MAKING ART - CONNECTING PEOPLE

Dee Moxon one of Lamplighter Arts CIC's original founders, started to make giant puppets in 1998 and found she just couldn't stop.

 

This fascination with big puppets led her to form Gynormous Rawkus (2001-2011). Dee instigated and ran The Easton Carnival Procession from 1999 continuing as Gynormous Rawkus from 2001-7. Alongside this, Dee worked both nationally and internationally creating carnival teams and really big puppets for both community and corporate clients.

 

Dee works with people of all ages and abilities using accessible workshop techniques at every stage. This has given her the privilege of being at the heart of communities as they celebrate. One of the most special occasions involved building a 40ft Dragon Lantern in the village of Dinder near Wells, Somerset to celebrate their dragon festival (documented in The Doomsday Book) which happens every 50 years. In 2011 the work of Gynormous Rawkus culminated in the making and performing of giant puppets for global brands Manchester United and Chelsea Football Clubs.

Since Gynormous Rawkus, Dee has become very interested in working with social history and special places, collaborating with many artists to create numerous visual arts pieces from story quilts to entire carnival teams and events.  Dee Moxon was integral in the rekindling of The Goram Fair with the Arts Enlarge team, a partnership project with Bristol City Council and Goram Events, leading in the project design & funding of 'Goram's garden' 2016 and Goram's Homecoming (2017) which was a large Oral History gathering piece of work in (2017) and Avona's Tide (2019) this saw the creation of a "giant" temporary public artworks in the grounds of Blaise Castle Estate. 

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 In 2016 Dee was delighted to receive Arts Council England's Artists International Development Fund to travel to New York City where she worked alongside Processional Art Workshops researching storytelling through processional arts.

 

 Early 2018 saw Dee being commissioned to produce the major event for Bristol Centenary City commemorating the exact Day 100 years ago when (some) women won the right to vote. Most recently (2021-2023) Dee worked alongside Streets Reimagined and Community Design Agency to bring about the finale lantern spectacular of Govandi Arts Festival the flagship project of British Council UK/ India Together celebrating 75 years of India. Very occasionally she writes a BLOG.