There were ambulances, fire engines, police horses, members of the armed forces and more organisations than I could count filling one of the car parks at the Trafford Centre, Manchester. Amidst the flashing lights, mascots and uniforms were some wonderful EmpowHER girls volunteering a day of their Summer Holidays to help the British Red Cross Emergency Response Team inform people about the work they do to help people in crisis.
The 999 Day is an annual event at which organisations who give assistance during emergencies come together to inform the public about the work they do, how to access support and what individuals and families can do to reduce their risk of being involved in an emergency. Aimed at families, the event was bustling with children who were collecting stickers and freebies, having a look inside emergency response vehicles and meeting staff and volunteers from the services.
Before the big day, the Blackburn based EmpowHER group researched
what the British Red Cross Emergency Response Team do and wrote a true-or-false
quiz based on their findings. Armed with their questions and oodles of bugs,
pens and badges, the girls spoke to the children (and adults) that came to
visit the stall and educated them on the role that the British Red Cross plays
in all kinds of emergencies.
They also got the chance to speak to other British Red Cross
workers about what the Emergency Response team do, got a tour of the Response Vehicle
and had some time to go and peruse the rest of the stalls to find out what
other services there are that provide assistance during emergencies.
The weather over the preceding few days had caused a lot of
flooding locally, meaning that some of the volunteers who had been planning to
come and help run the stall were unable to attend. Gale, the Emergency Response Officer for Cheshire &
Greater Manchester, who was coordinating the team was incredibly grateful for
the support of the EmpowHER girls. She said that without them it would have
been incredibly difficult for her and her team to engage with so many members
of the public. She, and other volunteers, were incredibly impressed by how
willing the girls were to get involved, and how well they interacted with the
public.
Thank you for all your help girls – we couldn’t
have done it without you.
If you want to see what the Cheshire & Greater Manchester Emergency Response Team are up to, check out their twitter @GMCheshireER
The theme of this week’s Refugee Week really resonated with the EmpowHER team. Our programme is built around girls and young women connecting with their communities and raising their voices, inspired by the legacy of the suffragettes who came before us.
Celebrating Sanctuary in Bristol
Last week people across the country celebrated Refugee Week and World Refugee Day (20th June) with local and national arts, cultural, and educational events. It was a wonderful opportunity to foster understanding between different communities, promote the importance of sanctuary, and raise awareness of the refugee experience.
Not even the traditional English summer rain could damped the party atmosphere at the ‘Celebrating Sanctuary’ event in Bristol (or stop Kim from enjoying an ice-cream!) Amongst many other fabulous organisations who support and celebrate the contribution of refugees, the British Red Cross was there to let people know about our Refugee Support and International Family Tracing Services. Our centre in Easton, Bristol helps many people who are seeking asylum or have been granted refugee status, who often find themselves in desperate need of emotional and practical support.
Many of our EmpowHER groups have been enthusiastically supporting the work of the Red Cross with refugees and asylum seekers. The girls are keen to spread messages of welcome, kindness, and love to people who have already gone through so much, and often still have a long way to go even when they reach the safety of the UK. Some of our Gloucestershire groups are making care packages specifically aimed at those using our Refugee Service in Bristol, especially young women like themselves!
Coventry Welcomes Festival
This year launches the ‘Coventry Welcomes Festival’ as a brand to promote a more inclusive image of the city with a diverse population. The festival will follow the national theme “You,
Me and Those Who Came Before” as an invitation to explore the lives of refugees – and those who have welcomed them – throughout generations.
Within the midlands groups we had several girls expressing that they wanted to get involved in refugee week! They wanted to welcome any new families but to also reinforce the fact that refugees were welcome with messages of support and kindness. It was a great conversation starter for some of the girls who had never considered that refugees live in Coventry. YMCA were generous enough to offer to hand the messages out as most of the girls could not attend. The messages were received with great gratitude. Well done to the girl who took part! Let’s see if these small actions inspire the girls to move onto bigger actions in this area!
Experiencing loneliness can be difficult at any time of year, but when your community are celebrating together it can be isolating and upsetting if you feel alone.
The EmpowHER groups from Blackburn decided that they were going to do everything that they could do make sure that the people around them didn’t spend this Ramadan fasting in isolation. They planned what they wanted to do, shopped for the ingredients and cooked 40 Iftar packs which were then distributed to people in their community who might be experiencing loneliness over Ramadan and shared them with non-Muslims in the community.
The groups also made cards to be given out to members of their community and service users and volunteers from the British Red Cross Refugee Services. They wanted to wish Eid Mubarak to people who might be unable to celebrate with friends and family.
The
staff in one of the Manchester offices were so grateful to receive the cards to
give out. They were surprised and pleased that the EmpowHER girls had taken the
time to make cards and then send them to be given out to people who they had
never met.
This Loneliness Awareness Week we want to say a big thank you to all the EmpowHER groups who have taken part in activities big and small to show some kindness to those in their community.
You are making a real difference to the lives of people around you.
In celebration of Volunteer Week we want to say a massive thank you to all of our wonderful EmpowHER Role Models who have volunteered to give their time and talent to support the work of EmpowHER and the girls that we work with. All of these amazing individuals have shown us so much support and encouragement throughout Cohort 1 of EmpowHER.
Our Role Models come from all kinds of places, backgrounds and life experiences – here’s a bio from Alice Thickett to give you a little sneak peek of why we love and appreciate them all.
“I’m new to this British Red Cross mentoring malarkey, so I thought I would write a blog post to introduce myself and say hi!
My name is Alice and I’m a short ginger lass, originally from the West Midlands. I did academically well at school, but I was more interested in being creative and so I went to college and Uni to do art.
After my degree in Nottingham (there’s not a huge amount of art going on in Dudley), I worked at a gallery called Nottingham Contemporary with 15-25 year olds and we put on a festival for 4000 young people, which was exhausting haha! It didn’t put me off working with young people though, in fact I had a great experience and so I still work with young people now, at a University in Manchester and support students with their pastoral needs.
I did my Masters in Manchester last year in Visual
Culture and I make artwork in my spare time. My art name is Keith Bloody Mary
and I make surreal collages to try to make people laugh. The finished work
usually gets put up in pubs or published in magazines, all low key stuff, I’m
not Picasso… yet!
I really love science and usually make work in
collaboration with scientists (last year I worked with Cancer Research), I like
learning about space but I’m actually really interested in biology (ironically,
because I’m a bit of fainter!)
I’m not particularly fashionable but I love looking at
clothes and designers and model photography, I love how over the top and
creative the photos can be.
My friends would describe me as super opinionated, but I only really have an opinion to keep a conversation interesting and enjoy playing devil’s advocate. The truth is that I’m only really passionate about people being open to discussion – all we can do in life is try to see things from other people’s point of view, learn and change as a person.
Well, that got quite deep all of a sudden, so I best leave it there for now. I always think that the day is better if you don’t take it too seriously!”
The EmpowHER team have been getting stuck into our own social action projects and raising some money for Red Cross Week…
One of the best bits of my job is the moment when I’m meeting a new EmpowHER group for the first time, and I ask them to tell me what they think ‘social action’ is. I tend to get a room of blank stares and puzzled expressions to begin with, but with a bit of coaxing we quickly get down to the crux of it – social action is all about doing something to help others, finding a way to make a positive change in the world.
By the end of the session the girls and young women, those of the initial blank stares and puzzled expressions, will have filled an A2 page all the ways they can help others. The range of ideas always amazes me, from visiting neighbours who live alone to creating artwork that they can sell to raise money for a good cause. And so the seeds of a social action project are planted!
Practicing what we preach
Lots of EmpowHER social action plans are born out of specific talents and interests of the girls and young women in a group. So when the EmpowHER team started thinking about how we could contribute to the massive national fundraising effort that is Red Cross Week, we knew we should take our own advice and play to our unique strengths and passions!
Red Cross Week is a brilliant fundraising extravaganza run each year at the British Red Cross. It’s an opportunity not only to raise some all-important funds to make sure we can continue doing the great humanitarian work we do, but also a chance to raise our profile with the public. Red Cross is held every year on the week when we celebrate the birthday of the founder of the Red Cross Movement – Henry Dunant. So it’s a perfect time to start conversations with people about how the Red Cross started and the foundations of our belief that kindess can create a better world for everyone.
So that’s how we ended up with our ‘Blind date with a book’ campaign – setting up those who donate to our Red Cross Week Just Giving Page with a mystery book either about or written by an empowHERing woman – check out our previous blog post ‘What’s on our Bookshelves’ to find out more about the inspiration behind it!
The newest member of our fabulous team, Jess, drew on her love of baking and getting people together to hold a bake sale in her new office in Coventry, and all of us have been out at local supermarkets shaking a bucket for the cause and sharing lots of smiles with the shopping public (or in my case getting quite a few bemused looks as I danced along to the music of a talented busker performing nearby)
And of course our wonderful EmpowHER groups got in on the action too – despite being only a week or two into cohort 2! An amazing group of young women from Uniting Communities Org went bucket-shaking with Rhian at their local Tesco and raised a whopping £96.75, whilst a school-based group in Gloucester ran a Red Cross Tea Party at break time and raised £19.30. That’s their first taste of social action, and we can’t wait to see what they’ll do next!
In the meantime, we’re still busy role-modelling that social action habits are for life, and raising as much money as we can for Red Cross Week in the process. It’s not too late to donate and get yourself a date with an empowHERing read, or to drop a few coins in the bucket of the next Red Cross fundraiser you see!
For Red Cross Week the EmpowHER team are raising money by setting
people up on a Blind Date with a Book. If you want to get involved then check
out our JustGiving
Page
As a team we love a good story and felt this would be a good
opportunity to give you some insight into the bookshelves of Kim, Rhian and
Clarise.
Let us know your thoughts on our shelves on twitter… @kimberley_pyle
@RhianGroome @HazzieBo
How many
books are on your bookshelf?
Kim: Around 300-400 I think. Far too many for the
number of houses I’ve moved them around that’s for sure! You never really
appreciate how many books you have till they make up over half of the boxes
when you’re moving house…
Rhian: I think I counted about 250 books. I thought
I had more, but a fair chunk didn’t make the cut when I moved city.
Clarise: 40 on the shelf, and a variety dotted around
the house. There are also a lot of cookbooks in the cupboard. I gave most of my
books to charity 6 months ago, and now I miss them but I didn’t need them and
hopefully they’ve brought joy to people and raised money for fabulous causes. I
listen to a lot of audiobooks too as I find it an easy way to fit more reading
into my schedule!
How many of your books are unread?
Clarise: 5
Kim: Always quite a lot – I’m a bit terrible at
picking up books charity shops, then getting another stack out of the library
and not reading the ones sitting on my shelves. Around 35 at the mo.
Rhian: After a quick count I’ve realised I also
have about 35. I’m trying to make my way through the ’50 books before you die
list’ and so have bunch of those still to read.
What’s your favourite genre?
Rhian: I would always say I love fantasy fiction.
Think Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Dark Materials. I think a lot of my books
would be described as Young Adult.
Kim: Hmmm, very tricky. I would say fantasy,
but I also love terrible historical-detective novels, if that’s a genre.
Clarise: I like dystopian fiction, fantasy or something
with a strong female lead.
Who is your favourite female author and why?
Kim: I found this strangely tricky actually.
One of the things this exercise has taught me is that I don’t actually have
that many female authors on my shelves! But in the end I realised I have
a trio of female authors who wrote my favourite detective stories – two of them
I didn’t even know were women for ages! They are P.D. James (winner of the Diamond Dagger Award for services to
crime writing, creator of DC Adam Dalgiesh, and author of the brilliant Pride
and Prejudice sequel ‘Death Comes to Pemberly’), Agatha Christie (who needs no introduction), and Ellis Peters (author of the Brother
Cadfael mysteries – he’s a medieval Benedictine monk who solves crimes.
Obviously.)
Clarise: JK
Rowling. I LOVE Harry Potter! Rowling’s creativity and ability to build a
whole world for people to immerse themselves in is incredible. I also admire
her commitment to ensuring Harry Potter was published despite the various
barriers she was struggling to overcome and for her philanthropy.
Rhian: I also love JK, but another fave of mine is Cat Hextall. I had the joy of working with
her in my old job and her book ‘Delilah’
absolutely broke my heart. She’s an amazing woman who ahs always encouraged me
in my own writing, which I am super grateful for.
What book do you own that every girl/ woman should read?
Clarise: This is such a hard question, but two that come to mind are – ‘How to be a woman‘ by Carlin Moran and ‘The guilty feminist’ by Deborah Frances-White
Rhian: This is so difficult! I have a a whole bunch of favourite books , but I’m struggling to find one that answers this question. As I was scouring my bookshelf I stumbled upon ‘The History of Love’ by Nicole Krauss. I haven’t read it in a longtime, but i remember it being beautiful, heartbreaking and intriguing. I think it was a book I read for Uni so it’s kinda cool and experimental.
Kim: ‘The
Blessings of a Good Thick Skirt’ by Mary
Russell is an amazing book about
female travellers throughout the ages. I love it because it opened my
eyes to the fact that throughout history women have been having adventures just
as amazing as men, we just don’t hear about it as much! Often their
adventures are even more amazing because of the confining attitudes of society at
the time– my favourite chapter is the one about mountaineers like Henriette
D’Angeville, who climbed Mont Blanc in 1838 in a full length tweed skirt.
Who is your favourite woman/ girl on your bookshelf?
Rhian: Tiffany Aching! She’s the protagonist of
some of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series (which are my favourite books). She’s
a witch and she’s great. She learns what her role is with her powers, but is unashamedly
questioning the status quo. Seriously. You should read the books she is in. I
only have 2 bits of jewellery that I wear every day – one of them is her ring.
Clarise: The obvious choice for me is Hermione Granger,
she is unapologetically true to who she is and completely holds everything
together. To be real Harry wouldn’t have stood a chance defeating Voldemort
without Hermoine, she’s the real hero of the story. I’ll also give a non-Harry
Potter example (I’m sure you get the sense I really like Harry Potter by now)
Starr from The Hate You Give. Starr goes through a journey of self-discovery
and learning. I admire how she learns to bring together her two worlds, embrace
who she is and challenges racism at the risk of losing friends. Through all of
this she finds her voice and activism. I relate my teenage self to Starr in a
number of ways.
Kim: Again, I found this a tricky one, because even
by favourite books by female authors often tend to have male
protagonists. I did some reflection on this and realised that almost all
of my favourite books growing up (which mostly remain my favourites to this
day, because your favourite books only get better with every re-reading) have
boys and men as the main characters. The huge exception to this, thank
goodness, are the Tortall books by Tamora Pierce – a fantasy world of swords
and sorcery populated by strong, individual, wildly relatable heroines, each
with their own series. These books had a huge formative influence on me
as a teenager, probably because they were some of the first books I’d read
where the girls and women unabashedly took centre stage (and there was none of
this ‘you can’t really tell the female characters apart’ so unfortunately
common in a certain kind of fantasy novel). So my favourite women represented
have to be those heroines: Allana, Keladry, Daine, Alianne, and Rebekah.
Here’s a picture of Kim’s favourite female characters, drawn by her friend Sarah when they were teenagers.
What does your bookshelf say about you?
Kim: Probably that I have an unhealthy obsession with
detectives. Oh, and that one day I’ll need a library of my own, because
apparently I’m incapable of getting rid of a book.
Rhian: I think my bookshelf says that I love the
magic of stories.
Clarise: You tell me! I’m interested to know.
What else is on your bookshelf?
Clarise: A carved Diagon Alley building from my step
dad. I love that he made this for me, it’s so special. I also have a globe, a
picture of some graffiti in Barcelona and a travel book. I absolutely love to
travel so I have a few globes in the house to keep me inspired.
Rhian: Mostly ornaments that remind me of friends:
a black, plastic rose that someone gave me for Christmas, a Harry Potter box, a Terry Pratchett advent
calendar, flowers from a friend’s wedding, lots of lizard related items, weird
clock. There’s a few slightly odd items there.
Kim: Lots of mementos and pictures of friends and family, plants, and interesting rocks.
How would you describe
your bookshelf in 3 words?
Rhian: Here be dragons
Kim: Crowded, cluttered, home
Clarise: Full of females!
How would you
describe your favourite book in 3 words?
Kim: Whirlwind, discovery, family (Howl’s Moving
Castle by Diana Wynne Jones)
Clarise: Magical, escapism, comforting. (Can you guess
what it is…? Haha!)
Rhian: Fantasy, journey, heroine (The Dark Materials Trilogy by Philip Pullman)
As we mentioned at the beginning of this post we are raising money for Red Cross Week and combining our love of empowering women and books.
To get involved, head to our Just Giving Page, donate some money, email Kim with your details and we’ll send you a book!
When I was a little girl one of the worst things I could be accused of was being selfish. Being selfish meant you were mean, unkind, and unhelpful. It meant you weren’t nice.
As I grew up this stayed with me a lot and the fear of being
seen as selfish took over. I needed to put other people first. I needed to do
what they wanted me to do. I needed to please them.
In my 30s I learnt the difference between being selfish and being self-caring. Self-care means listening to my needs and acting on them. It means looking after myself so that I can be as healthy as possible and then can look after other people. It means sometimes saying no to things if I am already exhausted or stressed. It is a good thing to do.
Self-care means listening to my needs and acting on them. It means looking after myself so that I can be as healthy as possible and then can look after other people. It means sometimes saying no to things if I am already exhausted or stressed. It is a good thing to do.
I think all of us know the difference between being selfish
and showing self-care. We recognise that sometimes you have to push your own
desires aside for the good of others. But we also know that if we do that too
often then that is to the detriment of our own physical and mental health. Somehow
putting that into practice can be very tricky and we need to learn how and when
to put ourselves first and show some good self-care.
Self-care will be different for all of us. It could be a spa
day, a good book with a cup of tea, turning your phone off for an hour or two,
going to the gym, having a bath, sleeping in late, cooking a delicious dinner,
painting your nails – the list is endless and it will be personal to you. It
will be whatever energises you, relaxes you and makes you smile.
So… go for it! Say NO to the idea that putting yourself
first is selfish and say YES to caring for yourself so that you can live the
best version of who you are!
As unbelievable as it is, we’ve reached the end of our first cohort of EmpowHER!
The time has absolutely flown by.
Our EmpowHER groups have been doing so much over the past 6 months, so here are just a few of their achievements and some of our team highlights:
Happy
Holidays
Way back at the beginning of this cohort we invited the EmpowHER groups to partner with the British Red Cross Community Connect Team to send holiday cards to those experiencing loneliness and isolation over the festive period.
We received over 250 cards, many of which were handmade, covered in glitter and had positive and love filled messages in them.
These cards were distributed across the country, one service user informed us that it was the only card that she had received.
Life Saving Confidence
Learning everyday first aid skills with our Crisis Education Team was a firm favourite for many of the EmpowHER groups.
Ten groups learnt these lifesaving skills and then went on to share their new-found knowledge with others in their community. Some groups were struck by the demonstration of how to use a defibrillator and decided to raise awareness of their locations in the community. Others got groups from their community together to teach them the skills that they had learnt. One group taught the session in both English and Punjabi so that the women at their event could understand what they were teaching them.
Caitlin is 10 years old and has been attending EmpowHER sessions at InUnity since November. As part of EmpowHER, Caitlin took part in a British Red Cross First Aid awareness with Birmingham based trainer Anne-Marie. This training proved helpful when she found her Mom unconscious in the living room.
“I really enjoyed learning about the first aid and it made me more confident when my mom collapsed in the living room. She was lying on the floor, I knew her sugar must be low so I gave her an insulin injection.”
Caitlin, 10, EmpowHER participant in Birmingham
Yemen Yells
One of the Creative Academy Groups was moved by the British Red Cross Crisis Appeal for Yemen. As part of the Yemeni community, they wanted to raise awareness of what the people of Yemen are facing, and raise money to support the relief that that the Red Cross is offering.
The group ran an event in a Yemeni Centre in West Brom that included: a tombola, cake sale, refreshments, pizza, guess how many sweets in the jar, guess the teddy bears name, outdoor sports, photo booth, sweet sale, key rings for sale (made by girls), face painting, arts and crafts, first aid and interviewing people about the crisis to raise awareness.
The group ran such a professional and well-advertised event, and it was really well attended. They raised over £250 and are still accepting donations.
Fantastic
Fundraising and Dazzling Donations
Many of our EmpowHER groups decided that they wanted to incorporate fundraising into their social action projects.
Money was raised for a multitude of British Red Cross services including crisis appeals, refugee services, independent living and the general work of the organisation.
All together the groups raised almost £600 for the British Red Cross.
Many groups also collected donations of items to be sold in British Red Cross charity shops or to be given to refugees.
One group collected donations for vulnerable groups of women who have had to flee their homes, because, “sometimes we moan that we don’t have things we want or things are hard here. But other people might think what we have is luxury!”
These 14 year olds raised money to put together care packages for Women’s Groups at the British Red Cross Refugee Centre, filled with essentials like toiletries and sanitary products.
The Power
of Kindness
Many of our EmpowHER groups decided to embrace the British Red Cross ethos of the Power of Kindness, so they ran events and activities to share advice and guidance on the importance of well-being and tips for how to look after our mental health.
At Cashes Green primary school, our EmpowHER group wanted to share what they’d learned – not only did they spread the word on Valentines Day by handing out paper hearts full of positive messages, they took it further by running Well-being Workshops with every class in their school. These amazing ten and eleven year olds ran sessions throughout the day, guiding all 140 of their peers through making Emotional Well-being tool kits and positive self-talk flowers – a great activity in which each petal features something you love about yourself and know you’re great at, to remind you to be kind to yourself when you’re struggling with something new or hard.
Celebrating
in Style
To celebrate all these incredible achievements, we’ve been having regional Celebration Events over the past few weeks.
It’s been an absolute joy to get all the EmpowHER groups in the same room and to whoop and cheer as they received certificates for all they have done with EmpowHER, shared stories of what they’ve been doing and had fun celebrating with copious amounts of food and sweets.
We also had the pleasure of presenting some of the girls with a Recognise certificate, the first part of the RED British Red Cross Award for young volunteers.
Seeing all the girls smiling excitedly and rocking their EmpowHER hoodies was a wonderful experience for all the EmpowHER team. We’re so proud of everyone who took part in Cohort 1, and hope that what they have learnt about themselves and their communities will stay with them for many years to come.
Rhian ready to rock an EmpowHER hoodie at the brilliant North West Celebration Event!
So the time has come for me to say my goodbyes to everyone
and everything EmpowHER and I am so not ready!
The last few months have flown by as I’ve watched such
amazing achievements come to light, I have frequently been in awe of events and
projects that have become such great successes.
I must say, this feels like one of the hardest tasks I have
ever had to complete, summarising my time and favourite moments is monumentally
difficult- when it’s all been so great!
So here goes!
I have absolutely loved meeting girls with such a wide range
of interests, skills, backgrounds and personalities. The sheer amount of enthusiasm
I have witnessed throughout the first Cohort has been more than inspiring. I
have learnt something new from every group, every girl and every youth worker.
Being able to connect with such a diverse set of participants has truly widened
my mind and developed my knowledge immensely. I would like to thank every one
of you for meeting me, speaking with me and showing me what you can do! You are
truly inspiring; no barriers can stop you from reaching your goals- that’s kick
ass!
The primary school girls from InUnity never failed to make me smile, so much energy and commitment. You never struggled to think of something you could do to make someone else’s day a little better and you never turned down a challenge. You should be so proud of yourselves, the keyrings you made sold out in a week! And you’re all now first aid experts from what I have heard!
I was amazed by the donation drive collected by InUnity’s older girls, I couldn’t even fit it all in my car! Although I didn’t get chance to meet you, I am still inspired by the hard work this must have taken.
InUnity girls learning life-saving first aid skills
Keyrings made by InUnity for their local British Red Cross shop. They sold out in a week!
I couldn’t even fit all these donations in my car! They were collected by InUnity for the British Red Cross Refugee Support Service
I definitely can’t forget to mention the Creative Academies Network Yemen group. The event that you put on was absolutely fantastic and I could not believe my eyes as I entered the venue. You had decorated, set up and the ‘together’ atmosphere was captivating. And WOW! Over £250 raised, you should feel so proud!
All of the girls in the Coventry Youth Partnership, including Positive Youth Foundation, YMCA, Grapevine, Coventry Boys and Girls Club and Creative Optimistic Visions:
Wow, there are so so many of you guys! I may not have been able to meet all of you, but I sure have heard a lot about you. I’ve followed your achievements through twitter and newsletters and what you have done is breath taking. You truly have taken causes that mean a lot to you and made a serious difference. I have had the pleasure of seeing some of you learn first aid skills, create Mental Health first aid kits and contribute to the national Christmas Card scheme, ensuring that people aren’t feeling lonely over the festive season.
Overall girls, you
should be so proud of yourselves and I know that your youth workers are proud
of you too. You truly have empowered yourselves. Now don’t forget, empowered
women, empower women. You are the role models for the next group of girls on
the project and even if you don’t feel it, I can promise you that you could
teach them and show them and inspire them- my favourite quote of the project “You can’t be, what you can’t see”, so
let’s make sure they can see it in you!
Now before I close off after typing away about all my
favourite bits (there were so many, I have condensed this a considerable
amount), I want to talk about the EmpowHER team, whether they be role models,
British Red Cross services who have collaborated, the team at UK Youth, or of
course my wonderful team mates Clarise, Kim and Rhian. You have done the most amazing job, and are
continuing to do so. Your innovative thinking, your creativity, your
commitment, enthusiasm, support, hard work and so much more are absolutely
imperative to this project and I want you to feel empowered and proud of what
you accomplish every day too!
The BRC EmpowHER team (plus a stray flamingo) at the South West Cohort 1 Celebration Evening!
I have also love love loved being able to attend and be a
part so many really exciting events- and by the way, I WILL be seeing you all
at the Midlands Celebration Event, there is no way I am missing out on that!
Right I need to sign off because I could keep writing for
hours but OMG I am going to miss everything and everyone so much!
One of the few female war
artists of the Second World War, Doris Clare Zinkeisen travelled overseas to
paint the horrors of war and was the first artist on the scene at the liberated
Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp. Doris offered her services as a war artist at
a time when the artistic portrayal of war was very much a man’s territory. She
was commissioned by the War Artists Advisory Committee to record and reflect
the humanitarian work of the Joint War Organisation of the British Red Cross
and Order of St John as it moved into newly liberated Europe in the 1940s.
British Red Cross relief team issuing gift bags containing comforts to prisoners of war in Brussels before they return home. Doris Clare Zinkeisen, 1945.
Copyright: Doris Zinkeisen’s estate. Photo credit: British Red Cross Museum & Archives.
Doris was born in Scotland
in 1898 and moved with her family to Middlesex in 1909. Having shown great artistic
talent from a young age, Doris and her sister, Anna Zinkeisen, were awarded scholarships
to the Royal Academy Schools in Piccadilly, now the Royal Academy of Arts. This
was Britain’s first institution which provided professional art training. She and
Anna exhibited their work in the Royal Academy summer exhibition of 1921 along
with a circle of female artists. This was however met with much controversy as
traditional art circles were furious with the decision to give these women a
prominent position in the exhibition. Nevertheless, Doris soon became a highly
acclaimed society portraitist and a well-known costume and set designer. One of
her well-known works include costume designs for Noel Coward’s play This Year of Grace at the London
Pavillion in 1928. She also designed murals for the RMS Queen Mary in 1935 and
RMS Queen Elizabeth in 1940 as well as producing commercial Railway posters.
British Red Cross relief team issuing gift bags containing comforts to prisoners of war in Brussels before they return home. Doris Clare Zinkeisen, 1945.
Copyright: Doris Zinkeisen’s estate. Photo credit: British Red Cross Museum & Archives.
During the First World War, Doris
volunteered as a VAD (Voluntary Aid Detachment) nurse in a hospital in Northwood,
Middlesex caring for convalescing soldiers injured on the front. Her record
card held by the British Red Cross shows that she volunteered from June 1918 to
January 1919. During the Second World
War, Doris once again volunteered as a VAD nurse in St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington
where she nursed air raid victims. Combining her humanitarian work with her
artistic skills, she produced paintings of wounded air raid victims she nursed.
Although often forgotten and despite the limited
opportunities provided at the time, female artists produced fascinating works
of art showing their portrayal of war. The first official war artists’ scheme
was set up in 1916 by the British government. 47 men were commissioned with
only four women of which three had their work rejected. The War Artists
Advisory Committee was set up by the British Government in 1939. When the committee was dissolved in December 1945, its
collection consisted of 5,570 works of art produced by over four hundred
artists. These artists consisted of those employed on either full-time or
short-term contracts or those who were commissioned for individual works to be acquired
by the Committee. Of the approximate 400 artists, only 52 were women with only
one woman on a full-time contract. Doris was commissioned at the end of the war
and her paintings were amongst the works acquired by the Committee. She
was amongst the few women who broke the stereotypes and braved the horrors of war
to tell the story of war beyond the home front. She travelled around north-west
Europe by lorry or by air from a nearby RAF base, sketching images in different
places and then transforming them into oil paintings in her studio based in Brussels
at the Joint War Commission’s headquarters, which had been the German
headquarters during the occupation.
Air ambulance being unloaded near Bruges. Doris Clare Zinkeisen, 1945
Copyright: Doris Zinkeisen’s estate. Photo credit: British Red Cross Museum & Archives.
Four of the paintings by Doris Zinkeisen are held by the British Red Cross Museum collection, others are held by the Imperial War Museum & the Museum of the Order of St John.
Doris was the first artist
to enter the infamous Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp after it was liberated
on 15 April 1945, she would have witnessed the 13,000 unburied bodies and
around 60,000 inmates, most acutely sick and starving. Her paintings not only captured the relief work carried out by the
British Red Cross, but the disturbing scenes of captivity and the pain and
suffering around her. In letters that she wrote to her husband, she described
the horrors that had taken place “The shock of Belsen was never
to be forgotten. First of all was the ghastly smell of typhus. The simply
ghastly sight of skeleton bodies just flung out of the huts.” She stayed at the camp until it was burnt
down on the 21 May 1945.
Human Laundry, Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, Doris Zinkeisen, April 1945
Copyright: IWM (Art.IWM Art LD 5468)
No doubt the
horrors of war haunted Doris for some time after she finished her work in 1945.
Nevertheless, she returned to work as a theatrical designer and held
exhibitions of her work. Following the death of her husband in 1946, she moved
to Suffolk with her two daughters and died at the age of 92 in 1991.
Burning of Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp. Doris Clare Zinkeisen, 1945
Copyright: Doris Zinkeisen’s estate. Photo credit: British Red Cross Museum & Archives
Although small in
number, Doris Zinkeisen and other women artists ensured that war was not just seen
through the eyes of men, they showed that women could also play a crucial role
in portraying and interpreting war. The role of women during the First and
Second World Wars is often remembered as consisting of nursing and caring for
injured soldiers and civilians, however art produced by women illustrates that
women’s contribution to humanitarian work during the wars went beyond this. They
had not only the creative talents but the strength to unflinchingly record and present
the traumatic and horrific scenes of war.
British Red Cross EmpowHER 