What Winchester Creatives means to me: Matthew Hampsey
I remember sitting in the local pub looking up at the TV - it was a surreal moment when the BBC announced that Donald Trump killed an Iranian general - the atmosphere was palpable. Everyone, locked in place, just staring at this screen. Along with the Australia bushfires, I remember thinking that the world was ending. I remember going home and talking to my housemate and saying “A storm is coming”. In a lot of ways I was right, but imagine my surprise when this storm was not the threat of a global war, but instead, a global pandemic that my Chinese classmate and I had been discussing as a little conversational tidbit after he’d returned back from China after Christmas.
My name is Matthew Hampsey, I was 21 years old when COVID-19 almost completely upended my life. It was a new semester at Winchester University for my master’s degree: Marketing, Branding, and Advertising. It was getting warmer, my new friends and I were sitting in a pub garden all talking about our visions for the future. I haven’t seen them since. In fact, since then we’ve all graduated, last I heard some of them got a job in the industry. I was so naive at the beginning of the lockdown. I had my masters finished up and then I had nothing. I say this for dramatic effect honestly, I had the stuff to do, but I had no purpose, no drive. Just watching the clock waiting for something, anything to happen.
One day, after my montage of groundhog day, possibly in an unflattering position, I noticed a post on Linkedin from our very own Richard Coope. It talked about how the government had overlooked the graduates who were leaving university, with no way to get their foot in the door. This resonated with me, this was me. I contacted him, and soon after a phone call, I was put to work.
Richard, Dan, and I started working on the initial incarnation of Winchester Creatives with a few other kind volunteers - Dan and I had previously worked together when I had undertaken an internship at another local design agency where he worked. As a small, dedicated volunteer Winchester Creatives team, we planned our initial launch campaign, created a fresh new visual identity, and prepared our first crowdfunding campaign. . During this campaign I sold my first piece of art and I was proud it raised some money for our Winchester Creatives cause. We conquered our fundraising goal raising £6,000 in just 8 weeks and we achieved all that we had planned. I even ended up doing some work for Dr. Martens after being presented with an exciting opportunity to work with Richard and his Brightful team.
Through Winchester Creatives, I networked, was mentored, worked hard, and developed my skills. It was an opportunity to have purpose again and I took it. It’s hard to state the impact that this project and these people have had on my life. They helped get the ball rolling and now I find myself in a new direction. To create, to develop my skills, and produce more and more until I’m recognized as valuable and as capable as I believe myself to be.
I’m turning 23 in a few weeks and I recognize that I have so much further to go, and I recognize that whilst the future is never to be taken for granted, I can’t help but feel that I’ll be okay as long as there are people out there like Richard Coope and Dan Benham. I feel I was practically a child when we first started working together but now I feel less of an impostor in my career. I can truly say I am standing on the shoulders of giants. Soon, I will be unable to ride the coat-tails of these two men, but before Rishi Sunak’s kick-start scheme kicks in and before the world embrace its new normal I think I will continue to push this cause for as far as it will go.
Thank you again, Richard and Dan,
