Power to the People? Self organisation versus official arts organisations.
May 28, 1.30-3.00pm
Peckham Pulse Healthy Living Centre, Studio 1
10 Melon Road, London SE15 5QN
Speakers: Emily Druiff, Cara Courage, E15 Mums, Live Art Development Agency
Arts organisations have sometimes been perceived as being insensitive to, or even hostile to, the needs and concerns of local residents. Many grass roots initiatives have found their voices in opposition to local councils and the government but also against art being used as a forerunner to the social cleansing of estates. Groups such as Grunts for the Arts who fought against the forms of art and culture being produced on the Olympic Park and the protests against Art Angel’s proposed use of the Balfron Tower have shown how local grass roots opposition can have a voice within the cultural agenda. The panel will consider how self organising offers resistance to ‘official’ structures of power such as arts organisations, councils and the government or if these organisations can still be seen as helpful and essential when it comes to local issues.
CARA COURAGE / Arts Consultant, Writer, Curator, Project Manager
Courage is an arts consultant, writer/commentator, curator and project manager and social practice placemaking PhD student at University of Brighton and member of the Placemaking Leadership Council and Fellow of the RSA. She has a career spanning 17 years, working across art forms with a particular expertise in visual arts; architecture/built environment; cultural learning; and collaborative and networked practice. She initiates her own arts-led built environment and placemaking interventions and is a co-founder and director of architecture collective, Threshold. Courage writes on arts and urban issues for amongst others, the Guardian Culture Professionals Network, Times Educational Supplement, AN - Artists News Letter,ArtsProfessional, Frame and Reference, Arts Council England and Conran&Partners; academic journals and conferences; and online publications including Global Urbanist and This Big City. She has published and spoken at, amongst others, Irish Journal of Arts Management & Cultural Policy, Royal Geographic Society Annual conference 2014, Association of American geographers, Arts in Society, Arts and the Public Realm and Cultural Trends Journal.
EMILY DRUIFF / Director: Peckham Platform
Peckham Platform is a creative and educational charity based in a gallery on Peckham Square, SE15. It became independent at the start of 2014 and was awarded Arts Council national portfolio funding six months later. As an organisation it believes that communities can inform and shape their engagement with their locality by working with contemporary visual artists. Its programme of commissions creates meaningful and accessible social arts practice for Peckham and beyond, providing an expansive platform for different voices and debate, bringing contemporary social practice alive.
E15 MUMS / Housing Activists
The Focus E15 campaign was born in September 2013 when a group of young mothers were served eviction notices by East Thames Housing Association after Newham Council cut its funding to the Focus E15 hostel for young homeless people. On September 21st 2014, the Focus E15 campaign celebrated its first birthday with an occupation of a disused block of flats on the nearly empty Carpenters Estate in Stratford, East London. The occupied flats were opened to the public and ran as a social centre for two weeks, with an evolving program of daily events, including workshops, meetings, and music and comedy gigs.
facebook.com/pages/Focus-E15-Mothers/602860129757343
LIVE ART DEVELOPMENT AGENCY
The Live Art Development Agency (LADA) is a Centre for Live Art: a knowledge centre, a production centre for programmes and publications, a research centre setting artists and ideas in motion, and an online centre for digital experimentation, representation and dissemination. LADA works to supports those who make, watch, research, study, teach, produce, present and write about Live Art in the UK and internationally, and to create new artistic frameworks, legitimize unclassifiable art forms, give agency to underrepresented artists, and generate the conditions in which diversity, innovation and risk in contemporary culture can thrive. LADA houses an open access research library, runs a unique online shop; pioneers models of development and discourse, contributes to groundbreaking research and education, develops ways of increasing access to Live Art through projects and publishing, and coordinates the Live Art UK network.