Westminster City School Project for Art on the Underground

I’m excited by the launch this week of Larry Achiampong’s commission for Art on the Underground at Westminster tube station. This is part of his series PAN AFRICAN FLAGS FOR THE RELIC TRAVELLERS’ ALLIANCE, here reimagining the iconic London Underground roundel in pan African colours. There are eight designs to spot across 70 sites in the station.

I visited the tube station with the Head of Art at Westminster City School, located nearby, to see the commission together as part of the planning process for a schools workshop and poster competition with a class of their Year 10 students. This will take place in early 2020.

For more information about Larry Achiampong’s commission take a look here

One of the roundel designs by Larry Achiampong at Westminster tube station

Tate Year 3 Project

I am so excited that my son is in one of the Year 3 class portraits as part of Steve McQueen’s commission, recently installed in the Duveen Galleries at Tate Britain. Unfortunately his class portrait is located right near the top row of photographs, so although I know which is his class - I can recognise his teacher, teaching assistant, the school uniform and the hall windows - I cannot work out which of the children is him! However I have been told that a giant magnifying machine is apparently on its way to enable better viewing of the higher up portraits so we will return soon as a family.

For more information visit here

The Year 3 Project installed at Tate Britain

New Clients - Empathy Museum & Museums Partnership Reading

I’m excited to be working with two new organisations. Firstly Museums Partnership Reading where I’ll be feeding into their Young People’s strategy across The Museum of English Rural Life and the Reading Museum by running a training day for staff around how best to develop a Youth Manifesto.

Secondly I’m working with the Empathy Museum which has been set up as a series of pop ups across the UK and the world, as participatory art projects dedicated to helping us look at the world through other people's eyes. For them I am consolidating their existing evaluation and feeding into their future plans for 2020.

Museum Hour Guest Host

Museum Hour takes place on Twitter on Monday nights 8 - 9pm. It is regularly hosted by a team of four people working in various museums but they also invite guest hosts to propose subjects to discuss. On Monday 16 September I was the guest host, focusing on Community Participation. You can follow the promo tweets and then the conversation via the eleven questions I posed by clicking on the various date links below. Thanks to #MuseumHour twitter.com/museumhour for having me!

Promos:

MuseumHour (@museumhour)14/09/2019, 19:00 Join us on Monday 16 September at 8pm (UK time) for #MuseumHour with ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ focusing on Community Participation. Who do you engage with in your community? Who is missing? How do you sustain relationships & what is the legacy? Hit 'like' if you'll be joining in on Monday! pic.twitter.com/py1PG1UA9Y

MuseumHour (@museumhour)15/09/2019, 19:00 To get ready for tomorrow night's #MuseumHour discussion around Community Participation with me ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ take a look at this interview with #MikeMurawski Director of Learning & Community Partnerships ⁦‪@PDXArtMuseum‬⁩ ow.ly/6gFU50w6J2P pic.twitter.com/YxUY4X7dYa

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 08:00 Check out this link ready for #MuseumHour at 8pm tonight (UK time) with me ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ focusing on Community Participation. An example of positive community practice is ⁦‪@SLG_artupdates‬⁩ working with local residents on three housing estates bit.ly/2lQNd7w pic.twitter.com/Y0MmLNdRS9

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 12:01 Check out this link ready for #MuseumHour at 8pm tonight (UK time) with me ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ focusing on Community Participation. An example of positive community practice is ⁦‪@mimauseful‬⁩ working with refugees and running a weekly community day bit.ly/31KZtas pic.twitter.com/hKYBe4DWWL

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 16:01 Check out this link ready for #MuseumHour at 8pm tonight (UK time) with me ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ focusing on Community Participation. An example of positive community practice is ⁦‪@empathymuseum‬⁩ art projects helping us look at the world through other people's eyes ow.ly/LNal50w6KE5 pic.twitter.com/M6nZlvLuKQ

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 19:50 This is your 10 minute countdown to #MuseumHour tonight with me ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ focusing on Community Participation. Grab a cuppa, get yourself comfy and be ready to chat... pic.twitter.com/w80bx85C5J

Questions:

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:01 Q1. Welcome to #MuseumHour focusing on Community Participation guest hosted by me, freelance arts educator & evaluator ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ To get us started who do you engage with in your local community? And how would you define ‘community’?

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:05 Q2. Does your ‘community’ exist outside the walls of your institution, or is your institution part of that community offering a community-centred approach? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:10 Q3. Who is responsible for community engagement on your staff? Is it only those within your learning team or is it everyone's priority? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:15 Q4. How do you prioritise who you work with within your community? Is this dictated by funding? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:20 Q5. What factors are key to consider when engaging with new communities? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:25 Q6. How do you avoid tokenistic community work and make sure that the audience’s voice is included and respected? How do you reflect on and evaluate this? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:30 Q7. "Who is not in the room and why?” This applies to local community participants but also workforce. How could you diversify your staff to reflect your local communities and help to make your organisation more inclusive? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:35 Q8. What has worked well for you, or give examples from other organisations, around working with your local community? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:40 Q9. What has not worked so well for you, or give examples from other organisations (feel free to keep this anonymous), around working with your local community? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:45 Q10. How could you sustain your community relationships beyond the end of your funding? What legacy could there be from your community work? #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 20:50 Q11. To end tonight's discussion, if funding and other barriers were not present which new communities would you ideally like to engage with and in what way? Think blue sky! #MuseumHour

MuseumHour (@museumhour)16/09/2019, 21:01 Thanks to everyone who joined in tonight & to #MuseumHour for having me as a guest host. Please feel free to continue the conversation with me ⁦‪@particip8tion‬⁩ or to check me out at particip8tion.com pic.twitter.com/7CNQ3uDEvM

Summer Fun with the kids In France

This summer I was fortunate to spend four weeks travelling around France again with my family in our campervan. On our travels we came across a number of quirky art, museum and heritage sites:

• Palace Idéal du Facteur Cheval, Hauterives - making a bit of detour on our travels we visited an incredible stone palace called Palais Idéal du Facteur Cheval which was built between 1879 and 1912 by Ferdinand Cheval. He was a postman by day and outsider artist by night. It only took him 33 years to create his masterpiece! Find out more here

• Musée du Velo, Tournus - featuring bikes through the ages this small museum displayed some wonderful bike posters, a wide variety of bicycles - including tricycles, tandoms and even a three seater bike - along with a section all about the Tour de France. I found it very interesting and I am not a massive bike fan. We were able to have a go on a number of unusual bicycles including one which was like a penny farthing - I was very surprised that I didn’t fall off! Take a look here

• Grotte de Clamouse - these stunning caves featured stalactites, stalagmites and eccentric concentrations of dolomite/calcite, including one looking like a jelly fish which is used as their logo! However I am not sure we needed the rather cheesy light and sound show in one cave. The tour was in French but we had English audio guides which were very informative. For further details look here

• Bunker 638, La Tamarissière - welcoming friendly volunteers explained about the restoration of this hospital bunker built by the Nazi occupation in France along with a hundred other bunkers along the South coast of France near Agde. It only opens one morning a week so we were lucky to be able to go inside. However Thomas was scared of the mannequins! Visit Trip Advisor here

• Ecluse Ronde, Agde - starting with a walk along the canal from the town centre we went to see a special round lock. Nearly 350 years old, it connects up three parts of the canal. We saw a boat using it on its journey, explaining to the kids what locks are used for. Check it out here

• Celles, Hérault - this village by Lac du Salagou was abandoned in 1967 due to potential flooding when the lake was supposed to be raised another 11 metres, but this never actually happened. A project is currently taking place to renovate the derelict and graffitied buildings so as to repopulate the village. There is only one family living there at the moment with their home, an exhibition and post office all housed within the Mairie (town hall) building. It was interesting chatting to the urban planner working with them. Discover more here

For myself, visiting Palace Idéal du Facteur Cheval was a truly special day as it was so incredible what Cheval had achieved on his own especially all the carved stone details. We were able to visit a number of churches, abbeys and cathedrals on our travels too.

Over the summer, it was lovely to see the children developing in confidence and increasing in independence as they explored the various campsites. We also went swimming everyday and - whenever possible - not just in pools but in lakes, rivers and the sea. It is strange to be back home spending much more time indoors but we are already looking forward to next year’s trip!

Palace Idéal du Facteur Cheval, Hauterives

Mentoring

Over the years I have informally mentored a number of young people, usually following on from meeting them via one of the youth programmes I have worked on. Two years ago I took part in the Mentoring for All pilot run by the Museum Association, which has helped me to formalise my future mentoring relationships.

I am currently mentoring an inspiring mentee who is one of the Young Freelancers at London Transport Museum (LTM). I find that I am learning greatly from the conversations we have whilst also supporting her early on in her career; both in navigating the politics of working in the arts sector and in mapping out her future as a freelancer.

To find out more about the programme at London Transport Museum and to consider putting yourself forward as a mentee for next years’ Young Freelancers programme visit here

Next year there will be an additional freelance role at LTM, The Khadija Saye Photography Fellowship.

Family Mural Tour

Last weekend, for Art on the Underground, I gave a tour of some of the 1980s Brixton murals along with Aliza Nisenbaum’s commission at Brixton tube station. The tour was aimed at families with free sketchbooks and drawing materials provided to encourage everyone to draw their favourite parts of each mural and map their journeys, whilst learning about the stories behind the murals and playing games together. 

For more information about the murals you can download the Brixton Mural Map. Copies are also available from Brixton tube station.

The artists with their sketchbooks

RA Collection Teacher Resources

I am very excited that the two teacher resources that I wrote for the Royal Academy are now online (and shortly available in print too). You can check them out at Stories from the RA Collection (primary) and Sculpture in the RA Collection (secondary & FE). I have also written an independent study guide aimed at 16-19 year olds available soon.

Primary Teacher Resource

FutureProof

As part of my role as evaluator for the DEVELOP Programme for young people at The Photographers’ Gallery I recently attended the private view of FutureProof to chat to visitors. Presented at The Truman Brewery, as part of Free Range, an annual showcase of UK graduates, FutureProof is an alternative exhibition of original works conceived and curated by participants of the DEVELOP Programme.

One visitor said: 

“It’s a snapshot of the art world in an intense moment. It’s great to see everything in a few days in one place.”

And someone else said that it was the first exhibition they had ever been to!

For more information about Future Proof take a look here

Future Proof exhibition branding

Routes In

I recently facilitated the latest Routes In Work network meeting at Tate Britain. Routes In is a commitment to offer up more opportunities and create a level playing field for young people from under-represented backgrounds when entering Tate, along with the wider cultural and creative industries. I am acting as a critical friend for the programme helping them to decide on their next steps following on from this year’s Routes In Alternative Careers Fair. For more information take a look here

Institute of Education

Last week, I was a guest speaker for the Alternative models for Art Education Module as part of the Art & Design in Education MA at the Institute of Education presenting about and running break out groups focusing on how young people could gain employment into the arts sector, contributing to diversifying the workforce. This included thinking about the work I have been doing around setting up paid traineeships or internships, evaluating careers focused programmes for young people, and mentoring young freelancers. In the breakouts we explored some of the questions I’ve been thinking about such as: What is the legacy of each individual trainee’s experience? Is it a tokenistic ‘1 in 1 out policy’? How could these roles contribute to institutional change?

For more information about the Art & Design in Education MA take a look here

Art on the Underground & LSBU Poster Project

Congratulations to LSBU student Ewan Coleman for his stunning flower design inspired by Linder’s Art on the Underground commission The Bower of Bliss at Southwark tube station. 

I set this project up with the BA (Hons) photography department at LSBU with the brief for Year 1 Photography students to submit an image for a poster design considering one or more of the key themes Linder has focused on in her work:

• Mapping a vertical history of Southwark;

• The station interior inspired by 18th Century notion of the English landscape garden;

• The station as a place of peace and tranquility, a refuge from urban life;

• The histories, myths and fables of women based in Southwark;

• A picture of empowerment for women everywhere.

I short-listed the submissions with LSBU’s Senior Lecturer Adam Brown and Art on the Underground Curator Kiera Blakey. The final design was chosen by artist Linder. This is what she said about the designs:

“I was delighted to see the work of the five shortlisted artists! I felt that even though I was just looking at one example of their work, I got some sense of each student as an individual who in turn responded to the brief in their unique way.”

Linder felt that Ewan’s design would work especially well in relation to her artwork, and would be noticeable to passing customers against advertising whilst reading well from a distance.

Ewan’s poster design will be outside Southwark tube station until the end of this month and Linder’s commission is up until October 2019. For more information visit here

Ewan Coleman’s Poster Design Monstrous Flower

Mainly Museums article

I’ve just written an article for Mainly Museums  - a personal take on Museums big and small from contributors across the globe. I chose the Derwent Pencil Museum in Keswick and you can read my article here.

You can follow Mainly Museums (set up by John McKerracher) on Twitter to see when the latest articles get posted up, or you might like to contact them to write your own article! @mainlymuseums

World War II Secret Map Pencil, Derwent Pencil Museum

Little Angel Theatre Evaluation

I am currently evaluating the strategic touring programme Take Flight  for Little Angel Theatre, where ten theatre venues across the country are aiming to develop long lasting relationships with primary schools in their area. I’ve so far met theatre venue staff and local primary teachers in Wolverhampton, Barking, Tower Hamlets and St Helens. The other six venues are Luton, Doncaster, Harrow, Rochdale, Oldham and Gainsborough. This evaluation will also include a SurveyMonkey questionnaire for teachers in autumn term, with a prize draw incentive, along with a teachers’ focus group in London. By the end of the year, I will be writing a report focusing on barriers to arts engagement and making recommendations on how each venue can work best with their local schools.  For more information about Little Angel Theatre’s Take Flight programme visit here

The Flying Bath, Little Angel Theatre

New clients - Tate & the Whitechapel Gallery

I am excited to be freelancing with two new clients.

For Tate, I am working with their Young People’s Programmes Team to support the evaluation and next steps of the Routes In Programme including devising and facilitating the next Routes In: Network meeting. The network aims to share knowledge, skills and expertise around creating progression routes for young people into the cultural and creative industries. For more information about the recent Routes In: Alternative Careers Fair take a look here 

For the Whitechapel Gallery, I am evaluating their forthcoming community project Voices that Matter: Women, Art, Collaboration working with three partners - City Gateway, Women’s Environmental Network and Numbi - with funding from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation. For more information about the Whitechapel Gallery’s Community Programme visit here.

CPD at the Courtauld Gallery

Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of facilitating a CPD session for an experienced team of gallery educators at the Courtauld Gallery, who are currently running outreach sessions in schools whilst the Gallery is closed for redevelopment. I devised activities that included a brainstorm around making contemporary connections to key artworks in the Courtauld Collection, and a discussion on classroom management issues. As usual in my CPD sessions, we used a lot of flip chart paper, postits & coloured pens. And from the feedback their favourite activity was ‘throw the question!’

Brainstorm around Van Gogh’s Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear

Lisbon - family friendly city

We have just returned from a holiday in Lisbon with our kids aged 5 and 7. It is such a great city for a family to explore (although a little expensive). Here are our highlights:

• Castelo - this is where you find the Castelo de São Jorge which has great views across the city and the kids loved exploring it - they sat on the cannons, climbed the towers, viewed the archaeological site, and got a guided tour across the city via the camera obscura. We were even joined by peacocks whilst we ate lunch!
• Belém - this is a lovely area just outside the city centre (you can get there via train, bus or tram) where the kids roamed by the waterfront (we also tried the electric scooters), climbed up the Tower of Belém, took a trail around the Art Museum (Museu Coleção Berado with a collection to rival Tate), and marvelled at the ornate Jerónimos Monastery, before we ended the day tasting the Pastéis de Belém!
• Cascais - this seaside town is a 40 minute train ride along the coast where we climbed to the top of a lighthouse, visited the spectacular orange building and paintings in the Paula Rego Museum The House of Stories, and ran around in the nearby Parque Marechal Carmona (where in summer there is a petting zoo). Of course there was the beach as well, where the kids ate icecreams, built sandcastles and splashed in the waves!
• Parque das Naçeõs - this area was so good for the kids we came twice! Arriving at Oriente station we checked out the street sculptures (by Anthony Gormley, Jorge Vieira and others), then took a cable car along the waterfront to the Oceanário. If you think you’ve been to an aquarium before you’ve not been to one this enormous! A giant central tank is surrounded by a number of zones featuring animals and fish from different climates - our favourites were the playful sea otters and the waddling penguins (one was called Oliver Twist!) We returned a few days later to experience the nearby science museum Pavilhão do Conhecimento (The Pavilion of Knowledge) - two massive floors packed with interactives and the Dóing area where you could ‘make’ and ‘tinker’. It was loads of fun and very educational!

In addition to these highlights, roaming around the city was a big hit with the kids - taking trams and furniculars to viewpoints as well as a boat across the River Tagus. And our fussy little eaters even enjoyed some of the ‘petiscos’. We hope to go back one day - as my 5-year-old says “I love Lisbon”!

Outside Lisbon’s Science Museum 

Engagement Advisory Group

Today I attended my first Engagement Advisory Group meeting at the Horniman Museum and Gardens as their ‘young people’ specialist. I am pleased to be giving time to somewhere I love to visit with my family. This is a voluntary group comprised of individuals who are able to offer a strategic overview of their areas of expertise and act as advisors during the Collections Peoples Stories project at the Horniman Museum and Gardens. These areas of expertise include museum community engagement, participatory work, need and provision in their local boroughs, current initiatives and best practise working with their target groups: mental health service users, new arrivals, older persons, disabled people, young people, marginalised families and ESOL learners.

Symposium: Youth-led Programming

Earlier this week I was at The Photographers’ Gallery for their Symposium: Youth-led Programming, presenting about Art on The Underground’s Clay Station Traineeship that I set up and ran in 2017. I was joined by trainee Abigail Holsborough to get her perspective on the project. We were part of the first group of speakers focusing on Behind the Scenes Programming which included speakers Aleema Gray from the National Maritime Museum and Rio Blake Youth Trustee at The Photographers’ Gallery. This was followed by a panel discussion covering tokenism, institutional change, barriers, and paying young people. Three more sets of speakers then focused on Public Facing Programming along with a second panel discussion. It was a fantastic turn out of arts educators and young people interested in engaging with museums and galleries, including one of my old Youth Forum members from the National Portrait Gallery.

You can watch the symposium here (Abigail and I are the first speakers).

Abigail and I presenting about the Clay Station Traineeship

Work in Focus: Michelangelo’s Taddei Tondo

The first of a number of teacher resources I’ve been writing for the Royal Academy (RA) is now online. This ‘Work in Focus from the RA Collection: Michelangelo’s Taddei Tondo’ acts as a springboard for students to compare and contrast this incredible marble sculpture with other artworks in the Bill Viola / Michelangelo: Life, Death, Rebirth exhibition, on at the RA until 31 March. Take a look under the section for teachers about this exhibition here.