Talia Beale

To Trudge In Zundon, BA Fashion Communication: Fashion Communication and Promotion, Runner Up, 2022

The media often push negative perceptions upon blocks of flats, presenting them as a type of cabinet of curiosity for the poor, problematic and unconventional. It then stigmatises areas such as estates to be brutalist no-go zones, feeding into the ever-growing class war. There are many realities which exist within these concrete castles and this is often overshadowed by gang affiliation presented through fetishised and traumatic imagery. This means other voices tend to not be heard or seen.

Through the utilisation of art house film – which is a serious, artistic, experimental piece containing unconventional, highly symbolic content, usually not designed for commercial profit but for a cult following – I want to explore how this process of film making could subvert ideas about estates and address new voices, specifically creative, queer kids who live in blocks.

I want to define a new avenue named ‘artestate’ film, where the focus is on communities from housing estates pushing the boundaries themselves of how blocks of flats and the stories within them can be represented. So, this is for those creative and often conflicted kids from concrete castles whose hearts start at home; I hope to see the next top deck fear who hubs at the back of the bus, living their life in magic… in magic and not dust.

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