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20 November 2024
Golden Celebration for 30 years of National Lottery
SSGEP selected as one of HLF’s game changing moments to celebrate National Lottery's 30th birthday.
The pioneering South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project has been unveiled as one of 30 Game Changing Moments across the UK in an exhibition celebrating the National Lottery’s 30th birthday, which was unveiled this morning at The National Portrait Gallery in London and online.
The project’s unprecedented success in restoring a previously low population of golden eagles to record numbers is reflected in the exhibit by renowned photographer and social media influencer Thomas Duke.
The exhibition marks the National Lottery’s 30th birthday and celebrates its impact in raising £50bn for Good Causes. The photographer has used his unique style to highlight some of the most memorable cultural moments of the last three decades made possible with the help of National Lottery funding.
Dr Cat Barlow, Project Manager of the South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project said:
“It is a huge privilege to see the South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project feature alongside such a prestigious list of Game Changing Moments at the National Lottery’s 30th birthday exhibition in the National Portrait Gallery in London.
“There has been incredible excitement at our Project’s unprecedented success to date, with record numbers of golden eagles thriving across southern skies, and communities across the region benefitting environmentally, socially and culturally. We are so grateful to the National Lottery Heritage Fund Scotland and National Lottery players for making all of this possible. All that we have achieved is absolutely testament to the generosity of our funders, and the support we have received from so many people, including ecologists, conservation charities, raptor experts, vets, landowners and land managers, as well as fifteen thousand community volunteers and project participants.
“We are now relaunching as a new charity Restoring Upland Nature (RUN) to keep this momentum going and explore opportunities to reintroduce golden eagles into England and Wales. We would be delighted to talk to any funding partners who would like to be part of our continued success.”
The South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project has launched an urgent public appeal to help secure its long-term future and put plans in place to reintroduce golden eagles to other areas of the UK where golden eagles are currently extinct.
However, as the Project’s current funding runs out at the end of this year, the initiative faces the imminent threat of needing to wind down unless £400k can be raised.
About the artist:
Thomas Duke, known online as @steppingthroughfilm, is a rising social media influencer renowned for his unique approach to cinematic storytelling and visual art. Through his platform, Tom combines his passion for film with stunning photography, blending both mediums to create a nostalgic, film-like aesthetic that has captivated audiences worldwide. His work involves tracking down the places where iconic film moments took place and holding up a photograph or a still in front of the actual location, aligning it perfectly to create a seamless blend of fiction and reality.
For The National Lottery’s 30th Birthday exhibition, Tom has travelled the length and breadth of the UK to recreate 30 Game Changing Moments that the Lottery funded over the last 30 years, in the style that Tom has become famed for.
Thomas’s rephotographed concept that seeks to ‘see the invisible in the everyday’ becomes symbolic of the journey to and impact of those moments; for each, there is real world context, a backstory, and a ripple effect. And a pivotal and often unknown role played by The National Lottery made in making them happen.
It is a great honour to be included in this national list of Lottery funded projects which have helped to shape the fabric of the UK from John O Groats to Lands End over the last 30 years.
Through the hard work and dedication of the project team and its many and varied supporters across Scotland, there are now more Golden Eagles in southern skies than there has been in the last 300 years.
We would like to take this opportunity to say a huge thank you to the National Lottery and all of our supporters across the UK.
30 Game Changing Moments
A full list can be found at 30 Years of Game Changing Moments - National Portrait Gallery
The list of includes iconic events such as:
· 1998: Sir Antony Gormley’s ‘Angel of The North’ is unveiled near Gateshead
· 2001: The Eden Project opens in Cornwall
· 2012: Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill wins gold in the Heptathlon at the London Olympics on ‘Super Saturday’
· 2014: The Kelpies by Sculptor Andy Scott are unveiled in Falkirk
· 2024: Fern the Diplodocus is unveiled at The Natural History Museum
· 2024: Keely Hodgkinson wins gold in the women’s 800 meters at the Paris Olympics and celebrates her victory at The French Flair Bar
In 2022, the South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project was named Scottish Project of the Year in the 2022 National Lottery Awards which celebrate the inspirational people and projects who do extraordinary things with the help of National Lottery funding.
After beating competition from over 1300 other organisations to reach the public voting stage, we were thrilled to come out on top. Visit Blog HERE
The Future
We are currently working around the clock to secure funding which will allow us to continue this important and exciting work. Our hope is to cement the future for Golden Eagles in southern Scotland and to extend the population into Northern England and, in the future, Wales. This ambition can only be realised if our funding appeal is successful.
IF YOU FEEL YOU CAN HELP IN ANY WAY PLEASE VISIT OUR WEBSITE
www.goldeneaglessouthofscotland.co.uk
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