VoiceOver Finsbury Park is a social radio project about the future of life in London. We have invited our neighbours in Park House, right across the road from Furtherfield Commons in Finsbury Park, to make short broadcasts about their lives and to express their ideas about the city’s future. Everyone in Park House shares a geographical viewpoint over London but everyone has different experiences of living in this city.
Residents are creating a temporary, hyper-local communications network by installing in their homes a series of light antennae, LED nodes and radio boxes designed by Umbrellium. These nodes create a network of light and sound that can be heard and seen all by participants.
The aim of the project is to create a temporary communal communication space that gives neighbours, who may never otherwise meet, a way to share a glimpse each other’s lives; for people to trust each other with their dreams for their global city.
VoiceOver Finsbury Park culminates in a takeover of a gallery in the Museum of London at the end of February 2018, where visitors will be able to listen to the voices, thoughts and interactions from Finsbury Park residents captured by the installation. Until then the broadcasts can only be heard by participants but you can follow the project on twitter on the #VoiceOverFinsburyPark hashtag.
VoiceOver Finsbury Park is is produced by Furtherfield & Umbrellium.
The Museum of London ran a competition looking for creative responses to An Idea for a Future London. They were looking for community projects that would imagine the London of the future. VoiceOver Finsbury Park is the winning idea from Umbrellium and Furtherfield
An Idea for a Future London is co-commissioned by the Museum of London and Thirteen Ways for City Now City Future. Supported by Arts Council England.
Umbrellium designs and builds urban technologies that support citizen empowerment and high-impact engagement in cities. www.umbrellium.co.uk
VoiceOver Finsbury Park is a development on the Umbrellium project VoiceOver East Durham, commissioned by East Durham Creates and produced by Forma. An Idea for a Future London is co-commissioned by the Museum of London and Thirteen Ways for City Now City Future, and supported using public funding by Arts Council England.
Award winning writer, director and actor Christine Entwisle is working with the residents to create a final broadcast which will be recorded and exhibited in the Museum of London. Christine Entwisle won the BBC writers prize for her radio play doyouwishtocontinue in 2015 and the BBC Audio Drama Award 2017 for Secret Kebabs. She also won the Funny Women Award 2015 writers prize and co wrote and directed a new series of webisodes Extreme Fairy.