Case study with Abhinandana Mk
Background to involvement with Encounter
Preston City Mela is a South Asian organisation which produces an annual Mela in Preston. Encounter provides the opportunity for local artists to come together and Preston City Mela has been part of Encounter for eight years.
Preston City Mela has been involved with Encounter for eight years, it is a South Asian organisation which organises a Mela every year for 2-3000 people.
It's like a fair where we have daylong performances, organisations which come to display what they have on offer for the South Asian community, and it also integrates the other communities in Preston, like the Chinese Confucius, Worldwise Samba Drummers, and we have celebrity artists performing who are touring the UK.
We're getting bigger and better and just in July we had our Mela on Moor Park.
Straight after we got to know the date of the event [Encounter] I contacted my organisation as a team, it's a beautiful opportunity for a lot of artists to come together.
After that we contact a few artists, vibrantly visually performance wise, and community wise all come together to perform their work.
Motivation for involvement
Preston City Mela's prime motivation for involvement with Encounter is the opportunity to represent the South Asian community through illustrating the cultural, social and wider contribution the community brings to Preston.
The most important aspect is representation, representing the South Asian community which is quite a prominent community in Preston; to put ourselves forward and show the contribution we are making culturally and society wise as well to the bigger picture of Preston.
When you see the procession, this is quite a diverse group and you can also make out that it's very different to how the others dress and present themselves; it is a unique presentation. Mainly it's to represent the South Asian community.
Activity
Preston City Mela brings a range of different contributors to be involved in the Encounter Torchlight Procession.
Many local artists, including Bhangra dancers, folk dancers, Bollywood children dancers and the South Asian Choir Group, were involved in this year's Torchlight Procession.
This year we had about 50 offers for participating and presenting different art forms through the procession. We try and include the local artists who are not very well known but who are very good with their art; they all came together and we had a procession.
We had the Bhangra dancers with their instruments leading the procession, followed by a ladies' group who did folk dancing; stick dancing and we used light up sticks to match the torchlight theme.
We had close to about 25 children who are very well known in Preston, they do Bollywood dancing and they danced throughout the procession.
We had the South Asian Choir Group who participated. So we had traditional dance groups, modern dance groups and the music group as well. We had a lot of parents supporting us in the procession, holding a lot of unique artifacts with the fairy lights and lamps and with a boom box showing what South Asian music is like, throughout the procession.
What worked well for 2024
It was felt that Encounter 2024 was in some way special - that it had a silver lining.
The social media was vibrant and drove the event well. The coverage of the festival on social media, Facebook and Blog Preston was an encouragement for the parade's participants.
The visual elements of The Harris, the laser show and fireworks made an impact, with the event supported by good weather.
From a participant's perspective, Preston City Mela was kept well informed in the run up to the event.
This year's Encounter was somehow special, it was really good. I think the social media side of it was vibrant, the whole light up, the fireworks were good, the laser show after the procession was amazing and I kept looking at all that was happening on social media, and I think the way it was driven on social media was really good.
This time Encounter festival had a silver lining. The laser lights outside The Harris were beautiful, the build up to the event the day before and the day after were quite in teresting.
We always look forward to the photographs that come just after the event on social media, on Facebook and Blog Preston, and it is very encouraging for the participants to see themselves represent their community.
The weather was amazing this year which made such a huge difference, we had dry and beautiful weather.
Working up to the event, all the information given to us was very useful. We knew what was going to happen through the past experience and also through the communication through the co-ordinator and Esther herself; she's very good at letting us know what is going to happen and how we can present ourselves.
What could be improved for 2025
It was felt that there was very little to improve on, with the only mention being the logistics of performers being dropped off at Moor Park rather than closer to the event.
We have to get dropped off at the beginning of Moor Park and we had plenty of huge sticks with lanterns we could have off loaded and used them, but because the cars had to stop at the entrance we didn't get to use as many as we would have liked.
It's a very minor thing but I think it could be worked around. There's nothing else, it's all very well managed, and we are used to how it runs.
Contribution
Preston City Mela brings high quality local performers to Encounter; entertainers from a range of different communities who showcase the contributions they make to art and performance.
In turn, Encounter provides Preston City Mela with the opportunity to represent the South Asian community through integrating with mainstream performance.
Mela brings a rich, diverse aspect of Preston to Encounter, it also brings very high quality talented performers who exist in Preston, to highlight their existence in Preston and also to showcase how entertaining and how enriching these artforms can be, and how well they can integrate as the performers were going into the audience, talking to them, making them dance and involving them, it was very vibrant.
Mela does a lot of outreach sessions, performances in the community but being in tegrated in the mainstream is a wonderful opportunity which Encounter provides to the South Asian community. Being able to be a part of the mainstream performance team or a procession representing the community is a wonderful opportunity.
Encounter going forwards
Encounter is part of Preston City Mela's annual agenda and they will be participating again in 2025. If it would be possible to cover a wider geographical area with some of the performances, this would help to bring the event to a larger area.
We would love to do that, that is one thing that is always there in our annual agenda, we always discuss Encounter, to be able to participate with Encounter.
Most of the performances and acts have been towards the town centre; there is a bit of a silence on the Fulwood side, if you are able to take a few performances out to maybe Penwortham, Hutton and Fulwood; it is a little more widespread and the audiences from that side of the City are also aware of how beautiful this event is.
There is the opportunity for Encounter to undertake more outreach activity by visiting communities over the year to promote Encounter and to let communities know how they can be involved and take part.
More active engagement, such as with the Preston Gujarat Hindu Society, would both increase the exposure of Encounter and provide more opportunity to engage and involve other communities.
We have a lot of small communities which exist in Preston, I think a quick meeting with them well before the event to involve and include Encounter festival in their agenda as well and to spread the word among their groups.
WhatsApp groups are so prevalent, so popular, and let them know about what is going on and let them know how they can get involved in Encounter and giving them a few options. For example, I work at the Preston Gujarat Hindu Society and we have three to four main major events which attract close to a thousand people so that could be an occasion where you could speak about Encounter, spread leaflets or information, and how we can involve people.