Contributors

Listed here is a comprehensive list of all the contributors to the Social Making 2O24 Programme, they are listed in alphabetical order (by surname).

Photo credit:
Dominick Tyler

Kathrin Böhm is an art worker and cultural entrepreneur across interdependent realms of cultural production, including the art world. Her work supports collective forms of (re-)producing public space, taking back the economy for more-than-capitalist futures, and enabling a new trans-localism that acknowledges the rural.

Kathrin is a co-founder of the international arts organisation Myvillages (since 2003) and has initiated Barking based Company Drinks (since 2014). As a researcher she contributes to the wider topics of New Economy, Usership of Art and the Production of Public Space. Kathrin currently holds an art professorship at the Economics Department at Alanus University, and is a member of the Community Economies Institute. 

In 2020 Kathrin stopped initiating new projects and engaged in a process of ‘composting’ of her work during a solo exhibition at The Showroom London, in order to make ‘fertiliser’ for evolving long-term infrastructures such as The Centre for Plausible Economies and Myvillages’ Rural School of Economics. 

Recent contributions to art events and exhibitions include Municipal Kitchens at nGbK, Berlin (2024), Artists and Peasants, Les Abattoirs (2023), Toulouse and Kassels’ Rural Undercurrents for Lumbung documenta fifteen (2022). Co-edited publications include Icebergian Economies of Contemporary Art (2020), The Rural (2019), and Learn to Act (2017).

Photo credit:
Dominick Tyler

Ben Borthwick is a Plymouth based curator, writer and occasional skater. He combines working internationally with grass roots cultural development.

Through roles at Tate Modern, Artes Mundi, and now as Head of Programme at KARST, he has worked closely with artists commissioning work for gallery spaces and the public realm for over 20 years.

As well as major international exhibitions, he works at local level on projects that bring together artists and communities to effect social change. One such project is PRIMEdesign, a longterm community project he set up with Take A Part connecting young skaters to contemporary art. This happens through workshops, events, and collaborative projects at the intersection of skateboarding, visual culture and the public realm, harnessing the ways artists and skaters can influence and redefine the physical and political spaces of the urban landscape. He has published widely on contemporary art and experimental music.

Megan is a Visual Mixed Media Artist & Socially Engaged Performance Maker with over 15 years of experience. She celebrates the great in human connection to create sincerely feel-good art.

On the face of it, Megan doesn’t make “serious art”, but she does. She takes silliness & her playful approach VERY seriously, resulting in interdisciplinary playful projects co-created with communities. She smashes together conversations from community with aesthetics from mainstream culture, using fine art & performative approaches to create colourful (sometimes laser cut) art installations, performances that tell stories and immersive arts events, that everyone is invited to take part in. Current themes are often about sustainability for the future and using art to create a legacy for the present. Her work is always aesthetically pleasing and tends to be questioning, queer, fun, humorous, bitter- sweet and surprisingly sobering at times. Her work is easily identified by the Bassett’s Fruit Salad chew colours; pink and yellow.

Essentially, Megan likes to make fun/ny projects with people. Megan is Co-Director of LIGHTS! LIGHTS! LIGHTS! and an associate artist with : The University of Bath, Knowle West Media Centre (KWMC), Terrestrial UK, The Royal Shakespeare Co and Super Culture.

At its core is an artist duo made up of very distinct skillsets and approaches. Hilary Powell has developed an intensely committed, embedded art practice over 20 years working with urban sites and communities. She values and foregrounds the overlooked and marginalised, making active space for collaboration and care. A 10 year critical engagement with the London Olympic Park regeneration site led to award winning short films, published books and art works collected by the V&A and MOMA NY – never compromising on independence and criticality in the face of coercive gentrification agendas. She brought her passionate, participatory practice and scenographic skills to their previous feature documentaries – building worlds in miniature for ‘How To Re-Establish A Vodka Empire’ (2011) and, as ‘Guv’nor making the ‘Rebel Bank ‘ thrive in ‘Bank Job’ (2021).

Dan Edelstyn is committed to finding ways to flourish and share an abundance mindset to create infrastructures of care and collaboration. He honed his filmmaking skills on multiple commissions for commercial clients and broadcasters and, since their first feature documentary led by his Jewish Ukrainian family history has built strategy for a sustainable practice via direct to audience marketing and movement building. Our previous feature launched into lockdown and saw Dan generate audiences of 1000s for the film alongside more traditional festival premiere (Hot Docs) release strategies. We were nominated for the BIFA Raindance Discovery Award for maverick producers and, working across fields of art, documentary film, social entrepreneurship and innovations in community energy and engagement we have to be.

We constantly ‘refound’ ourselves but consistently return to the sentence that brought us together in love and life: ‘Beneath the paving stones, the beach.’ Agile and adaptive, the team includes young artist film-maker Leonie Rousham who began work with us post Grierson DocLab programme. Our production approach is discursive and collaborative and Leonie works on ethical partnership building for impact.

Our challenges are those faced by many UK independent filmmakers and artists. Growing a sustainable practice. Finding routes to the biggest audience and biggest impact possible. 

We are also literally building a POWER STATION. This isn’t some narrative device. This is all very real and the work is big and complex and involves all our artistic and production skills.  Our lives and work are inextricable and as activists we are aware of the dangers of burnout and do our best to put in place systems of care and support.  

Success for us and for POWER STATION is where artistic and impact vision come together in joy and action. Where we witness a living legacy. When the film itself is a case for the critical role culture/arts/storytelling play in a just transition. When we can see that the work does make change as others take action and the film is more than an inspiring story but an empowering call to take practical steps towards climate justice. 

Daisy Hale (they/them) is an award winning independent producer of exciting performance artists and Creative Director of The Hale.

The Hale is a London-based arts producing company specialising in experimental, socially-engaged work that is not restricted by form. We exist to produce and develop artists who have been traditionally ostracised from mainstream spaces with a focus on Queer, Trans, Global Majority & Learning Disabled & Neurodivergent identities. We are just as interested in art as protest as art for fun. Often they can be the same. Our work priorities joy over trauma, looking for the fun in the mundane and using populism as an access point for deeper conversation with a broad audience about socio-political issues. Our work is countercultural, care focused and transparent. Often we work in models of co-creation and non-hierarchy.

Daisy regularly facilitates workshops & sessions on producing, leadership & inclusion for organisations including Clore, Soho Theatre, Yard Theatre, Stage One, NYT and Bradford Producing Hub. Daisy is an access consultant and disability equality trainer for arts organisations. They are a trustee of ArtsAdmin and Clore Leadership.

David Jubb co-founded the not-for-profit organisation, Citizens In Power, with Saad Eddine Said in 2023 and is its co-director.

He was Artistic Director and CEO of Battersea Arts Centre from 2004-19, Chair of Kneehigh Theatre from 2008-13, inaugural Chair of London Theatre Consortium from 2012-2015, inaugural Advisory Council member for Creative Industries Federation 2015-16 (now Creative UK), panellist on the inquiry into the Civic Role Of Arts Organisations by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation 2017-18; member of Arts Council England’s 10 Year Strategy External Reference Group from 2018-2019. David is an Honorary Fellow of Central School and has an Honorary Doctorate at Roehampton University. He has been an Independent Director for the Sortition Foundation since 2020.

Photo credit:
Dom Moore

Anneliese studied at University of Winchester and University of Exeter, achieving a BA and MA Performing Arts and a PGCE (Post-Compulsory Education).

Early in her career, Anneliese worked at Theatre Royal Winchester. In 2005 Anneliese joined Arts Council England, working in a number of roles before becoming Relationship Manager (Dance in 2010), providing support and advice to artists and organisations across the South West.

Last year Anneliese joined Exim Dance as Strategic Operations Lead, a post she held until their closure earlier this year. Since then, Anneliese has established a freelance career as a Creative Consultant (Eunoia Creative Freelance), offering business mentoring, planning and development; fundraising; project management and evaluation; and leadership support.

Her work is underpinned by a belief in the importance of compassion & kindness, collaboration and communication in the workplace. In her spare time, Anneliese has volunteered in her local community as a school governor, Academy Trust Director, a member of the town’s regatta committee, and Chair of Trustees of a local charity.

Photo credit:
Ilaria Constanzo

Anurupa Roy is a puppeteer, puppet designer and a director of puppet theatre. She is the Co-Founder and Managing Trustee of Katkatha Puppet Arts Trust since 1998.

She has a diploma in puppetry at Dramatiska Institutet, University of Stockholm and has trained at the Scoula De La Guaratelle under Bruno Leone. She is a recipient of the Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Puraskar in Puppetry, a National Award in Puppet Theater in 2006. She is a 2023 CLORE Chevening Fellow.

Anurupa works as a consultant in arts for public health, peace-building and education projects for communities, schools, juvenile homes, in conflict zones like Kashmir, Sri Lanka and Manipur. She has designed puppet exhibitions for Serendipity Arts Festival, The National Museum in Delhi, the Children’s Musuem at Prince of Wales Museum(CSMCS) Mumbai and the Goethe Institutes Infinite Library Project.

She has directed over forty puppet productions for Katkatha supported by India Foundation for the Arts, Festival Mondial Des Theatres de Marrionnettes, Charleville- Mezieres, France, Helios Theater, Hamm, Germany, The Japan Foundation, Atelier de la Luna, Spain and as guest director for TIE Repertory Company, National School of Drama and the Sandbox Collective, Bangalore.

A key priority for Anurupa is creating a rigorous training system for puppeteers with a focus to train the next generation of professional puppeteers in India, creating a discourse around puppetry and also building a network of puppeteers thus through UNIMA Puppeteers Trust where she co-founded the Master class programs in 2014 and the Foundation program in 2019.

Saad Eddine Said is a strategic leader who initiates and develops partnerships between communities, creatives, and cultural institutions with the aim to reshape arts and culture in cities and towns around the world.

His purpose is to re-think and re-imagine a blueprint for Institutional Leadership and governance. He is the CEO and Artistic Director of New Art Exchange where he transformed and led the organisation to become the first one, worldwide, to integrate a permanent Citizen Assembly as part of its leadership structure. He is also the Co-Director and Co-Founder of Citizens In Power and Co-Chair of Contemporary Visual Arts Network England.

Nadia Shaikh is a naturalist and land justice campaigner. She is now co-director of the Right to Roam Campaign and also leads The Raven Network, a group for people of colour who work in the conservation sector. She is interested in how decolonizing nature conservation is vital to reversing biodiversity decline which includes re-commoning the land.

Photo credit:
Dom Moore

Gem has worked in arts engagement in Plymouth for over 10 years. Over that time her work has crossed many different disciplines and involved a range of projects as diverse as community radio, public art, theatre, sculpture, mass dance, stone carving, tour guiding and orchestral outreach.

Always at the heart of these projects has been a desire to work with people, to support new audiences and communities to experience and enjoy artwork for the first time or to grow their passion for the arts in a new direction. Gem has worked with Take A Part for the last 15 years; heads up Take A Part’s engagement work, with a focus on Plymouth and a particular skillset around creative education, community engagement and work with families.

In 2022 Gemma won a Marsh Award for Excellence in Visual Arts Engagement and in 2023, on behalf of Take a Part and in collaboration with Prince Rock School, she received a MaxLiteracy Award. She was part of the Extend Leadership cohort during 2023.

Mark Teh is a performance maker, researcher, and curator based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

His diverse, collaborative projects take on documentary, speculative and generative forms, and address the entanglements of history, memory, counter-cartography, and the political. His practice is situated primarily in performance, but also operates via exhibitions, education, social interventions, writing and curating.

He graduated with an MA in Art and Politics from Goldsmiths, University of London. Mark’s projects have been presented at OzAsia Festival Adelaide, SPIELART Festival Munich, Seoul Performing Arts Festival, Bangkok International Performing Arts Meeting, YPAM – Yokohama International Performing Arts Meeting, Kunstenfestivaldesarts Brussels, MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum Chiang Mai, Salihara Jakarta, Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre, Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media, Fast Forward Festival Athens, MMCA Seoul, and Haus de Kulturen der Welt Berlin, amongst others.

In 2024, Mark is a recipient of the Prince Claus-British Council Fellows Award for Moving Narratives, and is a participant in in-tangible institute’s Pollination platform and Independent Curators International’s Curatorial Intensive Indonesia.

Photo credit:
Dave Lane

Born and raised in Bordeaux, France, Léo Valls has been a professional skateboarder for more than 15 years who has developed a creative practice based on city exploration.

His style is recognized worldwide. In 2017, he started working with the city council of Bordeaux in order to make skateboarding legal in the streets after more than ten years of repression.

Along with his prolific creative career in skateboarding, Léo became a cultural activist who has developed the concept of “Skateurbanism” by working with city services and architects on skate- friendly public spaces and furniture. He has curated several public art shows throughout the world focused on the creation of skateable sculptures in public spaces. He is driven by the idea that the city can be a place for playing and sharing space.

Photo credit:
Dom Moore

Kim hails from Canada with a background in the heritage and Disability Arts sectors.

In 2009, Kim founded Take A Part and since then, has been working on supporting and developing the Socially Engaged Arts sector (SEA), models of co-creation and values-led placemaking in the UK.  Kim has worked across the UK and globally to support communities, cultural organisations, institutions and local authorities to collaborate on values-driven approaches to cultural democracy and increasing representation within the cultural sector.  As a placemaker, Kim has established 10 social enterprises and supported the initiation of organisations such as Take A Part Carlow (Republic of Ireland) and Bricks Bristol.

Historically, Kim has applied models of Asset Based Community Development within her work.  Since the pandemic (challenges to democracy, environment, financial and social infrastructures), Kim has become interested in how we might explore and learn globally new approaches and innovations within the SEA sector that can help us to work with greater agility, with increased intent and in new partnerships that respond to the rapid global paradigm shifts and create more global or shared ideas and approaches.   Her research with Anurupa Roy exploring the necessity, benefits and considerations of Jugaad (to DIY or hack) creates a conversation about new modes and approaches to SEA against increasingly challenging UK frameworks.

Developed and delivered by Take A Part CIO, hosted by Bricks, Bristol.
Generously supported by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.