REPLAY Festival
- A celebration of children and young people’s creativity and play.
- A film, photography, and media festival made for and by children and young people.
REPLAY was a joyful celebration of children and young people’s creativity and play. The festival showcased digital media arts projects that were part of the Arts Council England funded, Place Partnership programme, including films, games, zines and photography made by children and young people in local schools and colleges.
REPLAY ran from 10 to 15 November 2026 in schools, at the Arc Cinema, at Wentworth Woodhouse and in ROAR’s Garage Gallery.
Each of these creative learning projects aimed to develop children and young people’s digital literacies and to embed opportunities for developing agency.
You can read the report ‘Embedding Agency in Digital Media Arts Projects with Children and young People’ on the Evaluation Hub.
Visit the Evaluation Hub
What if a magic, flying car...?
Young people from six primary schools (Meadow View Primary, Bramley Sunnyside Juniors, Sitwell Junior School, Anston Brook Primary School and Ravenfield Primary Academy) worked with Kettu Studios and Natasha Poland to create an imaginative animated film about a cloud‑powered flying car that flies over Rotherham, casting spells.
What sort of car is it? What magic does it create? What change do the children of Rotherham want to see?
Watch the animation!
Picturing Play
Young people from Oakwood School worked with artist Moira Lovell to produce their own exhibition exploring play at ROAR’s Garage Gallery.
Inspired by a visit to Wentworth Woodhouse’s 'House of Fun' exhibition, the young people created and exhibited photographs and zines that invited audiences to think about play in their own lives and why play is important to us all.
Children's Games
What games do children in Rotherham love to play? Inspired by artist Francis Alÿs’ Children’s Games, over 200 children from seven schools worked with their teachers, filmmaker, Rachel Bunce and Into Film to create short films that celebrate and share the games they play.
You can watch all the films, including the ‘making of film,’ in our Children’s Games Gallery.
Archives of Play and Creativity
Children and young people stepped into the roles of historians, archivists and curators. They documented their experiences of play and creativity and of taking part in Children’s Capital of Culture’s festival year.
Researchers and archivists from the University of Sheffield led this project, enabling schools and colleges to capture what they felt was most important about this remarkable year. Each school and college curated and created artefacts for preservation in Rotherham Archives for future generations.
Cinemini: Playing with Film
Cinemini is Small World Cinema’s playful film event for children under five. Developed by the Cinemini Europe Network, it offers a magical first cinema experience for young children, either as a family event or within schools and early years settings. The programme combines carefully selected short films from the Cinemini Catalogue with creative play and hands-on activities designed to spark imagination, curiosity, and conversation long after the screening ends.
Schools and early years settings (Aughton Early Years Centre, Ravenfield Primary Academy, Rawmarsh Nursery School, Kimberworth Community Primary School, Crags Primary School) hosted a playful installation for a day, inviting children to explore lights, cameras, colour and sound.
Perception Busters
Perception Busters was a project based at Wentworth Woodhouse, designed in response to a familiar challenge within the heritage sector: many young people do not see heritage as something that belongs to them.
This programme set out to challenge those assumptions by reframing heritage as something living and shaped by people’s experiences, identities, and stories.
The core purpose of Perception Busters was to place young people at the centre of how heritage is explored and communicated. Rather than asking young people to engage with pre-defined narratives, the programme invited them to define heritage for themselves, using film and digital storytelling to express what mattered to them and why. The project culminated in a public event at Wentworth Woodhouse called the BIG HOUSE | SHORT FILMS festival, where the films were screened.
Twine Tales
Young people from Rotherham schools took part in a week‑long work experience programme, creating text‑based games for children using Twine, an open‑source tool for interactive storytelling.
Guided by writer and game designer Lauren O’Donoghue, the young designers took inspiration from Children’s Capital of Culture themes to develop their ideas before pitching them to industry professionals. Their games explored favourite local places and encouraged teamwork, wellbeing and curiosity.
Rotherham Rhythm Youth Project: Flow
Flow followed a young dancer as she explored textures and movement in a safe, creative environment. Directed by Gemma Thorpe, the film highlighted how freedom to explore supports confidence and creativity.
This project formed part of the Arts Council–funded Rotherham Rhythm Youth Project, led by ASHAY Dance CIC (Nisha Lall) and Khula Arts (Tongesayi Gumbo). Magic Light Pictures also shared several of their much‑loved films with young audiences as part of this programme.
Rope Girls
Inspired by the National Circus and Fairground Archive (NFCA), based at The University of Sheffield, artist Natasha Poland worked with children and young people from two Rotherham schools (Thrybergh Academy and Bramley Grange Primary) to create a series of animations about aerial performance.
Future Play
The project Future Play, led by The Blanket Fort Club, was a youth-led, creative producing programme rooted in co-creation, agency, and imaginative leadership. It aimed to empower young people at Kelford School (Nexus Academy Trust) to become creative leaders, giving them ownership over ideas, decision-making, and outcomes.
