Engagement

The Critical Practices Research Group is committed to fostering a role within the public sphere, seeking engagements through public events, exhibitions, collaborative projects and sustaining a range of mutually beneficial partnerships with public organisations. These include galleries, museums, arts organisations, design companies, and charities whose activities can benefit diverse social groups locally, nationally and around the world.

Key associations and sites of practice:

John Hansard Gallery is one of Britain’s leading public galleries of contemporary art. Part of the University of Southampton, the gallery is renowned for its vibrant programme of work by outstanding artists from across the world. The Critical Practice Research Groups regularly engages with and supports the curatorial and educational work of the gallery, including exhibitions of work by Aura Satz, Uriel Orlow, Victor Burgin, and contributing to a wide range of talks and outreach events, engaging, for example with the Gallery’s ‘Historical Leads’ lecture programme and supporting large scale events such at British Art Show 8, which John Hansard Gallery co-hosted with Southampton City Art Gallery.

Tate Exchange, based at Tate Modern, is the museum’s high profile initiative defined as ‘an open experiment that explores important topics of our time’, offering a vital new public space for collaborative projects, and opening up Tate and its Associates to new audiences and new ways of working. Winchester School of Art (under the direction of the Critical Practice Research Group) is a member of Tate Exchange’s Associate programme, alongside a host of charities, educational institutions and businesses who all share belief in the role the arts can play for wider social engagement.

Kochi Muziris Biennale was established in 2012 as India’s first international art biennale. It is widely regarded a ‘people’s biennale’, due to its close social engagements, and with Kochi regularly referred to as ‘Biennale City’ following significant positive impact on the local economy, in terms of tourism, real estate, technology/creative start-ups and urban regeneration. The Creative Practice Research Group has been closely engaged with the Biennale since its inception, particularly evidenced through the publication of D’Souza and Manghani’s India’s Biennale Effect: A Politics of Contemporary Art (Routledge, India, 2016), and with ongoing dialogue regarding the wider ecosystem for the creative and cultural industries in India as it emerges in and around an event such as the Kochi Biennale.