How do we define community?
A creative thinking and making space in John Street Gallery
Drop in Fridays and Saturdays 10am -1pm.
Discussion sessions in the week (get in touch below for more info)
What does the community mean to you? Is your family your community? Your fellow allotment holders? Your neighbours, friends or work colleagues?
How inclusive or exclusive are our communities?
A community can come together beyond just physical geography or demographics. But Communities can be defined by circumstance, practice and affinity (as described by James Doeser in the video presentation below).
We are offering SVA’s John St gallery as a creative thinking and making space. We invite anyone and everyone to join in this experiment by contributing ideas through visuals, narratives and joining in discussions.
You can also join in by bringing in an an object, picture, artwork or anything that makes you think of your community or what the word represents to you.
Are you are looking to make a new community or strengthen an existing one? We are! We want to make new friends, build new connections and creative projects. We hope this project will bring people together in a relaxed informal way (there will be tea and cake!) and open the door to future creative community based adventures.
This project is an attempt to map and understand our community and communities as part of SVA’s wider research and development programme around Inclusion and Relevance.
Want to get involved?
Are you part of a community who would like to use the gallery to share and discuss your ideas? Let us know so we can offer some time in the gallery to do this.
Get in touch below if you would like to get involved or just drop in on a Friday or Saturday from 10am - 1pm
Sessions:
11th-12th: Rebecca Stapleford and Alice Sheppard Fidler 10-4pm
8th, 15th, 22nd: Thursday Art Group 10-1pm
16th: Artshape - Art bridge and Artlift artists 11-1pm
17th: Patch making with Sam Bates 12-2pm
18th-19th: Radical Restart 10-4pm
21st: Black Ark Media 12-2pm: In which ways can creativity and activism bring communities together?
23rd: Gasp placard family drop-in 10-12pm
25th-26th: Freeweaver SOARI Studio & Emily Sandy Fri 12-4pm, Sat 11-4
In this video, Dr James Doeser gives a detailed overview of the power of research in the context of communities and audiences. Over 35 minutes he walks us through the value of data, where to find it, how to interpret it and what to look out for when assessing facts and figures. Filled with insights, helpful directions and analysis of case studies, James' film is essential viewing for anyone who wants to better understand the people who live and work near you.
How to Build A Community
SVA and Atelier Stroud researched creative communities in Berlin in 2019 as part of Berliner Zeitgeist which was a project that explored the ideas, stories and initiatives around the fall of the Berlin Wall.
We hosted talks by 5 legendary creative changemakers from Berlin in July 2019. Dimitri Hegemann (who founded the famous techno club Tresor) presented this film “How to build a community” produced by Detroit SOUP. Detroit SOUP is a microgranting dinner celebrating and supporting creative projects in Detroit.
