"Come in for a coffee, then you can tell me all about your art. What's your medium?"
It took me a matter of hours to remember having a game plan was ridiculous. Of course it's natural to want to feel prepared, especially when someone has chosen to invest their time and cash in you, but, really, I should have known better. The people I meet, place I'm in and things that crop up are always at the centre of any work I make and it's not possible to pre-empt or prescribe that. I also know I can't visit a place just once if I'm to make real work there. I should have stopped the formulating, shoved some socks in a bag and just got myself here.
I'm 120 miles from home in Peterborough; the city where 'picking, packing and plucking' make the world go round. As the fastest growing UK city, Peterborough's historically central, agricultural industry is moving away in geography but not importance. I've never met so many people involved in working farms, co-operative food growing initiatives or groups advocating sustainable living. I've also seen a lot of people tucking in to crisps for breakfast, but you've got to maintain the balance somehow.
I've had two hosts in Peterborough: The Urban Engine Room and Sue's place. The Urban Engine Room is a very new space, built in the back garden of someone who saw a gap and didn't wait for someone else to fill it. Day to day, his children revise, watch films and hang out in there, but once a month or so it plays host to an artist. Sue was advertising her spare room, a twenty minute walk away, on Air BnB. I'd never been to Peterborough before and genuinely had no preconceptions of how it would be; everything about the week has been a surprise.
My work involves delicately unpicking a place, situation or topic. Often this leads into an event, but the people, conversations and skills that are uncovered and engaged are more important. I can see the process come together in a really physical way. It's as intricate as lace: A thread out of place, or a click in the pattern, and it's noticeable. Sometimes the key is to iron out the kinks, at other times it's embracing the inconsistencies and framing them in a way that helps them be viewed differently.
Once I had remembered to not worry about making 'things', I got on with saying 'Yes' to everything. Tea, coffee, beer, biscuits, curry, soup, sandwiches: A theme to the invitations emerged. In lots of ways, hospitality and food are synonymous, aren't they? Cooking and eating happens differently in every household, and depending on where in the world you are, but we all do it. It's a basic offer of care from a host and the ultimate window in for a guest. In that sense, I've been offered numerous windows into Peterborough.
A private gig in a musician's back garden.
Chats with artists commissioned to reconsider 'Harvest'.
A meeting with Peterborough's first ever high profile squatters.
Sharing theory, ethos and practice with a seasoned community developer.
An introduction to a co-operatively run green space, growing and teaching about plants and food.
Conversations with a disabled dancer about labels, funds and motivations.
Learning about and hand-picking a kilo of salad leaves in the middle of endless flat ground.
Having my feet washed in the local church.
Bending over maps and hearing about what was.
Noting every detail of recipes by my new favourite Lithuanian sandwich-maker.
Sharing a soda and lime with the performer who serenaded David Cameron with a ukulele.
A tour of Lincoln Road.
Cooking local ingredients to feed new friends.
Mapping in my first studio space.
I left Peterborough with an offer to go back in September. And again next year. And maybe even the year after that. No parachuting in: A sustained investment. For the many people who told me Peterborough is nothing special, this was a surprise.
I'd recommend a residency to anyone. Really: They should be a compulsory part of working in any any profession. Stepping out of your everyday is SO valuable. I came to know a new place through the people who live there; not tourist information. I had room to reflect on Leeds, where I live and work most of the time. I had space to map my thoughts in a way that really surprised me. I was freely given access to books, references and contexts that were new and exciting. I'm assured I was also able to reciprocate the incredible hospitality I received, open up conversation and kick off the imagining of other possibilities for Peterborough.
And, as my host just said in a text, "it's all just the start".
To carry on the conversation and see lots of photos from my residency, find me on on social media:
Twitter: @LydiaCatterall
Instagram: lydiacatterall
Tuesday 26 May 2015
Friday 15 May 2015
People Make Theatre: The role of the arts in the new politics
Great blog post by Jonathan Petherbridge that we just needed to share with our followers!
Jonathan issues a challenge to Arts Council England and arts institutions: Think about how art can be a process, an experience - not a product to be consumed.
We hope this reblog of Jonathan's post will stimulate further debate and, more importantly action - self-organising. The time is NOW!
ORIGINAL POST HERE:
People Make Theatre: The role of the arts in the new politics
It's the day after the full election result. Saturday. The radio and
papers are full of bemused reflection - how did the opinion polls get it
so wrong, where has liberalism gone, what direction should the Labour
Party now take, whither proportional representation ? Friends, family
and colleagues are slowly emerging from shocked despair and bracing
themselves for five more years.
But what's to do ?
Partly inspired by Stella Duffy's listing of her practical response and partly provoked by the fallout from Participation on Trial, I am wondering if the electoral outcome actually offers a challenge to the arts sector.
My fear is that the result of the election showed middle England's default position. People might flirt with Lib Dems but when the chips are down the tick goes to Conservatives - or possibly UKIP. I am trying to put myself in the position of a young first time voter not living in London or one of the cities like Leicester or Bristol that shunned the Tories. The serious conversations going on around this young me are about jobs and mortgages. My parents and teachers talk about interest rates and eradicating the national debt. I turn on the TV and any debate is framed almost entirely in the language of numbers and the context of money. In my area schools are becoming academies and seem to reinforce this default thinking. In the state schools too, arts subjects are becoming marginalised. And in the current climate my mates sort of think this is rational. Arts aren't going to get you a job - well not a proper job.
Is this the dominant thinking that young people are growing up receiving and believing ? Is it therefore becoming normal - even cool - to vote for a party that puts the individual before the society ? The shareholder before the customer. The self before others.
I think we should assume that these are now the default values of middle England. Beyond London apart from a few northern outposts and a scattering of island-cities surrounded by a sea of blue voters, for the majority the dominant values are the values of the market.
So what's to do ?
A coherent political response is going to take some time to formulate and I fear it's going to get worse before it gets better. But while we're waiting for the party wheels to grind I think the arts, especially participatory arts, can offer a surprisingly different way of looking at things.
Arts activities offer young (and old) people a space where things are valued differently. In the best cases they offer a space where we value ourselves and each other differently. Countless arts projects involve people in playing, making, writing and performing, and these operate through a different set of values. Most encourage co-operation, accessibility, listening, respect. Many build work from individual personal narratives, but artfully amplify these with the contributions of many. A recent piece at the Young Vic was woven from the testimonies of female carers over several months*. I was fortunate to catch one of the performances given by a cast of about 30 female carers. The sense of solidarity was tangible. The exploration and celebration of an abstract concept ('care') had the audience doing that smiling/glowing thing. And the dancing was fantastic. The values on show, and I suspect throughout the process offered an alternative argument of what is important in life, and - and this is key - that argument was registered emotionally and physically.
In many instances art is increasingly regarded as a commodity rather than a means of self and/or group expression. Even in participatory arts there seems to be a greater emphasis on the product rather than the process and I am seeing a growing tendency to think about the market and the wrapping of the goods for sale, right from the off ? Sometimes our responses themselves are monetised - if a viewer or participant values art for what it does to their mood or mind, spirit or soul, then that response may well appear on the billboard or in the funding bid for the next endeavour.
I think many of us are falling into this money and numbers game - it's not surprising. The number one coffee break conversation at any conference is going to be funding. The number one piece of work will be a spreadsheet. The first demand from a funder will be outputs - or outcomes measured numerically. And artists continue to talk about how they are paid (or aren't paid) - publicly.
But we must hold our nerve. The default political position described above leaves a vacuum. I like to think (and this may be very old fashioned) that people require other things. Friendship, connection, love, humour - soft and squidgy sort of spiritual things that make it worth getting up in the morning. Things that some link to the concept of Wellbeing. The arts - especially participatory arts - offers space where people can experience this - other places do too, faith groups and sports clubs, the WI and the allotment. But participatory arts spaces have less of an agenda and are more explicit about stating the rules of engagement - the ethos. Skilled facilitators - be they a conductor or youth theatre leader will mediate a space where teamwork is all, they will foster and monitor a atmosphere of connection and creativity. And the dancing will be fantastic (and it will include seated dancing too).
While society sorts out how it wants to be represented politically, I think it is important that the arts offers opportunities for people to meet and work positively together. Non-religious, non-institutional, open and accessible spaces where an alternative set of values can be experienced. I challenge the Arts sector - the Arts Council and the 'institutions' to consider how they can present art not as a product, but as a process, to be experienced - not consumed.
* https://youngviclondon.wordpress.com/2015/05/12/turning-a-little-further-two-boroughs-at-the-young-vic/
Jonathan issues a challenge to Arts Council England and arts institutions: Think about how art can be a process, an experience - not a product to be consumed.
We hope this reblog of Jonathan's post will stimulate further debate and, more importantly action - self-organising. The time is NOW!
ORIGINAL POST HERE:
People Make Theatre: The role of the arts in the new politics
The role of the arts in the new politics
But what's to do ?
Partly inspired by Stella Duffy's listing of her practical response and partly provoked by the fallout from Participation on Trial, I am wondering if the electoral outcome actually offers a challenge to the arts sector.
My fear is that the result of the election showed middle England's default position. People might flirt with Lib Dems but when the chips are down the tick goes to Conservatives - or possibly UKIP. I am trying to put myself in the position of a young first time voter not living in London or one of the cities like Leicester or Bristol that shunned the Tories. The serious conversations going on around this young me are about jobs and mortgages. My parents and teachers talk about interest rates and eradicating the national debt. I turn on the TV and any debate is framed almost entirely in the language of numbers and the context of money. In my area schools are becoming academies and seem to reinforce this default thinking. In the state schools too, arts subjects are becoming marginalised. And in the current climate my mates sort of think this is rational. Arts aren't going to get you a job - well not a proper job.
Is this the dominant thinking that young people are growing up receiving and believing ? Is it therefore becoming normal - even cool - to vote for a party that puts the individual before the society ? The shareholder before the customer. The self before others.
I think we should assume that these are now the default values of middle England. Beyond London apart from a few northern outposts and a scattering of island-cities surrounded by a sea of blue voters, for the majority the dominant values are the values of the market.
So what's to do ?
A coherent political response is going to take some time to formulate and I fear it's going to get worse before it gets better. But while we're waiting for the party wheels to grind I think the arts, especially participatory arts, can offer a surprisingly different way of looking at things.
Arts activities offer young (and old) people a space where things are valued differently. In the best cases they offer a space where we value ourselves and each other differently. Countless arts projects involve people in playing, making, writing and performing, and these operate through a different set of values. Most encourage co-operation, accessibility, listening, respect. Many build work from individual personal narratives, but artfully amplify these with the contributions of many. A recent piece at the Young Vic was woven from the testimonies of female carers over several months*. I was fortunate to catch one of the performances given by a cast of about 30 female carers. The sense of solidarity was tangible. The exploration and celebration of an abstract concept ('care') had the audience doing that smiling/glowing thing. And the dancing was fantastic. The values on show, and I suspect throughout the process offered an alternative argument of what is important in life, and - and this is key - that argument was registered emotionally and physically.
In many instances art is increasingly regarded as a commodity rather than a means of self and/or group expression. Even in participatory arts there seems to be a greater emphasis on the product rather than the process and I am seeing a growing tendency to think about the market and the wrapping of the goods for sale, right from the off ? Sometimes our responses themselves are monetised - if a viewer or participant values art for what it does to their mood or mind, spirit or soul, then that response may well appear on the billboard or in the funding bid for the next endeavour.
I think many of us are falling into this money and numbers game - it's not surprising. The number one coffee break conversation at any conference is going to be funding. The number one piece of work will be a spreadsheet. The first demand from a funder will be outputs - or outcomes measured numerically. And artists continue to talk about how they are paid (or aren't paid) - publicly.
But we must hold our nerve. The default political position described above leaves a vacuum. I like to think (and this may be very old fashioned) that people require other things. Friendship, connection, love, humour - soft and squidgy sort of spiritual things that make it worth getting up in the morning. Things that some link to the concept of Wellbeing. The arts - especially participatory arts - offers space where people can experience this - other places do too, faith groups and sports clubs, the WI and the allotment. But participatory arts spaces have less of an agenda and are more explicit about stating the rules of engagement - the ethos. Skilled facilitators - be they a conductor or youth theatre leader will mediate a space where teamwork is all, they will foster and monitor a atmosphere of connection and creativity. And the dancing will be fantastic (and it will include seated dancing too).
While society sorts out how it wants to be represented politically, I think it is important that the arts offers opportunities for people to meet and work positively together. Non-religious, non-institutional, open and accessible spaces where an alternative set of values can be experienced. I challenge the Arts sector - the Arts Council and the 'institutions' to consider how they can present art not as a product, but as a process, to be experienced - not consumed.
* https://youngviclondon.wordpress.com/2015/05/12/turning-a-little-further-two-boroughs-at-the-young-vic/
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