Celebrating Age

Touchstone, Pavilion and Ian Duhig are pleased to share their new poem ‘The Meaning of Food’. This poem was co-written by Ian Duhig and Touchstone’s Cha DaCup group, who have now ‘crossed the threshold’ to become published authors, as their poem has been featured in the recently released in ‘The Cookbook Project Sewerby Hall and Gardens’ by Ahilopalapa Rands. Ian worked with the Sikh Elder's Cha Da Cup group as

Image: Timothy Neat, The Victorian market and the city of Leeds (series) circa 1965-66. Copyright Timothy Neat. Touchstone’s BME Dementia Service has been working closely with art organisation Pavilion and sound artist Ryoko Akama to gather oral history recordings of the life stories and experiences of older people who were first generation migrant workers in textile factories in Leeds. These recordings are currently being showcased as part of Ryoko

As part of part of Touchstone’s BME Dementia Service’s on-going partnership with Pavilion, artist Simon Warner delivered a workshop with the Cha Da Cup group who regularly attend Touchstone on Mondays to exercise,  share food, meet with friends and get involved in lots of different activities. Simon’s workshop was centred on creating silhouettes, an age-old art form which first became popular in the mid 1700’s due to the work of

As part of the Interwoven Histories Art workshops, Pavilion held a film workshop with members of Touchstone’s BME Dementia Service’s Hamari Yaadain Dementia Café. Will from Pavilion brought along a projector to the group and showed Nathaniel Dorsky’s 16mm silent film Autumn (2016).  Towards the end of 2015, Dorsky captured footage of the seasonal changes we see in the world around us and created this film, which explores the changing

We are pleased to share that Carol Sorhaindo ran another fantastic community workshop with Touchstone’s Hamari Yaadain Dementia Café members. This time, Carol used the resilient buddleja plant as inspiration to think about our roots, migration and what gives us strength in difficult or uncertain times. The buddleja plant, which is common in Britain and Asia is known for its ability to thrive and adapt to many different climates, and has unusually long, tough

This year, Touchstone has partnered with visual arts organisation, Pavilion to deliver “Interwoven Histories” – a  project which aims to engage older people from BME communities in creative arts workshops. Wednesday 18th October marked the first workshop of our exciting new programme, when Carol Sorhaindo introduced the Hamari Yaadain Dementia Café members to the use of saffron dyes and block painting. It is well known that saffron is the most