Community Maker: A Floral Walk

In Certain place and IXIA Public Art Thinktank Conference \nAnna Francis was invited to lead a walk, via Birmingham’s wild flowers, to talk about her place based practice. The walk centred around notions of ‘working from home’ in relation to the Community Maker Project, where Francis leads a creative arts project in her own neighbourhood, in order to explore the artist’s role in the changing city. \nConference Details: \nIn recent years the landscape of public art commissioning in the UK has undergone profound change. Linked to the regeneration of post-industrial places during the last decade, funding for public art has diminished as the effects of the recession and austerity politics have taken hold. Meanwhile, in response to what many perceive as the widespread instrumentalisation of art within urban policy, artists and curators have begun to develop new methods of producing and articulating the value of public art, which are predicated on collaboration, critical reflection, intervention and the development of long-term relationships with a place. \nBuilding on the themes and questions raised by Subplots to a City – a new publication which details the last 10 years of In Certain Places – The Art of Dwelling will examine the role of public art within the post-regeneration age. Bringing together artists, curators and commissioners from across the UK, this one-day conference will focus on the significance of working in a place for a sustained period of time. Taking the notion of ‘dwelling’ as a starting point for discussions, the event will examine the motivations and methods of long-term, situated approaches to public art, and the challenges, responsibilities and opportunities these entail. \nThe conference has been developed by In Certain Places in partnership with ixia public art think tank, and will include presentations by Anna Hart (AIR) Claudia Zeiske (Deveron Arts), Elaine Speight and Charles Quick (In Certain Places); workshops led by Becky Beinart (Primary), Kerry Morrison (In Situ), Anna Francis (Air Space Gallery), Jayne Murray (Place Prospectors) and Gavin Wade (Eastside Projects); and opportunities for group discussion.