London’s homeless work with leading contemporary artists to create ‘Our place, our space’ art exhibition
London (PRWEB UK) 9 July 2013 -- The artistic talents of residents at Arlington, a high quality accommodation and support service for homeless people in London, will be showcased at Our place, our space – The 2013 Creative Space art exhibition from Thursday 18 – Friday 19 July.
The exhibition will feature fascinating prints and images, thought-provoking poems and quirky puppets, all created by the residents who participated in the 2013 Creative Space art programme at Arlington. The residents collaborated with leading contemporary artists the drawing shed, performance poet Sonority and drama practitioner Clare Fry to produce the collection of artwork on the six month programme.
Our place, our space will provide the opportunity to gain an insight into the residents’ lives and their challenging experiences of homelessness, through their creative interpretations. Visitors will be able to enjoy prose and poetry, appreciate interesting imagery and interact with some original puppets. There will also be a welcoming “pop-up” café selling light refreshments where visitors can relax and socialise within the exhibition.
Customer S has been a regular participant in the Irregular Bulletin print-making workshop and will have some of her prints displayed at the event.
She said: “The Irregular Bulletin project opened my eyes to my abilities and possibilities - it got me motivated to go out and do the creative things I'm doing.
The Irregular Bulletin gives me space to be myself - get stuff down and into print. When you have peace and some space, your mind works wonders!”
Jason Pryce-Kennedy, Head of Homelessness, commented: “We have some extremely talented customers at Arlington, but sometimes it takes a while for them to realise their abilities. Programmes, like the Creative Space, are a softer, less intimidating way to encourage our customers to engage and help build their confidence and capacity. We are always exploring different approaches to motivate customers to fuel their ambition and fulfil their potential.”
Fiona Fieber, from SPACE added: “We believe that having artists as neighbours in the place where you live provides a wonderful opportunity to take part in and experience the arts. The Creative Space artists have not been afraid to explore some pretty personal and challenging issues together with the residents. The arts and creativity inspire and transform lives and are essential ingredients to a healthy and dynamic society.”
Delivered by arts charity SPACE in partnership with Arlington, the Creative Space art programme has been running at Arlington since 2010. It gives customers the opportunity to learn new skills, discover hidden talents and raise their self-esteem, while expressing themselves and sharing their stories in a therapeutic setting.
Our place, our space – The 2013 Creative Space art exhibition will be open to the general public on Thursday 18 July 11.00am–3.00pm and Friday 19 July 11.00am–7.00pm at the Arlington Conference Centre, 220 Arlington Road, London NW1 7HE. Admission is free.
For more information, please contact Isha Richards on 020 8821 5228 / irichards(at)onehousinggroup(dot)co(dot)uk.
Notes to editors
Arlington takes a revolutionary approach to tackling homelessness in the United Kingdom. It is the largest mixed use hostel in the UK, providing a stimulating community of high quality accommodation for homeless people, social enterprises, low rent accommodation for young professionals and low-income workers; together with a state of the art Conference Centre based in Camden. It provides 139 accommodation units, of which 95 are for homeless people who are on the various stages of their journey from homelessness back to independent living.
As well as accommodation, Arlington provides high quality on-site care and support, along with bespoke education, training and job opportunities to help customers progress to independent living and employment.
Arlington is owned and managed by One Housing Group, a leading provider of affordable housing, care and support across London and the South East.
For more information about this story or Arlington in general, please contact Isha Richards on 020 8821 5228 / irichards(at)onehousinggroup(dot)co(dot)uk. Please visit arlington.org.uk for more information.
The Creative Space arts programme engages Arlington residents in the arts. It is delivered by SPACE in partnership with Arlington and has been offered to residents at Arlington since 2010. Every year customers are able to access a diverse range of creative workshops to learn new skills, engage with others and build their confidence.
The 2013 Creative Space art programme featured workshops in print-making, creative writing and performing arts. Over a six month period residents participated in weekly workshops where they worked with experienced artists in the different fields.
The artists: the drawing shed, Sonority and Clare Fry.
Sonority is a poet, creative artist and workshop facilitator from Camden. She works with various groups; in schools, with arts venues and in community settings to communicate ideas and play with words and language.
She was selected as the 'Poet' to represent Camden by Adidas for their "Take the stage” Olympics campaign, co-running some of London's liveliest performance events at Keats House, the Roundhouse and Passing Clouds. Sonority ran the creative writing workshop on the programme.
Clare Fry is a freelance drama and workshop facilitator, who has worked for the YMCA movement for the last seven years. She specialises in facilitating, producing community theatre and writing, as well as running issue based workshops. She was a founder of Benchmark Theatre with residents and friends of the YMCA London South West.
After completing a BA Honours in Drama, Theatre and Performance Arts and Human Rights, she recently gained a Post Graduate Certificate in Applied Theatre at Central School of Speech and Drama and is a trainee workshop facilitator with the Almeida Theatre. Clare delivered the performing arts project on the programme.
the drawing shed is a contemporary visual arts organisation based on two housing estates in east London. the drawing shed works in collaboration with local people on projects using print, text, photography, performance, film, sculpture, drawings, installation and social media. The drawing shed ran the Irregular bulletin print-making workshop on the programme. http://www.thedrawingshed.org/
SPACE - Founded in 1968 by the artists Bridget Riley and Peter Townsend, SPACE supports artists throughout their careers. This is achieved primarily via provision of affordable studios for over 700 artists across 17 sites, in 7 London boroughs. Alongside we run an extensive programme of artist professional development, exhibitions, residencies, talks, screenings, performances, professional training, workshops, school and community engagement. SPACE has a particular focus on supporting emerging practice and via the Media Lab & The White Building supports the use of emerging technologies.
For further information about the Creative Space studio project at Arlington please contact Fiona Fieber fifi(at)spacestudios(dot)org(dot)uk. Please visit http://www.spacestudios.org.uk for more information.
Isha Richards, One Housing Group, 020 8821 5228, [email protected]
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