Good Grief: A New Festival for Hastings
FIONA MCGARRY
A new four-day festival exploring grief, love and loss is coming to Hastings this May. It will take place over the late May Bank Holiday weekend and run by local events organisation 18 Hours, in partnership with St Michael’s Hospice, Good Grief Festival CIC and the University of Brighton.
Bev Lee Harling performing Hey Good Lookin’
The festival is part of the Coastal Community and Creative Health research project, a national research initiative exploring how creative community activity can improve wellbeing and help tackle health inequalities in coastal towns, including Hastings.
Events will take place at different locations across Hastings. They will include remembrance walks, storytelling events, talks, film screenings, live music, performance and art exhibitions. There will also be opportunities to explore grief through shaping clay, weaving, writing, dancing and creating together in shared spaces. Some moments will be quiet and reflective, others communal and energising.
Festivalgoers will be able to visit a Death Café for friendly and warm discussion or take part in a silent disco where they can dance as a way to reflect, remember and reconnect with joy. Bev Lee Harling will be performing Hey Good Lookin’ – an evening of story and song commemorating her father who she lost to dementia. There will also be a ‘microcinema’ showing short films by local filmmakers and visual art exhibitions at Hastings Museum and Art Gallery and Electro Studios Project Space.
Originally created as an online event during the pandemic, Good Grief Festival was founded by Professor Lucy Selman at the University of Bristol with the aim of bringing grief and bereavement into the open and supporting people grieving in isolation.
Since then, it has grown into a nationally recognised festival, bringing researchers, healthcare professionals and counsellors, artists and communities together to talk openly and creatively about grief,attracting thousands of participants across the UK.
“Good Grief Hastings is about creating space for grief in all its ways. Grief is not only about the loss of a person. It can be about changes in our lives, our health, our relationships or our sense of identity,” says 18 Hours Director, Dr Mandy Curtis. “We hope to offer a welcoming and creative environment where people can explore those experiences openly through conversation, making and shared moments.”
Find out more about the Good Grief Festival on goodgrieffest.com. More details about the Hastings Festival will be released soon.
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