of the Park Hill Housing Project (c.1962).
Park Hill was Sheffield City Council’s first redevelopment scheme after WW2. Work began on the site in April 1957, and it was formally opened by Hugh Gaitskell on 16th June, 1961. The film itself was created by Sheffield City Council's Department of Design and Building Services and shows the Park Hill flats shortly after the completion of their construction. After it was finished it became the first post-war slum clearance scheme in Britain.
The design of the building was trying to create ‘streets in the sky’ and avoid creating a monolithic block of flats. As a result, there were large walkways and ramps which a milk float could even fit onto. It is said that the architects wanted to combat the perceived empty spaces, isolation, and lack of street life that they felt modern design brought about.
The flats were, however, not the utopian vision they were hoped to be initially, and over the years suffered from vandalism and muggings. The future of Park Hill is today a controversial issue.
Watching the film, you can see how there was a real attempt to mix the outdoors and the indoors with tree planting, green areas, wide open walkways and big windows. Prioritising nature and the outdoors in building projects is something that in recent years has become even more of a priority with increased warming temperatures and extreme weather conditions. Green walls and trees are being built into designs and building material is being adapted to include such things as bricks made of mushrooms.
Returning to Park Hill, the winning score of an edit of the film was by Rebecca Corfield chosen by a panel of experts made up of Chi Chi Nwakodo (Sony Music Publishing) Sian Rogers (Siren), Sophy Purnell (The Composerworks), and Sam Lenthall (Universal Music).
We would like to extend a massive congratulations to Rebecca; you can listen to her composition over on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21gHu0Z61vw
