SYMPOSIUM: Does Art Work?

Saturday 24 May 2025  BOOK PLACE
Early Bird tickets now available from £25, from £35 thereafter. Students and online tickets are free

 

Every culture throughout history has made art. The need to create, to translate thoughts and ideas into physical form is one of the fundamental cornerstones of what makes us human. It is a mode of expression, a language, if you will, more universal than the spoken or written word, and one which permeates our everyday lives, not only through the realm of fine art, but also architecture, design in every sphere, fashion, landscape, and more. Art is everywhere and it informs the way in which we shape our individual and collective identities and interact with others.

On this very place 400,000 years ago, Manuports, a sort of proto version of art were picked up by distant genealogical ancestors and carried over 100 miles to be discovered in the 10th Century in Swanscombe in Kent. Providing us with a link through objects between the animate and the inanimate worlds. A connection that today reminds us not so much of our obligations but the material fact of our entwinedness with the planet.

At a time in which the arts are officially considered ‘non-essential’ subjects in the UK education system, resulting in an increasing lack of public funding, whole generations of young people are being deprived of the opportunity to make art, to express themselves through creativity, to be understood, and to build communities through making. Not only are myriad technical skills being lost, but so too are visual literacy and cultural understanding suffering as a consequence.

This Symposium seeks to illustrate by way examples from experts within the creative industries, science, education, politics and welfare why the arts not only create but work.

 

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