FEMINIST ART ACTIVISMS AND ARTIVISMS edited by Katy Deepwell examines different art practices through discussions on identity, gender, power structures and politics and contributes to dialogues between feminist thought and activism in relation to visual arts
Loraine Leeson in debate with Stephen Pritchard on artist involvement in community-led visioning
On 20th September 2019, as millions of school children, workers and trades unionists across the globe commenced a week of action for climate justice, the Active Energy project celebrated how older and younger people have come together to work for environmental change in their community.
The event was held in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, close to where the water wheel is located. It was opened by Paul Brickell, Executive Director for Regeneration and Community Partnerships at the London Legacy Development Corporation.
On 12th September 2019 masters students following the specialism in art and social practice led by Loraine Leeson and Alberto Duman exhibited the results of their study in the MA graduate shows.
Wendy Charlton, Alison Lam, Dorottya Szilagyi and Natalia Talamagka have focused on topics as diverse as the regeneration of a North London housing estate, carer experience of autistic children, the recycling of plastic and survival strategies for victims of domestic violence. The media on which they have drawn has included film, photography, live events, sculplture, installation and app design. Tragically the MA Art and Social practice that was supporting these students, has been discontinued by the university for financial reasons. However social practice work at Middlesex continues through other specialisms such as MA Fine Art.
2-4pm Friday 20th September 2019
Loraine Leeson and The Geezers invite you to celebrate their latest venture in the Active Energy arts project. A floating water wheel has been installed close to the London Aquatics Centre in the Waterworks River to drive an aerator that will help counteract the effects of pollution on the river’s fish and wildlife. Meanwhile pupils from Bow School have constructed their own working models of turbines using designs suitable for the generation of renewable energy.
The Last Drop
5 Thornton Street, Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, London E20 2AD
Close to the ArcelorMittal Orbit
queenelizabetholympicpark.co.uk
Nearest tube: Stratford
Map
On 30th May 2019 Loraine Leeson gave the keynote address at the Aliar-se conference in Barcelona, which explored how collaborative artistic practice could begin to inform cultural policy in Catalonia.
The conference was organised by Ramon Perramon and Montserrat Moliner and supported by CONCA, Catalonia’s National Council for Culture and Arts.
The objectives of the conference were as follows:
Loraine spoke about lessons learned from her own art practice and introduced the work being done by Arts for Labour to inform cultural policy in the UK.
Highlights from the first MA Art and Social Practice graduation show at Middlesex University.
Feedback from Allan Struthers:
”Congratulations on teaching/facilitating such a great cohort. The students I spoke to last night are incredible.”
Jenny Dunn’s project was excellent, her selection of what to show from an embedded position felt well distanced enough from her own personal experience and perspective for it to function at this secondary level of reading as a tactful and highly moving piece of social representation.
The experience of getting caught up in its latent utopianism was a beautiful one.
I mean this in the sense of how it prompts the viewer (in this case, me) to imagine the possibility of every estate having someone who’s principle occupation it is to make, take, and implement suggestions about how the quality of life can be raised.
It’s a work that demonstrates what I’ve heard autonomists and anarchists talk of as ‘radical care’, and insofar as the narrative’s content prefigures a future society freed from the determining force of capital upon social relations, the image given is politically hopeful.”
Culmination of an AHRC funded arts-community network project between UK and India addressing water scarcity in rural Rajasthan
https://rajasthanwater.weebly.com/
9:30 for 10am start – 4:00 pm
Friday 5th October 2018
M Shed
Princes Wharf, Wapping Rd
Bristol BS1 4RN
https://www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/m-shed/
This one-day seminar will reflect on the potential and role of the arts and creative practice to address critical global challenges:
Presentations by Michael Buser, Loraine Leeson, MS Rathore, Nina Sabnani,
Anurupa Roy and Neelam Raina
FREE, but places are limited
For further information contact Michael.Buser@uwe.ac.uk
Picture collages or political weapons?
Artists Peter Kennard and Loraine Leeson with writer David Evans will be discussing all things photomontage – exploring the history, techniques and effects of photomontage, from darkroom collages to digital manipulation.
A Four Corners archive event for anybody interested in the art of protest, radical culture or community activism.
6:30 PM – 8:30 Thursday 20th September 2018
Four Corners
121 Roman Road
London, E2 0QN
Map
REGISTER HERE
free
On 1st July 2018 BBC FOUR broadcasts the first programme in a documentary series celebrating the 70th anniversary of the NHS. It focuses on people’s memories of the health service, and include an interview with Loraine Leeson. It also features the posters on health issues she produced with Peter Dunn in the 1970s. Some of these were in support of the campaign to keep Bethnal Green Hospital open, while others were produced with members of health workers’ unions for East London Health Project to warn people about the impending cuts to services at that time – one of these posters celebrated 30th anniversary of the NHS. A retrospective exhibition of this work was held at the ICA in May 2017.
