Social Art Network is an organisation that supports creatives with projects. They are a community of artists with an aim to aid enable people to create community based work, often political and reflective of social culture.
Meetups
A big part of their support is the meetups that they organize. They meet in 12 places around the UK, where creatives are invited to meet and give each other feedback on projects. Their conversations can also be based around social inequalities including anti-racism and inclusion in social art. It sounds like this is a great way of making connections with people with similar aims to me. The Brighton meets are hosted by Susana Amoah, a social activist and artist herself so I can imagine it is a valuable opportunity to attend for someone like me.
Greening Arts practice guide
The Website also has a page of resources that are available for use including a vast number of helpful documents on art practices. The one that looks most useful to me is the ‘Greening Arts practice guide’ which is a well curated PDF with a wealth of information on environmentally considered art. It encourages artists to ask questions such as:
- How are your materials sourced? And could you change this to something more renewable/second hand?
- How do you deal with the waste?
- Have you considered using degradable materials?
- Are you being sponsored by a company that is ethical?
It showcases many sustainable art projects such as the ‘Fabric of Place’ project. It was an artist residence which required the four residency artists create work responding to the theme ‘outside in’ involving the community, culture , history or landscape of Swaledale in North Yorkshire.
611d50bf5ebb440137c5710e_GAP-Guide-Full-Aug21.pdf (webflow.com) – The link to the Greening Arts practice guide PDF
Microsoft Word – Fabric of Place – Part I – Project Report (180619) (website-files.com) – the Fabric of Place Final report