“ Hope lives eternally in our hearts, we cannot do anything about it, thankfully. As long as there is something inside of us which is the core of our humanity, we are going to maintain hope against all evidence. Because all the evidence is really bleak. But we have no right to be empirical about it. Unlike the weather, which is independent of what we think about it, history is made by people who don’t a damn about predictions”
Yanis Varoufakis, Greek economist, academic, philosopher and politician
#CultureResetStroud Mondays
Join in here - Pod Sessions
Small groups are invited to meet at Atelier, SVA and online to listen to inspirational provocations by international ‘Culture Reset’ arts activists, leaders and thinkers.
We are inviting two groups of six people to meet at SVA and Atelier Stroud. There will be two pods for each session - one at SVA and one at Atelier Stroud. Each pod will take part in a #CultureResetStroud listening session and link up with the other pod to continue the discussion from a more local perspective.
You can also choose to join on Zoom from home.
Each session will last approx. 1.5 hours.
Is Culture Bad For You? (with Dr Dave O'Brien)
Monday 12th October 7-9pm
This session will begin with a brief introduction to #CultureResetStroud by Jo and Kat. This will be followed by pod and online group listening of “Is Culture Bad For You? ” a Chorus Project podcast produced by Upstart Theatre and recorded live at DARE Festival 2019. Tom Mansfield talks to Dr David O'Brien about Panic! It's an Arts Emergency, a ground-breaking study into inequality and taste in the arts in the UK.
Dave O'Brien’s book Culture Is Bad for You which came out in September 2020, analyses the connection between culture and social inequality, presenting the first large-scale study of social mobility into cultural and creative jobs, hundreds of interviews with cultural worker, and new analysis of secondary datasets to show how who works, and who engages, in culture is deeply unequal.
“Culture will keep you fit and healthy. Culture will bring communities together. Culture will improve your education. This is the message from governments and arts organisations across the country; however, this book explains why we need to be cautious about culture.
Offering a powerful call to transform the cultural and creative industries, Culture is bad for you examines the intersections between race, class, and gender in the mechanisms of exclusion in cultural occupations. Exclusion from culture begins at an early age, the authors argue, and despite claims by cultural institutions and businesses to hire talented and hardworking individuals, women, people of colour, and those from working class backgrounds are systematically disbarred.
While the inequalities that characterise both workforce and audience remain unaddressed, the positive contribution culture makes to society can never be fully realised.”
Dave O’Brien is Chancellor’s Fellow in Cultural and Creative Industries at the University of Edinburgh. He has published extensively on sociology of culture and cultural policy, and is currently part of a large scale AHRC project assessing the impact of COVID-19 on the cultural sector in the UK.
Listen Here
Next #CultureResetStroud Sessions:
Monday 16th November 7-9pm
Monday 14th December 7-9pm
More information coming soon.
Listen here
Katharina Child (Atelier Stroud) and Jo Leahy (SVA) met on a sunny Sunday morning to discuss what Culture Reset is all about and how it connects to the work they are doing, the community of Stroud and international connections such as the upcoming Creative Bureaucracy Festival in Berlin.
This conversation is an introduction to a series of #CultureResetStroud discussion groups which will take place at Atelier Stroud, SVA and online.
Read more here
What is Culture Reset?
Culture Reset is a UK wide practical rapid response programme to inspire more relevant and impactful cultural organisations and practices. Born out of the devastating impact of Covid-19 and inspired by the urgent need to accelerate change and respond to the experiences of a broader diversity of people, it provided expert support and dynamic stimulus for 192 arts and cultural producers, makers and directors across the UK over the summer of 2020
SVA
and #CultureResetStroud
Jo Leahy ( SVA), one of the participants of Culture Reset, engaged in critical discussions with artists, producers, theatre makers, operational managers, curators, artistic directors to build a body of research and network connections to help to find a way forward in finding some answers.
"Culture Reset and other initiatives like Culture Plan B (set up by David Jubb) have suddenly burst forward as result of the pandemic and the devastating consequences on the arts. The pandemic and Black Lives Matter have exposed the great inequalities in our society and as a result there is an urgent call to arms for a complete reset of the structural and economic systems that the current arts world so obviously relies on."
Atelier Stroud
and #CultureResetStroud
Following on from last years Berliner Zeitgeist and Creative Spaces and Communities spaces, Katharina Child and Uta Baldauf are keen to continue to work with SVA to share and extend these discussions in connection to Culture Reset and the community of Stroud.