Renowned author, illustrator and storyteller Peter Stevenson will be holding two storytelling sessions at Narberth Museum on Thursday 26^th September.  The stories will be based around the Mabinogion (Y Mabinogi) and to bring these to life Peter will be using Crankies.  A Crankie is a long, illustrated scroll (also called a “moving panorama” or a “moving backdrop”) that is wound onto two spools, and loaded into a box which has a viewing screen. The scroll is then hand-cranked while the story depicted upon it is presented.

Peter’s will be holding two sessions for invited school groups.  .  The project has been funded by money from the Welsh Government through the Federation of Museums and Art Galleries of Wales.

Peter Stevenson is a storyteller, children’s writer, book illustrator, folklorist, film maker, crankie maker, artist, book maker, organiser of the annual 3-day Aberystwyth Storytelling Festival and Y Mabinogi Project in collaboration with Aberystwyth Arts Centre, and the Wales Appalachia Project, along with Stories@Medina, a storytelling club that encourages collaborations with visual artists, musicians, and puppeteers. He has illustrated, compiled and written many children’s books, travelled the country with storytelling shows for adults that use hundreds of illustrations, crankies, and live music and has written four books of Welsh folk tales for the History Press.

Narberth Museum volunteers recently attended a workshop with Dr Marian Gwyn and Beloved Adonai entitled Museums, Cynefin and Communities: Building A Lasting Legacy. The event explored how museums can contribute to the Anti-Racist Wales Action Plan and how, through open dialogue, building up community connections and exploring the ways that the collection can tell more than one story to increase diversity and interaction. It was a fascinating and eye-opening event, real food for thought about the importance of museums and their collections to change-making. There were lots of very interesting discussions and really made the museum look at the way that it engages and uses its collections. Planning ahead now!