Around the Lake Festival weekender kicks off in Crawley's Tilgate Park

Residents of Crawley and anyone from further afield were invited to experience Tilgate Park in a whole new way last weekend, with a lineup packed full of live performances, art installations, drop-in-art and more - all for FREE. Visitors to the festival experienced stories on rowing boats, circus in the forest, a new peacock puppet, a special bee colony, poetry trails, foraging workshops and more.

One of the main attractions, Crossings is a new sound installation artwork created by world renowned artist Luke Jerram in collaboration with BBC Radio 4 producer Julian May. Free to experience, audience members boarde a rowboat and row out across beautiful Tilgate Lake while listening to twelve audio stories about boats, birds, sounds, the sweet potato, plastic, and especially, people.

Launching the festival with his artwork Crossings, artist Luke Jerram said: “Lots of the artwork I make involves a degree of public participation. This artwork involves lovely rowing boats which have been decorated on the inside with imagery related to stories, and inside the boats you have speakers that tell the stories - incredible boating adventures, a lot of them, from around the world. Audiences sit in the boat with their friends and families, and get to row around the Lake listening to these stories. It’s that combination of listening whilst doing an activity which will transport audiences into another world.

Tilgate park is an amazing park - it’s really green and very beautiful. I’d certainly recommend everyone come down and have an opportunity to float on a boat on the lake. It’s such a relaxing thing to do.”

Also attending the launch was newly elected Crawley MP Peter Lamb, and local Crawley Resident Parveen Khan who has recorded her story for Crossings, lending a local Crawley connection to the piece. The Odyssey of Parveen Khan tells the story of how she came to Crawley, her South Asian heritage and an incredible solo travelling adventure.

Around The Lake Festival ran from 13 - 14 July in Tilgate Park, with free events all weekend, including poetry and spoken word with local poets Woodzy and Friends; ‘You Are Here’ Art Sessions; a Foraging Walk and Lakeside Chats with artist Victoria Melody. Performance and installation included Crossings; Mughal Miniatures Walkabout Bonded by Alleyne Dance; Weight(less) by MIMBRE and Without Walls performances BEES! The Colony and TEABREAK.

Around the Lake Festival was supported by Arts Council England and Crawley Borough Council. Crossings by Luke Jerram was originally commissioned by Compton Verney Art Gallery & Park.