Introduction

We created this project because like the poet Kae Tempest we each have a sense, a feeling, that creativity has great potential to help people to be and feel well.

We want to explore and understand how and why creative practices can radically transform peoples’ understanding of themselves, other people, and the world around them. We think this might be key to why creative practices can help build happier and more fulfilled lives.

We also recognise that intersecting oppressions (through race, gender, sexuality, class, ability etc.) are amplifying in our increasingly divided and divisive world. This means that some people need creativity and its wellbeing benefits more urgently than others, but that simultaneously their access to creative community and practice is curtailed by structural forces which increase marginalisation and oppression. This means, we believe, that building creative community, understanding how and why this might be successfully achieved, and finding ways to do so sustainably, are urgent tasks that our work together must address.

Creativity

During the first week of our Artists’ Residency, Cinna, Bee, and I, have talked, in depth, about how and why creativity is important. Our conversations have revolved around an idea that Kae Tempest calls ‘creative connection’ which is “the use of creativity to access and feel connection and get yourself and those with you in the moment into a more connected space” (Kae Tempest, 2020).

We have broken this down. We’ve explored ‘connection’, drawing again on Kae Tempest to understand connection as,

We’ve discussed how fundamental this is to wellbeing.

As Cinna so eloquently put it on Day One of our residency, “wellbeing is a process of feeling connected with people that I like… and connection is what gives me the joy of being alive”.

How, then, might creativity lead to connection with our selves, our bodies, feelings, other people, the world around us? How might this ‘land us in the present tense’?

I’ll write more about our thoughts on this in my next blog posts (coming soon).

Intersectionality

And, crucially, what might get in the way of creating, connecting, and connecting through creativity?

Carving out space and time for creativity through practice and conversation is a privilege not afforded to everybody.

If you live under conditions in which your basic needs (housing, working conditions, healthcare, physical and psychological safety) are constantly under threat because of the colour of your skin, your gender, your sexuality, or your socioeconomic situation, for example, then finding the time to create and to connect might be hard. And even if you do find the time, there remains the question of whether you feel safe enough in the spaces where creativity and connection might happen to let yourself become ‘fully immersed… aware of your minuteness… feeling absolutely located. Right here. Regardless of whether that ‘right here’ is agitated or calm, joyous or painful’?

The Artists’ Residency: What happened during week one

We’ve explored this through practice. At first this meant trips to museums, reading books, crafting, painting, and talking. A lot of talking. Increasingly, however, I’m realising that one of the main ways we are exploring creative connection through practice is by connecting with each other. This has been challenging as we are working over Zoom. Yet, still, I can’t shake the feeling that the art produced over the next two weeks, and most of all the creative ideas, will be but parts of the main thing we are making together through this residency, which is a creative connection between the three of us.

There’s an intangible quality to this that exceeds words, yet it feels important to try to capture and convey elements of the process and what we are discovering. So, this will be the first of a series of blog posts. I’ll publish one per week. Each blog will pull a thread from the residency and untangle some of its knots, elaborating on emerging feelings, ideas, and art in the hope that this expresses the spirit of what we are cultivating together.