Press Release issued: 6 February 2013.
The internationally famous Glasgow Film Festival opens next week, boasting the motto 'cinema for all'. But just how accessible are its films to people with sight loss? That's the subject of a new radio programme today exploring how open the arts are in Scotland generally.
Presenter Jill Daley, who is herself blind, interviews Alison Gardner, co-director of the Glasgow Film Theatre, on her lunchtime show 'The Arts Gallery', broadcast by Partick-based Insight Radio.
The award-winning station was launched by sight loss charity RNIB in 2006. Many of its presenters and producers, themselves, have sight loss.
On today's show, Daley praises the GFT for its efforts to show those films that are audio-described - the on-screen actions being explained by a narrator through special earphones for audience-members who are blind or partially sighted.
But Gardner warns this can be more difficult to achieve for Festival films. "We will have 57 UK premieres of films, sometimes far in advance of their general release-date," she explains. "Unfortunately, not a lot of films we're showing at this year's Festival are audio-described. We're getting films virtually straight from the lab, so they won't yet have audio-description added, though they may do later."
For its general monthly film-programmes, however, the GFT does strive hard to book audio-described films wherever possible. "Every month we check which films are available that are audio-described and try to get them. We take our motto, 'cinema for all', very seriously in terms of access," insists Gardner.
"Unfortunately, a lot of films that are audio-described are not GFT-type films, so fall outside our remit. But if there's a film that we can bring back in our 'Did you miss' section that has AD-captioning it will win out over a film that does not."
The programme also discusses the range of venues that will show Festival films this month.
"This year's Glasgow Film Festival is the most extensive yet with 26 venues," says Gardner. "We are obviously limited to space at the GFT, but we have partners onboard, including Cineworld and Glasgow Cathedral. We're showing the 1928 silent classic 'The Passion of Joan of Arc' in Glasgow Cathedral with music written for a church and soprano. In fact, we have 26 venues in total, so it really is a citywide film festival
"We're very good at using our community, our city, our spaces and our audience really appreciates it."
The weekly 'Arts Gallery' slot showcases Scottish creative arts that people without sight can experience and enjoy, from audio description to touch-tours and talking books.
Jill Daley said: "I lost my own sight at the age of 19 due to diabetic retinopathy. My world, at the time, had been plunged into darkness in the space of two weeks. Having always been a lover of cinema, live music, theatre and art, my mum and my friends tried to include me and did their best to describe what was going on.
"This is why I am so excited about this new series. With 'The Arts Gallery', I want to bring the arts to people living with sight loss. The big difference for me now is that all these are so much more accessible, and I can enjoy others creativity in a more independent way. My hope is that blind and partially sighted listeners will be inspired to open themselves to many of the arts."