Community Storywork
Creating honest, safe places where people and communities can share their lived experiences, explore new possibilities, and build meaningful connections.
About André van Wyk
I am André van Wyk, originally from South Africa, now living and working in Wales. With over 20 years of experience working alongside communities in South Wales and parts of Africa, I bring a wealth of knowledge in youth work, arts development, local community coordination, and cultural wellbeing.
I founded Community Storywork in 2024 to bring together facilitation, media production, and long-term community engagement to support approaches that empower people to learn, connect, and transform.
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My approach weaves together three powerful frameworks to support meaningful change for people, organisations, and communities.
Seeing the whole picture by exploring connections between people, places, stories, and systems that shape everyday life.
Systemic Practice is about seeing the whole picture — how individuals, groups, and organisations are connected, and how change in one area affects another. Rooted in family therapy and organisational consultancy, it helps us move beyond quick fixes to address underlying patterns. For me, this means working with communities to bring what's really happening to the surface, identifying the narratives and structures shaping people's experiences, and finding leverage points where small changes can create ripple effects across entire systems. I am a member of the Centre for Systemic Studies
Inspired by Jo-ann Archibald and Indigenous knowledge traditions. Story brings wisdom, identity, and hope.
Storywork is about respecting people's lived experiences as a form of knowledge and wisdom. It's not just about collecting stories — it's about creating conditions where people feel safe to share, where their voices are heard with respect, and where their narratives can shape decisions. Whether through one-on-one conversations, community workshops, or digital storytelling, I help people and communities tell their stories in ways that build understanding, challenge assumptions, and create space for new possibilities to emerge. Learn more
Bringing Society, Arts, and Work together. When these three come together, people thrive.
Drawing from Systemic Practice, Jo-ann Archibald's Storywork, and over two decades of community work across South Wales and parts of Africa, I've come to understand something simple but powerful:
For people and communities to thrive, three things need to be in play.
Society
Everyone needs a genuine sense of belonging. This comes through meaningful social interaction — places where we feel included, connected, and part of something bigger than ourselves.
Arts
Within this social space, we also need to express our uniqueness. Creativity — stories, voices, art, movement, film — helps us show who we are.
Work
And we need to contribute. Everyone has something to offer their group, their community. Having a role, making a difference, builds purpose and confidence.
This is SocialArtsWorks — a practical, human framework for connection, creativity, and contribution.
These three layers — Systemic Practice, Storywork, and SocialArtsWorks© — shape everything I do.
"In the end, it all comes down to the stories we tell — and the stories we believe."
What I Offer
Collaborative approaches tailored to the unique needs of individuals, organisations, and communities.
Creating safe spaces for groups to explore ideas, untangle challenges, and discover new possibilities together through skilled facilitation.
Through Community Storywork, I design and lead workshops that help groups bring lived experience to the surface, build trust, and co-create practical solutions. For Tai Tarian, this included facilitating tenant-staff sessions through story-based approaches and systemic practice to identify common themes and shape meaningful improvements, rooted in the journey of repair experience and broader service experience.
Using photography, video, sound, and digital storytelling to capture and share community narratives in powerful ways.
For Community Lives Consortium, my role led to creating the Valuing Lives media storytelling project - a story-driven film process focusing on tenant voices, everyday experiences, and the Welsh concept of Cynefin. This included co-developing the narrative, filming across homes and community locations, and producing an introductory short film that communicates CLC's values through real lived experience.
Guiding individuals and groups through collaborative processes that respect lived experiences and build understanding.
For Swansea Poverty Truth Commission, I designed and delivered a story-led media process focused on Commissioners' lived experiences and wisdom. This included creating short testimonial films, bilingual subtitles, and qualitative insights drawn from narrative interviews, ensuring Community Commissioners and Civic/Business Commissioners were represented with respect and clarity. It supported the Commission's goal of moving understanding through personal story, using film, sound, and creative data analysis to bring these experiences into public dialogue.
Building lasting partnerships with communities through long-term engagement that creates genuine connection and trust.
For South West Wales Connected, my role led to the development of Port Talbot: Herstory - a community-rooted sound walk project that collected and elevated local women's stories, past and present. Through ongoing engagement with residents, artists, archives, and partner organisations, the project wove lived experience with local history to create a GPS-guided walking route that connected people to Port Talbot's heritage, everyday voices, and the ongoing story of the town of resilience, identity, and belonging.
Sharing knowledge and building capacity within organisations and communities through workshops and collaborative learning.
Working with the Local Challenges Research Office (LCRO), I
supported their community research and learning on behalf of Tai
Tarian about home retrofit and green technologies in Neath Port
Talbot. My contribution included:
High-quality sound
recording of resident experiences and insights
Creating
AI-assisted transcripts and concise themes to inform LCRO
research
This work has strengthened Tai Tarian's
community-centred approach to retrofit planning and provided
practical, central materials for ongoing research and training.
Strategic advice on community-led approaches, cultural wellbeing, and integrating storywork into organisational practice.
With over two decades of community work in South Wales and parts of Africa, I offer consultation that is rooted and people-centred, helping organisations design approaches grounded in lived experience. Through separate youth work support, arts development, community coordination, and cultural wellbeing, I support clients to shape thoughtful, practical, and relationship-led approaches for engagement, learning, and systems change.
Important Information
Transparency and care are at the heart of everything I do.
Principles:
At Community Storywork, I am dedicated to cultivating an inclusive and equitable environment.
I recognise the critical importance of data protection and privacy in our storytelling activities.
My Pledge:
I am committed to weaving sustainable and eco-conscious approaches into my work.
Get in Touch
Whether you have questions about our services, want to collaborate, or just want to say hello, I'd love to hear from you.
Every community has a story worth telling. Let's tell yours together.