Memorial to Godfrey Smith – Friend of Highlight Arts
24th February 2015Highlight Arts recently lost one of our good friends, long-time supporters and great inspiration, Godfrey Smith (18 November 1948 – 12 January 2015).
Godfrey Smith
Godfrey was involved in the first Reel Afghanistan festival we held in 2008 in Edinburgh, and a number of meetings we had about the project was in the house he shared with his partner Sheila, in Balmaclellan, Galloway. We would gather around their wood burning stove, which sat alongside Godfrey’s shoe-making workshop, Clog and Shoe, which was the last workshop in Scotland to make handmade clogs and shoes. We were welcomed by them both and given the space, encouragement and inspiration to make our ideas a reality. Godfrey had a strong interest in Afghanistan, he’d been going over there since getting involved in Afghan Schools in 2003 with his long-term friend and serial-collaborator Robin Ade. Their work with Afghan Schools was a huge inspiration to us. They worked together with friends in Afghanistan and tried to think constructively what they could do that would be of use as the conflict continued, whilst based in the UK. Godfrey, as chairman of the Afghan Schools Trust, presided over many activities in Nuristan including the building of six primary schools, a women’s education centre, and a large primary school for 500 pupils. Many former students are now in further education both at home and abroad.
Godfrey was also a founder of South West Community Woodland Trust, which has permanent use of the land at Taliesin, an ancient woodland site in south west Scotland, where craft workshops, festivals and events were held.
Godfrey was incredibly supportive of the plans for Reel Afghanistan, he was familiar with the rich arts being produced there and was keen to find a way to showcase this in the UK. He helped us with suggestions of people to speak to and calling in favours from various friends, including exhibiting the wonderful black and white photographs of Afghanistan in the 1970s by Aliki Sapountzi to the practical support of putting up some of the artists taking part in friends houses, vital for a cash-strapped festival being run by a bunch of novices.
Although Godfrey’s main personal area of interest was Afghanistan, he continued to be incredibly supportive of the festival’s ideas, and it was natural that we would gather once again in his house to discuss how the idea could progress, and deciding that we would follow Reel Afghanistan with a series of events focusing on Iraq in 2009. Godfrey stayed supportive, coming up to Edinburgh for the festival and ferrying guests around town in his blue van. Godfrey would always say yes if you asked him to help, always approaching tasks with an optimism and sense of humour and respect that was infectious. Many of the artists he drove around the town said that interacting with him was one of the highlights of the time at the festival.
Over the following years Godfrey stayed involved in Reel Festivals on the sidelines, as a long-term champion of the project. He encouraged us to keep going, and helped out however he could. We last saw him at our re-launch party in October 2014 in Edinburgh, and we spoke to him in December and he was delighted to hear what a good time we’d had in Pakistan and was looking forward to helping out with the project in the UK. Godfrey was a worldly and open character who was full of life. Godfrey touched so many lives, from all corners of the world, and has helped unite us not only as individuals, but as a planet.
If you would like to donate to Afghan Schools Trust you can do so here.
