Save the date! Join us for our in person artist peer group at London's Southbank Centre - a chance to hear from, support, and meet other artists in creative health.
Our artist peer groups are an opportunity for artists exploring health and wellbeing in their practice to gain feedback and support on their projects, ideas or challenges that they are facing. The space is for active feedback, meaning that artists aren’t sharing finished works, but asking for specific support from others attending the session. Together we pool resources and provide feedback in a supportive environment. There’s time at the event to meet others working at the intersection of arts and health, and connect, too.
Click here to read more about how the groups work.
Our presenting artists for this session are Selene Heath and Dr Jane Robb.
Want to share your work at a future group? Fill out our application form.
Cost.
Free / Suggested Donation £5
Image: Selene Heath
About Selene Heath.
Selene is an artist and educator with over 15 years of experience working across the arts, education and wellbeing sectors. With experience of working both in the NHS and with local councils supporting care experienced young people, as well as collaborations with numerous charities and art organisations, inclusion and accessibility are core approaches to her teaching and artistic practice.
Selene’s practice and research draws on analogue photography, printmaking, poetry and collage to explore Black cultural identity, hidden community histories and decolonial ecology through the use of diaspora plant-based photographic developers. Collage, in particular, is central to her methodology, weaving together personal and cultural archives to explore experiences of displacement and neurodiversity, to hold hope and care within the copies and facsimiles of reproducible images.
Selene will be sharing works from her Front Room Pinhole project which is based on her Jamaican grandparent’s archive of photographs and ephemera, that remembers and celebrates their lives. Objects associated with their beloved front room cabinet, whether they were inherited or 'found', became part of their story of migration, family and style. Selene used pinhole photography to frame the objects as memories, rather than records. The grounded process of making each pinhole photo, brought both comfort and experimentation.
Selene is looking for support on different formats and ways to show the work - such as a zine or exhibition - alongside ideas on how to run participatory workshops linked to the project.
Find out more about Selene:
@selene.heath on Instagram
Image: Dr Jane Robb
About Dr Jane Robb.
Dr Jane Robb is an artist and academic with over a decade of experience in environmental education, including as a qualified teacher and lecturer in outdoor education. She works with the themes of the body in the landscape and how we interact with places, using a mix of photography, drawing and writing. She is interested in how the practice of research is also a creative practice. Her exhibited work spans fine art photography, photo-essays, drawings, video, animation and illustrated flash fiction.
”Body focused repetitive behaviours are within the broad remit of obsessive compulsive disorder but with their own pathologies. They can involve picking and pulling of skin and hair on the body, and for some, can cause other serious physical health issues. As an approach to redirect my attention away from picking or pulling, I started to make intricate pen and ink drawings of natural materials that have gone through their own process of excoriation, like a twig stripped of its bark, or bones stripped of their flesh. The intense focus required to make such drawings supports my own BFRB recovery, while the subject matter acts as an expression of the experience of having a BFRB.”
Find out more about Jane:
@dodgeandburnphoto on Instagram
More info about this event.
No creative experience is necessary - just a sense of curiosity and willingness to be supportive to our presenting artists.
Everyone is welcome at this event, regardless of whether you’re an artist, healthcare professional, or general member of the public.
The event takes place within Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall. We’ll email you a few days before with the specific room and a map. You may want to arrive a little early if you’re unfamiliar with the building.
Refreshments (soft drinks / water) are provided. There is a bar if you want to get something specific.
Note on Self Care: The nature of our organisation means that we platform and support the voices of artists that are exploring personal experiences (their own or others) that can sometimes focus on complex issues including health, disability, race, the body, marginalisation, mental/physical health and more. We always encourage you to consider how to self-resource what you need before, during and after engaging with our activities. You can access a list of support resources here.
You’ll need to be aged 16+ to attend.
Questions etc.
If you're not sure if this event is for you or if you have any questions, including about accessibility, please contact info@artsandhealthhub.org.
Cost.
Free / Suggested Donation £5