February 19, 7 PM
How can art address social issues? How can creative projects have lasting effects on communities? Why should cities embed artists into their futures? Learn from Create London experts
Create London is a registered charity and National Portfolio Organisation of Arts Council England. Founded in 2008, Create was set up to commission artists to work with communities in east London, home to more artists and arts organisations than anywhere in Europe, and one of the UK’s most economically deprived areas.
Organization now works across the UK to embed artists, curators, architects, designers and other creative practitioners within communities to encourage participation and engagement with the arts and creative industries through ambitious projects delivered outside of traditional cultural spaces.
Create commissions art anywhere and collaboratively in the places people encounter every day, with projects that are driven by artists, issues and places. Create experts reach a very wide demographic with socially motivated art and creative projects of the highest quality. By connecting communities with artists, they are facilitating positive urban renewal.
Primary beneficiaries of projects are residents of neighbourhoods that are areas of multiple deprivation with families on low incomes, facing long-term unemployment. This communities are among the most diverse in the UK (some with more than 40% of the population born outside the UK), and have the lowest engagement in arts and cultural activities.
Create work closely with the Mayor of London’s team, helping to shape their thinking and ambitions around how artists can positively influence all aspects of the city and what the impact will be if artists cannot afford to live and work in London. Working in outer London at this time is crucial — they are actively making the case for the positive benefits that artists can bring to the city and their potential to support the social and economic development of neighbourhoods that are poorly served in terms of opportunities to engage in arts and culture.
Over the last ten years Create London have helped to build a cinema under a motorway, set-up a new drinks-making company run with local people, built a new soft play centre and commissioned over 100 artists to deliver some of the most ambitious projects of their careers. To date, four of our commissioned artists have subsequently been nominated for the Turner Prize, including 2015 winners Assemble. Their partners have included the Arts & Humanities Research Council, Barbican Centre, Chisenhale Gallery, Frieze, Hayward Gallery and the V&A.
The lecture is a part of the Future Culture programme.
Admission is free and places are limited, so please register in advance.
