Sophie Everest

Sophie Everest

Dr

  • Lecturer in Film Practice, Drama

Accepting PhD Students

PhD projects

Inviting PhD candidates interested in practice-based approaches to cultural heritage research.

Personal profile

Overview

I am a Lecturer in Film Practice in the Drama Department at the University of Manchester. My research explores the role of filmmaking as museological, archival and heritage practice. 

I started my career in factual television production, working for the majority of time in BBC Current Affairs where I first developed my skills as a self-shooting documentary director and editor. Alongside my role at the University I am a Director of Belle Vue Productions, a film production and creative research company that works with arts and heritage organisations.

My research connects directly with my work at Belle Vue, implementing and investigating film as a tool to capture and initiate relationships between audiences, collections and cultural practice within museums, archives and heritage spaces. Underpinning my research is a commitment to film as a socially engaged practice that invites collaboration and co-creation. I am particularly interested in using film archives and film practice to co-investigate colonial museum histories with audience communities; archival film; film as contemporary collecting practice and film as a tool for advocacy and evaluation.

I have worked with a wide range of cultural and charitable partners including The Greater Manchester Combined Authority; The Barbican Gallery; National Museums Liverpool; Showtown: The Blackpool Museum Project; The Whitworth Art Gallery; The Manchester Museum; Manchester City Council; Manchester Art Gallery; The Women’s Institute; The Churches Conservation Trust and Wood Street Mission.

CURRENT PROJECTS:

Film partner: AHRC Pet Histories and Wellbeing Project with the Geffrye Museum of the Home

Film partner: Platt Hall Inbetween https://www.platthall.org/

Film and evaluation partner: Greater Manchester Combined Authority Cultural Strategy

Film partner: ‘Where Next?’ gallery re-development project at Liverpool’s World Museum

Film partner: Manchester Together Archive project with the Institute for Cultural Practices, University of Manchester, Manchester Art Gallery and Archives+ 

Before joining the Drama Department I also taught filmmaking within the History Department and filmmaking and cultural policy within Arts Management Policy and Practice, both at the University of Manchester. My MA and AHRC-funded practice-based PhD 'Film and the Production of Knowledge at the Manchester Museum' were both completed in Museum Studies at The University of Manchester.

Expertise related to UN Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. This person’s work contributes towards the following SDG(s):

  • SDG 4 - Quality Education

Education/Academic qualification

Master of Arts, Art Gallery and Museum Studies, The University of Manchester

26 Sept 200820 Sept 2009

Award Date: 21 Oct 2009

Bachelor of Arts, English , Oxford University

19972000

Award Date: 21 Sept 2000

External positions

Board Member, Greater Manchester Combined Authority Culture and Heritage Steering Group

2018 → …

Director, Belle Vue Productions

1 Apr 2013 → …

Areas of expertise

  • AM Museums (General). Collectors and collecting (General)
  • Film practice
  • Archives and creative archival practice

Research Beacons, Institutes and Platforms

  • Digital Futures
  • Creative Manchester

Keywords

  • Practice as research
  • film practice
  • Museum Ethnography
  • Museum Natural History
  • Evaluation
  • Material Culture
  • Knowledge Production
  • Archive film
  • Contemporary Collecting
  • Colonial histories

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