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:

• To analyse artistic practices as a mechanism for organisation, and at the same time for political and cultural action, assembled through collective participation.
• To advance a cross-sector view which moves beyond professional sectorial specificities.
• To generate debate regarding issues related to artistic production in collaborative and participatory assembly-constituted processes.
• To bring other perspectives which may enrich cultural policies.

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.