Can art help us imagine new futures? is a text written in response to Is context only half the work?, the first of a series of six online Constellations ° Assemblies by UP Projects’ Senior Curator (Learning & Live Research), Elisabeth Del Prete, that highlights key insights and considerations from the event held on 16 March 2022
Is context only half the work? invited visual artist and curator, Jeanne van Heeswijk, local resident and project manager of Homebaked Community Land Trust, Tom Murphy, and director of Kin Structures and Programme Manager, Culture & Community Spaces at the Greater London Authority, Arman Nouri as speakers, and was moderated by artist-curator Gavin Wade. The speakers presented two projects that use art and culture as ways to bring people together, build communities, and shape the place where they live and work: Orchard Gardens, located in Lewisham in London and coinciding with Lewisham Borough of Culture 2022, and Homebaked Community Land Trust, a Liverpool-based project that began in 2012 and is located on the boundary of Everton and Anfield.