Ant Heald

I won the Writers' Hour Magazine competition on the theme of 'Roots' with this entry. the competition was judged by Kathryn Tanner, co-founder and non-fiction editor of the Welsh literary journal 'Folding Rock'.

I was commissioned again to contribute to the annual series of Nation.Cymru 'cultural highlights of the year'. Includes Welsh National Opera productions (referring to their ongoing funding difficulties), poetry collections from Welsh poets Rhian Elizabeth and Grahame Davies, and music biographies from Simon Raymonde and Will Hodgkinson

This personal essay was one of two runner's up winners in the 2022 'Planet' magazine new writers' award. It was subsequently published here in Nation.Cymru.

Article on the launch of 'Hon' - an illustrated hardback book featuring the work and words of ten women artists from across Wales, and accompanying art exhibition. As well as writing the article, I took the included photographs.

Opinion
Ant Heald
Last year I wrote a Letter from Llanelli for Nation.Cymru, acknowledging the economic decline of the town, but claiming that if we can build on its proud past while looking to the future, it can surely be great again.
Now, Llanelli is in the news for the protests and counter-protests relating to the decision to use a hotel in the town to house asylum seekers.
So, it seems a timely moment to look beyond Llanelli’s headline-making troubles and profile one of the people rising ...

Culture

Review of cultural highlights of 2022

Contribution to "Letter from ..." feature, a weekly column by writers from towns across Wales.

“What’s the catch?”

The question came out of, then drifted across the blue towards Whiteford Lighthouse as we gazed across the mirror-flat waters of the Loughor estuary on a beautiful crisp cloudless morning.

I was just finishing my beach dog walk and marvelling that I actually live here, and that this glorious ever-changing tidal vista is one I can see every day. My interlocutor was an English house-hunter, drawn westwards by holiday memories

He was on his way to Pembrokesh...

Review of 'Cultural Alzheimers and Other Essays' by Osi Rhys Osmond

Culture Section: Nation.Cymru

“Strangely, the recent past when re-examined through the photograph, can sometimes look more remote than the distant past.” This sentence appears in an essay re-published in this miscellany of writing by and about Osi Rhys Osmond.

It originally appeared in a book of photographs documenting life after coal in the Afan valley, a fitting subject for Osmond, who was himself a product of the South Wales coalfield, born into a mining family in the Sirhowy valley, north of Newport....

Culture

The third Osi Rhys Osmond (ORO) Art Prize was recently awarded at an emotional evening celebrating the life of the Welsh artist who died in 2015.

Osi’s relatives and friends, the shortlisted artists, and members of the public filled Llansteffan Memorial Hall, just yards from the house and studio that was Osi’s home, for an evening of wine and food, music and words, and of course appreciation of Osi’s artistic legacy, and the promising talent being nurtured and recognised by the award ...

I had two poems 'New Years Day' and 'Feathered' published in this anthology.

Welcome to our Christmas and winter volume III anthology - our third annual; volume! It's been ten months of work to curate this beautiful book, that's ideal for lovers of literature and winter traditions.

Once again, we feature the stunning work of Gower artist, Emma Bissonnet, and the work of approximately 100 writers from across the world. The edition is edited by Welsh writer Matthew M. C. Smith and sub-edited by Damien B. Donnelly and M.S. Evans.

Feature article based on an interview with Tania Szabó, daughter of WW2 heroine and George Cross recipient, Violette Szabó

On the 26th June, a picnic will be held on The Groe in Builth Wells celebrating the 101st anniversary of the birth of Lt. Violette Szabó GC. Centenary celebrations took place last year, but were restricted by Covid regulations.

This year, it is hoped that the public celebration will be on a scale that Violette’s short but extraordinary life deserves.

Violette Szabó is one half of the most highly decorated married couple of World War II.

News article:

For the first time in decades this weekend, beams of light have shone from Whiteford Point lighthouse across the waters of the Loughor estuary in celebration of the Queen’s platinum jubilee.

Spectators gathered to watch a pair of LED lights, powered by batteries charged by solar-panels, shine across the sea towards Llanelli and Penclawdd.

Triggered by a timer, the lights beamed out just after sunset from Thursday to Saturday of the jubilee holiday weekend, delighting hundreds of onlooker...

Culture
Ant Heald
For those of us for whom manual work extends no further than pecking at a keyboard, industrial estates are forests of inscrutable boxy buildings that we drive past on the way to the supermarket.
Maybe an ill-advised venture into the world of home-improvements might lead us to one of the bigger warehouse-stores that often front such industrial zones, proclaiming themselves ‘open to trade and public’.
But proper industrial estates, where stuff actually happens, where things ge...