Art projects in north Essex have been granted cash by the Eastern Arts Board to help celebrate the year of the artist.

The money has been granted to help fund artist residencies, which will bring artists out of their usual studios or rehearsal spaces and into the community.

The year of the artist will be officially launched in June and will see 1,000 artists working in residencies throughout England.

Eastern Arts Board has now announced the first 32 out of a final total of 100 grants set to be handed out to help the project along.

Media artist Christopher Andrews will take up a residency with the charity Mind and this will allow him to work with people involved with mental health services in Colchester.

The project has received £3,900 of funding and Mr Andrews will work with the Oxford Road Project and Mind Centre and use facilities at the Signals Media Centre.

A grant of £3,850 has been awarded to Jenni Meredith, who will be working with staff, crew and passengers on board and in departure lounges of ferries operating out of Harwich.

This will allow her to spend time on board ship and at port to develop digital imaging, video and poetry.

Essex County Council will also be holding a residency with the help of artist Gail Pearce and an Eastern Arts Board grant of £4,750.

She has been drafted in to create individual screen savers for employees' computers so while the computers are not in use meaningful and thought-provoking messages can be portrayed.

A grant of £4,800 has been awarded to Signals Media Arts to help fund its Cooking the Books project.

Artists Gail Pearce and Zbigniew Jaroc will look at the history of Colchester's first library, built in 1894, now used as a restaurant for Town Hall employees.

Writtle College has been awarded £5,000 to pay for a part-time fellowship.

It will join together with Commissions East - which commissions works of public art - to research ways in which artists, horticulturists and landscape designers can work together.

The poems will be performed on board ship with exhibitions in the departure lounges and improvisation sessions with the ferries' resident pianists.

The project will run from June to August with a final exhibition in the autumn.

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