A festival exploring hope is coming to Coventry at the beginning of April for one weekend only.
Organised by local health and wellbeing social enterprise Hope For The Community CIC, HopePunk is a weekend festival celebrating the meaning of hope and showing just how important creativity is for health and wellbeing.
Thirty-two artists, made up of participants and facilitators from Hope For The Community’s Hope Programme, as well as local and national creatives, have formed the HopePunk Collective. Responding to the question “What does hope mean to you?”, HopePunk showcases stories of talented people living with chronic illness and carers, through an array of exciting artworks. There will be sculpture and songs, paintings and poetry, plus lots more too.
HopePunk will take place at the LTB Showrooms – the latest disused space to be reclaimed and reloved by AWD Restorations – from Friday 8th to Sunday 10th April 2022 as one of the Coventry City of Culture Trust’s Taking Place In events. There will be over 80 pieces on display, as well as a packed programme of talks, workshops and music, sound bath meditation and a dedicated podcast.
Hope For The Community’s Chief Executive Officer Gabriela Matouskova said: “We’re absolutely thrilled to be able to showcase our Hope Programme through HopePunk. We work with some amazing people; those living with chronic illnesses, those caring for people with long term and life limiting conditions, those having a daily battle with mental illness. Creativity plays such an important part of our programme, that to see such beautiful pieces of work come out of it … There was no way we could keep them to ourselves. We had to share them with Coventry; and what better time to do it than during our year as the UK City of Culture!”
HopePunk Collective member Ruth said “I am so glad to be taking part in HopePunk and am really excited for the event. I loved creating my artwork, and am incredibly grateful for what the Hope Programme has done for me. I feel like this is my way of saying thank you to Hope.”
HopePunk festival is open 12pm to 4pm daily from Friday 8th to Sunday 10th April 2022, is free to attend and is largely unticketed. Some of the talks and workshops will be ticketed due to limited capacity. For the latest news on the HopePunk programme, as well as information on how to book tickets for the talks and wokshops, make sure you keep an eye on Hope For The Community’s social media pages, and the HopePunk website www.hopepunk.org.uk.