Crankie-making and Storytelling: a two-weekend course

A creative course for anyone who loves image-making and story, and would like to explore combining these art forms.

Sat 6 - Sun 7 Feb  & Sat 6-Sun 7 March 2027

10am - 6pm 

The Old Endowed School, Rodborough, Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 3NF

£460 - including all materials

A two-weekend workshop in Crankie-making and Storytelling. This creative course is for anyone who loves image-making and story and would like to explore combining these art forms. Bring a story to life with a beautiful crankie box of your own dreaming and design, with instruction from professional crankie-artist Bronia Evers and professional storyteller Hannah Moore. Whether you’re an artist with a curiosity about narrative, or a storyteller with a hunger for craft, this course has a lot to offer. Equally, no experience in art, craft or storytelling is necessary, just a willingness to come and enjoy the creative process. 

FAQs

1. What is a Crankie?
2. More about Storytelling
3. What will I get from the two weekends?
4. What stories will we work with?
5. What else will the workshops involve?
6. Why two weekends?
7. Practical information and course fees
8. Contact details
9. About the facilitators

1.What is a crankie?

A crankie theatre is a storytelling machine - an artistic, narrative form of moving image.

The crankie box, open at the front like a picture frame, contains a long illustrated scroll turned by a handle. As the images on the scroll appear and disappear, the story is told. 

Crankies can offer us a connection with the past that brings sweet surprise and delight in the present. The first crankies were made in the Victorian era and were known as Moving Panoramas. Today, crankies are part of a revival of folk and story-related crafts, and are used by storytellers, artists and musicians to engage audiences of all ages. 

As stories told with crankies offer both an aural and visual experience, they can act as a portal into the story world, and bring a special layer of magic to the telling of a tale. The rhythmic motion of the handles turning and the images scrolling past can help anchor and slow our busy minds, and enable us dream  deeper into the story that is being shared.

2. Storytelling

We’ll be working with traditional oral storytelling - ways to remember and bring a story to life without needing a book or a script. When traditional storytellers tell a story live and in the moment, they use all sorts of fun and imaginative techniques to help their listeners enter the ‘cinema’ in their own minds, and see the story take vivid shape in their imagination. Tellers also work with the story in

ternally, using creative exercises to develop their deeper understanding of the themes, meanings and resonances that the tale carries in its images. With whatever story you want to bring to life, we’ll explore several of these processes over the two weekends, to help you tell your tale  confidently, dynamically, imaginatively and impactfully, even if you've never told before. 

3. What will I get from the two weekends?

• 4 days (spread over two weekends) of in-person tuition from two experienced facilitators
• Make your own crankie box
• Develop a rich connection to the story you choose to work with 
• Design a crankie scroll to accompany your story
• Learn skills for telling stories live, supported by the moving images of your crankie artwork 
• A four-week period between the two course weekends to develop your work
• An online creativity evening half way through this five weeks period to connect, share progress and make together.
• An opportunity to share work-in-progress during the final afternoon of the course in a supportive environment

4. What stories will we work with? 

We will invite you to choose a short story to work with in advance. This could be a simple folk tale, a poem, song or rhyme that has some kind of narrative element, or a short story from your own life or your family history.  You might also choose a section from a longer story like a fairy tale or myth.

5. What else can I expect from the course?

• Games and play
• Creative exercises
• Image-making
• Oral storytelling techniques and activities
• Tools for journeying deeper into a story you want to tell 
• Experimental play with a range of art materials
• Lots of cups of tea 
• Creative chat

6. Why two weekends?

The course has been designed to allow participants time to develop their story and crankie work between sessions, which is why we’ve planned a  four-week gap between the two weekends. There will also be one evening group zoom call half-way between the two weekends, where participants can check in, ask the tutors questions and listen to a story whilst doing some making on their crankie box. 

7. Practical info and course fees :

The fee for the course is £460 inclusive of materials and refreshments. 

If money is a barrier to you attending the course, please email the facilitators to discuss. 

Please note this is a non-residential course. If you are coming from further afield, you will need to organise your own accommodation.

Tea, coffee and light refeshments will be provided throughout the weekends. You will need to bring your own lunch. There are supermarkets and cafes within a 5-minute drive of the venue. 

8. Contact

Any questions or enquiries, please email:

Bronia Evers: onemomentintimetheatre@googlemail.com

Hannah Moore: hannahmoorestoryteller@gmail.com 

9. About the facilitators:

Bronia Evers

Bronia is a storyteller, visual artist and crankie maker.  Her work weaves together story and craft, featuring hand-made crankie theatres, puppets and miniature story worlds. She is co-founder of the company One Moment In Time, with whom she has been making and performing story-based work since 2006. 

Bronia's work has appeared at venues including Oxford Story Museum, Manchester Literature Festival,The Puppet Barge, and Beyond The Border International Storytelling Festival. She has facilitated workshops nationally and internationally for people of all ages and abilities, and has been a guest tutor for organisations including Little Angel Theatre, The Ministry of Stories and The School of Storytelling in Sussex. She is based in Stroud, Gloucestershire.

https://www.broniaevers.com/

Hannah Moore 

Hannah is a traditional storyteller with a background in theatre, dance and restorative justice. From touring shows to arts centres and theatres to telling stories in therapeutic settings, Hannah is passionate about the power of stories to transport and transform. She trained with and now teaches for the School of Storytelling. She has performed folk tales, fairy tales and myths for adults at events and festivals across the UK and Europe. 

She runs a monthly storytelling night The Wonder Night Cafe - like a book club for wondertales in her local town of Stroud, and offers creative storytelling courses and workshops both online and in person, including the Fairy Tales for the Fearless series and internationally acclaimed Tree of Stories programme. Hannah’s favourite thing about storytelling is how the ancient stories meet us now - the way that each listener who journeys with a story may find themselves within it, and how the right stories have the power to bring the right change when we need it.

www.hannahmoore.co.uk