About

Who says smashing injustice can’t be fun?
— Flickfilosopher on 'Bank Job'

Our practice spans 20 years of independent art and film production, honing these crafts and the ways they invite, greet and build community and audiences. We produce feature documentary films full of purpose and mischief - stories that involve movement making and large scale, eventful and participatory art practice.

We work hyper locally with global reach. We are grounded in place and work closely with an ecosytem of collaborating organisations both on the production and on the impact campaigns around each work.

In 2018 we set up Optimistic Foundation cic working alongside our film production company Optimistic Productions Ltd and embedding community in our working practice and manifesto.

Based in Waltham Forest , North East London we are committed to local training, employment and community wealth building. We reject the often derisive use of the words 'local’ and ‘community’ within ‘artspeak’ and both make and make the case for a visionary practice built from embedded grassroots work.

Our feature documentaries have premiered at BFI London Film Festival and Hot Docs, had cinematic releases nationally and internationally, been commissioned by and featured on Netflix and C4 and nominated for Grierson and British Independent Film Awards. Our artworks have been exhibited and are in the collections of institutions from the V&A to MOMA NY and Cambridge Fitzwilliam Museum. We were recently named Big Issue Changemakers of the year, won Samantha Heath changemaker of the year at the Sustainable Cities Awards, were GLA Civic Futures Fellows 2023 and are part of FootWork Trust’s 2024 ‘People and Place’ cohort. We are currently finalists in the Ashden Awards ‘People’s Energy’ category.

It’s genius, and poetic and humorous and impactful. Just the best!
— Seth Honnor. Artistic Director, Kaleider
Other people talk, but these folk act. They are brave and committed artists and we need more like them to show us the way forward.
— Crowdfunder supporter.