Teaching Artistry In Action Symposium

On Tuesday 2nd December in the Royal Court Theatre in Liverpool, I attended the Teaching Artistry In Action Symposium organised by Curious Minds Network.

This is the first symposium I've been to that talked about artists working with people in the community and even though there was an emphasis on working in schools, I found it interesting and relevant to my work.

There were many speakers that spoke about the importance of teaching artistry within communities and also how we can work together to support each other. I particularly enjoyed Ali Eisa and Hafsah Naib’s contribution. Specifically when Harsh Naib spoke about how when she works in different countries, particularly in places where there is economic need, she has no problem in connecting with the community in exploring art making and its importance. She mentioned that in other countries, the connection between people and image/story making is already seen as valuable. But here, in our country its not so.

Story telling and image making was very much apart of our historic culture but its not anymore. In the UK the only thing we have that dominates this construct is the stories we post Instagram and Facebook. And Im not talking about the local gossip group on social media either. Feeling connected to meaningful cultural narrative and image making is not something I have ever been taught, not by my parents, my school or my culture. If it wasn’t for art, I don’t think I would feel connected to it either. This is something I need to think about.

I think many people who went yesterday wanted to meet Darren Henley OBE the CEO of Arts Council England. In fact after he had spoken there were many attendees who wanted to speak to him. I just felt the burning fire of discontent. I think he is so used to talking, he’s forgot how to answer questions properly. Maybe speaking a lot ‘buzz’ words all in a variety of empty sentences is enough. I just don’t know what to say other than he did declare that he is obsessed with happiness…which is nice I suppose.

I had my hand up for a question, but I didn’t get the mic so Im going to send it out into the universe through this blog. The question came from Darrens comments about excellence and quality. He said he’d seen many good and bad examples of ‘excellence and quality’ at many different levels in his work. He also mentioned the importance of funding things that are excellent and of high quality. So my question was:

I understand the need to use excellence and quality as a standard, its useful because its quantifiable. (Eg: Was what you saw excellent on a scale of 1-10, or do you think the activity was good quality - agree, disagree agree etc). But how revenant is excellence and quality when I’m sat with a dementia resident in a local nursing home, trying to draw a picture and the resident forgets what they are doing and I have to guide them back to follow the line with my finger, so they can make their own art. What has excellence and quality got to do with that?

Anyway, I had to leave before the end, and I missed the best bit! Four community artists all talking about their work! It should have been first!

I came away feeling that I should be more confident in the work I do, even though its hard to describe sometimes what I do. There are many community artists in the world, all trying to connect the community through art…Its a really good thing!