SOME THOUGHTS ABOUT SOCIALLY ENGAGED ART BY THERESA EASTON, CHAIR OF ARTISTS' UNION ENGLAND

We are really pleased that Theresa Easton has joined our network as a member.  Theresa does amazing work as chair of Artists' Union England - a union who welcome members who are socially engaged artists.

When Theresa joined us, she wrote a short statement about socially engaged art practice.  She is happy that we share it here:

I think our field of practice should have equal status with all art practices. I think arts organisations, public bodies and commercial businesses that appear to incorporate social engagement into their commission, project, residency etc need to fully understand the area of work and not use is as a token gesture and pay lip service to the fundamentals of the practice.

We couldn't agree more.  Tokenism in our field is dangerous and misleading.

We welcome any comments, thoughts, responses.