Flatpack Festival
Film for all the senses

What happened to Iris?

Thursday 31st May, 2018

As part of the for-Wards Birmingham Public Music Project, we are proud to present the final Erdington performance of IRIS by local artist Scott Johannsson.

On June 16th, 1968, it has been reported that Erdington native Iris Threadwell (1897 - ?) attended a service at St. Barnabus Church. After leaving, she was reportedly seen wandering, confused, about the churchyard. When a concerned police officer approached the yard to assist her, she was gone...

Following on from a work-in-progress installation during Flatpack Festival in April, filmmaker/musician/Erdington native Scott Johannsson has continued working with a number of Erdington community groups as part of the citywide for-Wards music programme, culminating in his return to the area with a live audio visual performance dedicated to Iris' disappearance.

Scott's work often incorporates pre-digital media, drawing on techniques and ideas from early cinema and surrealism and harnesses his fascination with the interaction of sound and image to play a part in the film and animation workshops he delivers with young people and adult learners.

These fascinations and focuses have resulted in IRIS with a large scale electronic installation of semi-improvised electronic music using vintage analog synthesisers, cut-up voice and field recordings and super eight projections. Scott will deliver a 'prepared history' of Iris Threadwell that blends the details of Iris' life and mysterious vanishing in June 1968 with personal and communal reminiscence and local history.

It's going to be pretty fascinating stuff.

WBirmingham 68to be supporting this unique performance to Erdington as part of our Birmingham 68 project this summer. This project is dedicated to uncovering, documenting and celebrating the changing cultural landscape of Birmingham in 1968 resulting in a series of events, podcasts and an academic publication at the end of the summer.

IRIS will take place on Saturday 16th June at the Main Entrance of St. Barnabas Church, Erdington and will be followed by free tea, coffee and cakes in the church cafe.

The performance will start at 15:33.

It's completely free! Register your attendance here.

Come along and discover, what happened to Iris?


Huge thanks to for-Wards and the children of Chivenor School, Erdington Welcome Cafe, Kingstanding Food Community Project and Stockland Green Local History Group for all the help and contributions to the project and final performance.

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