‘CHANGING THE CULTURAL LANDSCAPE ISN’T TOO MIGHTY A TASK’ (Jess Thom)

Creative People and Places have just published my ‘reflection’ on their recent conference in Wolverhampton, alongside several other responses and a really good video featuring some of the CPP participants who attended. (The conference took place at the rather lovely Lighthouse, which is apparently currently under threat and needs your support.) 

It was a good conference, brilliantly chaired by Talia Randall, and it was good to hear about recent shifts in CPP and then reflect on what I believe is a really significant programme. You can read the whole thing here, but in the spirit of those bad film teasers from which you know the whole story, in case you’re simply too busy or important to read a whole 1525 words, here 120 of them spliced together as a trailer. (Added line breaks inspired by Julius Lester.)

An appetite for making culture together,
not just taking part, is growing….

/

After years of trial, error and conversation,
see the task differently….

/

Disruptive holism,
an unsettling of place…

/

A disabling culture circling….

/

Deep-rooted power and the vast, vast

majority of funding with larger institutions….

//

BUT

//

A warning flare in Sir Nicholas Serota’s speech…..

/

CPP reverses the usual patterns 

of who engages…

/

A Human Centred Design Process – 

something NPOs structurally incapable of…

//

AND

//

A better question: 

what would happen if 

all arts activities were 

resourced 

in the way CPP has been? 

/

Would ten year funding,
on a vision not delivery-basis,
be fantasy?

//

Jess Thom’s words: 

‘changing the cultural landscape

isn’t too mighty a task’…

//

Change is possible.