INSIDE AND OUTSIDE: ARTISTS AS FUNDERS AND COMMISSIONERS OF CREATIVE WORK
SAN LDN is excited to invite you to an online Discuss & Exchanged session with invited guest speakers. Open to everyone interested in the intersection between art & society.
WEDNESDAY 18TH NOVEMBER, 6-8PM
REGISTER FOR FREE ON EVENTBRITE!
Join Gemma Seltzer, special guests and the Social Art Network community for a discussion about the relationship between artists, creativity, funding and commissioning.
Alongside making creative work, many artists are fundraisers and project managers, or employed by cultural institutions to advise or administrate arts funding and programmes. How do they navigate the responsibility of supporting fellow artists?
Artists within cultural organisations can help make processes more open and inclusive. Yet it brings challenges, too. How can those of us on the ‘inside’ reckon with the tools of administration to best serve our peers? And, how do our creative selves intersect with this business side of the arts? Can bureaucracy be beautiful? Can project management be an artform? Can team meetings become sites for creative investigation?
The pandemic has taken away the physical office, so has it democratised the way artists communicate with funders and creative organisations? Can this change offer an opportunity to transform how we think about power dynamics, decision-making and collaboration between funders, arts organisations and artists?
Guest Biographies
Gemma Seltzer makes all kinds of creative projects and has enjoyed facilitation, performance and writing commissions from BBC Radio 3, Tate Modern and the Venice Biennale. Her short story collection ‘Ways of Living’ will be published by Influx Press in 2021. She collaborates with older adults in care settings, supported by Age UK and the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust. She runs Write & Shine, a programme of morning writing workshops and online courses. Alongside this, Gemma has over 14 years experience working in charity and arts funding. At Arts Council England, she initiated the Jerwood Compton Poetry Fellowships for ground-breaking poets and played a key role in designing the ‘Developing your Creative Practice’ fund for artists. As the first UK lead for crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, she coached writers, artists and makers to raise funds and share their creative ideas into the world. She’s also led successful fundraising bids for several creative and social action projects as a volunteer fundraiser.
Andrew Ellerby has worked at Arts Council England for 11 years. He is currently the Senior Manager for Combined Arts and for Environmental Sustainability but has also worked across the visual arts and dance teams, and with a North (Manchester), London and National focus. He studied Photography (BA) and Fine Arts (MA) at Manchester Metropolitan and took a keen interest in performative practices. In 2016, after living in London for 4 years, he launched the capitals first pan-London Queer Arts Festival named And What? bringing together his love of cross art form programming and Queer practice in a festival context.
Sarah Philp is Director of Programme and Policy at Art Fund, the national fundraising charity for art, where she leads on the development and delivery of the annual grants programme, museum and gallery support and relations, and sector policy, public affairs and research. During her time in the role she has overseen the growth of the annual grants budget from c£4million to c£8million, and has been responsible for the development and launch of a grant-making programme encompassing funding for the strategic development of museums and gallery collections, curatorial research and training, and exhibition, touring and public engagement projects.
Jacqueline Crooks has worked in the Third Sector for over twenty-five years. She was CEO of Westminster Befriend a Family, an award-winning children and families support charity. She now runs her Sharp Raiser, own consultancy, supporting charities, community groups, and artists with fundraising, business development, and training. She is a writer and delivers creative writing projects for young people, older people, migrants, refugees, and other socially excluded communities.
Debbie Adele Cooper is an artist, curator, fundraiser, manger and producer. Debbie’s art practice is based around photography, socially engaged practice and installation, she has exhibited and toured work internationally and been artist in residence for NHS Scotland and Dartmoor Prison. She currently works as a curator and producer for FORMAT International Photography Festival, runs the Digital Artist Training programme for QUAD, and is the Manager of the Photographic Collections Network. Previous roles include Fundraising Manager for Museums Sheffield, Associate Artist Nottingham Contemporary, Artist & Curator W. W. Winter collection.
Timetable (open to change, please check back before the session):
17:50 Zoom open to registered participants
18:00 Welcome and guidelines
18:10 Introduction from host Gemma Seltzer (Live on YouTube)
18:20 Guest tutor presentations, followed by Q&A (Live on YouTube)
19:10 Discuss & exchange session (in breakout sessions)
19:30 Group reflections
19:45 Closing
*Only the presentations will be broadcast, the Discuss & Exchange sessions takes place only to registered participants.