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    • The artist as many other things first
      • Holly McEntegart in conversation with Anne Noble, facilitated by Mark Amery <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Anne Noble Merging her work as an artist, mother and full spectrum doula, Holli McEntegart recently brought something remarkably different to the bustle of Wellington’s Courtenay Place, in an exploration of art as a social practice.  Providing a warm, calm space for participation, Inhabit brought together mothers and their infants to examine how community, cultural and whānau postpartum care has changed in Aotearoa, sharing experiences in real-time and as oral history. A private issue was brought into a public realm. Rethinking the artist’s role in society, McEntegart was supported by artist Anne Noble in a project commissioned by Letting Space for vacant space activators Urban Dream Brokerage. McEntegart now has plans to bring the project to Auckland.  Here are Holli and Anne in conversation. Mark Amery Anne Noble: Letting Space and Urban Dream Brokerage have made a really remarkable contribution to the Wellington art scene. Letting Space positioned itself as an entity that sits outside the conventional domain of the gallery, where the artist is mostly defined e as a producer of objects and artefacts. They offered an experimental space and an invitation to artists to expand the ecology of contemporary art and provide support for them to provide a new kind of experience for communities and publics to engage with contemporary art I see Inhabit as a perfect example of the kind of project that Letting Space and Urban Dream Brokerage were established to nurture, enable and support.  When I first thought about your ambition for Inhabit: to marry both your practices as an artist and a full spectrum doula, one of my first questions was about the expanded role of the artist in a social practice. How is your work first and foremost art while being shaped by other practices and concerns?   What came to mind was a book [^1] I’ve had on my bookshelf, which has on its cover The Artist As followed by a list: that includes such descriptors of the artist as .. producer; the artist as… archivist; the artist as… ethnographer; the artist as… catalyst; the artist as… orchestrator; the artist as… poet; the artist as… curator. And it ends with this really beautiful phrase in capital letters: AND MANY OTHER THINGS FIRST. This points to the fundamental premise of your art practice - driven and formed by another whole domain of expertise, professional practice, experience and activist concerns. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Anne Noble | Infant massage with Jo Chambers. From left: Megan Rodgers and Jasper, Jo Chambers from Blissful Bubs You define yourself as a social practice artist but you also practice as a full spectrum doula.   How did you arrive at the idea of merging your practice as an artist with your life as a mother, your interest in the post-partum experience and your activism in this space?    Holli McEntegart: You and I talked a lot about the artist as a conduit; or as activator. As a young artist I was always really interested in capturing images of moments that had complicated stories behind them. I realised that my interest was often more in the story; how we got to this point; the full stop. The work was always, for me, in the negotiation of  getting to that image - with the image itself feeling lacklustre in comparison to that journey. Then when I moved to Pittsburgh to complete my Masters I found that there was a greater focus on social practice as a role for the artmaker. The driving need for me has always been to build relationships, and therefore community. So when I was taking photographs I would spend months getting to know people, navigating the permission, not just to be there, but to be accepted; to belong. I’ve joined every group under the sun! A loon (an aquatic bird) counting group in Maine, a porcelain painting group in Mt Albert, a bluegrass group, banjo club and a barbershop quartet in Pittsburgh, and a cake decorating group in Otara, to name a few. But I didn't feel like I had the right to be there unless I was really an accepted part of the community. That came to a head for me in Pittsburgh when I joined a  semi-gated spiritualist community called Lily Dale, and began making work out of the readings they were doing for me. I would spend eight months with them before I could make that work. By the time I was living in New York there were many grants, residencies and galleries supporting a socially engaged framework of art making. My eyes were opened to the fact that this community exchange and the energy I was investing into relationship building was not only valid, it was the work.That really gave me permission to move past just documenting my work with photographs or videos and writing and to pull the focus back to the process, the making and the relationship tending.  Research is a huge part of my process, whatever I’m working on I’m always off down a research tunnel. So, when I got pregnant in New York with my first child Arlo I went on a huge journey to understand pregnancy, birth and everything that was happening to my body. I discovered that in New York City, the maternal mortality rate in pregnancy, birth and early postpartum is astoundingly high, and that black women are 12 times more likely to die in childbirth than white women. OB’s are often pushing for a lot of unnecessary interventions within the hospital system and midwives are not as commonly used, though that is changing. I come from a family of home birthers in New Zealand, it was normalised and seemed like the obvious place for me to birth, but only around 1.5% of people give birth at home in the US, so it's quite a radical thing to do in that context.  I was so lucky that I had a neighbour and friend who was training to be a midwife and was working as a birth doula. Through her I discovered this group of folks called doulas. I started learning about the role they play in birth work, about reproductive and birth justice advocacy, and about everything I was going to need to know to birth my baby at home while being supported by a midwife and doula team. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Anne Noble New York City is so compact, we had a tiny apartment and I had a home studio. My son, Arlo, was born underwater, in a birth pool on my studio floor. At that point I had been working for some time within these spiritualist communities. I had been really delving into why people were seeking healing in these communities and what it meant to be constantly practising these healing rituals. Birthing my son in my studio was like an epiphany, I was on a healing journey myself and this was a part of the work.  Birth was incredibly healing for me at that point in my life and then, like many people, postpartum was a completely different beast. Like most people experiencing giving birth far from their home and family, I just felt an intense lack of support from the world. And with that a deep loneliness. I was so homesick. My parents came to visit for two weeks which was incredible, but it went so fast. A few good friends showed up as best they could but I was living and working as an artist in New York, I didn’t know anyone with babies or even young kids. People are busy - for everyone else, life goes on. It’s the postpartum person that is stuck in stillness, but constantly working. It was a totally different world. You get the sense  that everybody shows up for birth, everyones interested, you learn so much about pregnancy and childbirth, tracking the changes in your body all the way through to this kind of event, and then everyone leaves, and you’re left in charge of a human. It’s wild, uncharted territory and no-one’s told you that much, or what they have told you is irrelevant, biassed, outdated and sometimes even harmful. I longed for my family, mostly for my mum. I found myself floating out to sea, and there was a realisation that no one was going to rescue me - I had to rescue myself. And to do that I needed  to dive even deeper into what was happening to me, go down that research tunnel again and find out what support there was in the world and how I could heal.  That led to me doing Seen, a postpartum doula mentorship programme with Birdsong Brooklyn, and learning constantly - four or five months too late - what could have rescued me before I needed rescuing! It was eye opening and there was a lot of deep grief about the care I had missed out on, and the ways I could have been  supported. I was diving deeply into the profoundness of becoming a mother and the reality of how much is lacking in the world in supporting new parents. I just fell in love with this idea that we could be healing collectively if we just looked after each other better and shared our knowledge.  I built my community from that in New York in that first year of parenting. At that point I had been  working for three years as the studio manager for an incredible artist, Janine Antoni, who is also a parent and understands that mothering work. It was a huge question for me: how do I keep working in the world as an artist, be able to show up as a mother and earn enough money to live? How do I juggle all of this and stay tethered to myself? I gave birth to my son when I was 38 and I was being called a geriatric mother by the medical system. It scared me. I wanted to breathe in my baby, just inhale him and not miss a second. But  how do I do that and keep up my practice? Well… I just gave birth to my son in my studio…. It was these layers of realisation: this labour is the work. I have to reframe my life so that this labour of the home, the labour of care, of mothering, is seen and valued. So I left my job in the studio with Janine and went straight into postpartum doula training. I needed to be immersed in the community in the same way I had been with the spiritualists or the cake decorators or the bird counters in Maine. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Holli McEntegart | Multiples Feeding Support Group. From left: Jessie Lee Broadbent, anon Anne: You have talked about your journey as a photographer engaging with communities, and how the outcome can be separated from those experiences that feel like part of the work. That is n true for many documentary photography projects.You’ve also described beautifully your dissatisfaction with being both outside a subject and yet needing to be  right in the heart of it.  The notion of a social practice artist is less common in New Zealand than in the US. It has currency in art schools, but my instinct when we first met and talked was that you have a really highly evolved practice in which you prioritise your  relationship as an artist to the post-partum communities you engage with  Your work  begins with you your life as a mother and your practice as a doula being the site of public art activism, of making the post-partum world experience shared and visible. How have you then addressed the visibility of this as an artwork? You only need to look at the project website to see the level of community engagement and the number of people you have drawn into this space. It’s really significant. Those workshops - people flocked to them. But to make it public, visible to participants and to audiences how does that work?  Holli: What comes first for me is the relationship, being a good community member and trust. I come at relationship building and getting people involved with their whole heart; with a genuine interest and respect. I have to have something at risk as well. Inhabit was a year in the making, but the day we opened, with a multiples lactation support workshop. We had six twin mums and probably six assistants or helpers, including grandmas, friends, lactation and doula support. That's 12 babies plus Indigo [Holli’s own baby]. Over 24 bodies breathing life into the space. That was the moment that the work became art; that it became an artwork. It was activated by the community of people in the room and their energy. Up until then there’s a lot of risk on my part because I don’t know who is going to show up and what they will bring on the day. The work is filled with intention but it has to meet people where they are and vice versa, and for that reason, it’s never the same, it evolves and unfolds and, much like mothering, I must surrender to it.   I think I’m comfortable leaning into the unknown. Within a socially engaged practice you really don’t know how your participants or your audience (the public) are going to enter the work.  I consider the folks facilitating  workshops my co-creators. There were six months of emailing and zoom conversations about what I was making with that final group of people, so many conversations about what the community needed. And then there was a point when  they came to me with a  plan to set up this specific workshop for multiples families. They were asking for my permission, and I was overjoyed because, it was at that point that they took ownership and really began to have agency within the work. That was the moment when the community was activated, they started creating what they needed under the umbrella that I offered - this community activation was where the social practice aspect of the work really came into play. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Milan Maric | Combined yoga and Infant massage workshop with Emma Chen Flitcroft and Jo Chambers I was coming to Wellington, into a community I’m not from, so I’m constantly asking myself, how do I leave this space better than when I got here?  Within social practice I think there is a very real responsibility to care for the community you're working in and to make sure there are ongoing care agreements in that community. Everyone that provided a workshop for Inhabit offers free or sliding scale services that could continue to be accessed after Inhabit closed for example.  Anne: That’s a beautiful description of the artist as catalyst. I’m very fond of the notion that when an artist plays those roles, the artist in a conventional sense disappears to become a  generating and catalysing force  Holli: I’m interested in the way my role shifted from facilitator to participant, or mother , or host. Hourly that changed. Originally I thought I would be facilitating some workshops but I didn't end up doing that because so many people wanted to facilitate their own. At the beginning of each workshop I would introduce the project and really ground it back into the context of an artwork, to remind people they were participating in something both bigger than them, but also inherently generated by them, and then I would participate alongside them. I was  never an observer, I was a participant.  I think it’s really important I have the ability to be part of what’s happening as opposed to being an outsider. Learning, participating and being vulnerable. That vulnerability permissions other people in the space to also be vulnerable. It’s not like, as you’re describing Anne, that ‘‘you’re the artist and you’re over there’ on a pedestal. The process is about me sinking back into the work. It’s a dance between making sure people feel like they are being held and acknowledged and the space is being tended to in the correct way, but not dominating it. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Anne Noble Anne: As a public artwork, positioned in Courtenay Place, it was a really beautiful intervention with really subtle signage and this glowing light masked by a wall of handmade stitched together nappies! It offered a surprising encounter that was intriguingly signposted and people were welcomed to just stop and to consider what it might be - as a public art project.  Sometimes I was amazed at the number of people participating and how  the work created an opportunity for a community to assemble. How did you introduce participants to the process of being part of something for them but also part of something larger? Of being participants and collaborators in Inhabit as an artwork. Holli: That was definitely one of my biggest challenges. There were a couple of things I did practically. Even before Inhabit opened I worked very hard to centre the project in the community with this drawing project that involved - six Love Note posters that were plastered repetitively around the city in the two weeks leading up to our opening. I was documenting them in situ and sending images of them to people when they were signing up for the workshops as well as using them in social media. So there was a centring of it as an art project before they arrived. Most people had seen these drawings and then saw the wall of Love Notes  growing on the wall when they came into the space. I introduced that as a collaborative drawing project and really impressed the importance of adding everyone's voice to that growing archive.   <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Lily Dowd I constantly was re-centring it as an artwork in this way all the time, and encouraging the public  to participate, reminding them of what they are a part of. I see the Love Notes as the beginning of an archive of postpartum stories - a collection. And that maybe this is how we start something: a movement, a book, an archive - we just have to start putting our stories on the wall. I think that grew really organically and became a way for people to gently  be reminded of the fact that they were a part of an artwork, and then they forgot about it - which was great. Someone hands them a bowl of soup, nourishes them, checks in and makes sure they’re OK. Offers to hold their baby.  and that energy of care flows into the space and  people feel really comfortable. And that comfort was there in part because I was there visibly parenting, making the work. Creating a space that makes visible the lived experience of parenting, and artmaking at the same time.   <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Anne Noble As it transpired there was very little foot traffic, and actually the space needed to be very protected, intimate and gate kept. So the curtain that I made really provided a level of intimacy. It is another drawing project I had been working on as a part of the show, but I didn’t quite know where it would fit. I’ve been collecting these used flat nappies. They are very identifiable, heavily washed and starched white cotton with a red stripe down the side. They are the kind of do everything cloth of motherhood. So representative of the labour of the home. Soaking up the mess of it all. I’ve been stamping all over them with my own mother at my kitchen table, “Ssshhhhhh sshhh shhh ssshhh shh shh shh…” On the first day of installation it was clear to me that we needed to be able to transform the space into a private, intimate one, and to open it up to the world. Sewing the nappies together to make a curtain was a wonderful way to create that boundary between public and private. And then at the end of the last workshop I was really inspired to “pull back that curtain” and be seen. I called you and asked you to document this moment of being seen in parenting and artmaking. It was such a moment of connectivity and community connection. There’s now two groups I believe that came together at Inhabit and are continuing to meet. It was great to cultivate this level of nurturance and community engagement  in a place like Courtenay Place - buses, cars and people with so much going-to-work energy,  once we pulled back that curtain I think people were taken aback by it “there are so many babies!” <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Milan Maric | Combined yoga and Infant massage workshop with Emma Chen Flitcroft and Jo Chambers Anne: Yes it was a brightly lit window that glowed like a little jewel! And was such a surprising experience walking by. You’ve described the artist as a generator and how there is a legacy for participants beyond the exhibition space. What were some of the highpoints during Inhabit and some of those legacies? Holli: The highest high was our opening, that first day. 13 babies in the space. One of the sets of twins was only five weeks old and it was their first time out of the house and their mum had driven an hour to get there, they spent all day with us. Any future Inhabit projects will always open with a multiples workshop  because these folks are the least catered for within the system. The world was not made for people birthing two or three babies at a time… So to have this space where people were surrounded by support and advice and understanding. It was so magic and it was so clear there was a need for that.  I think that in the current Covid climate people are feeling so much more isolated and unable to get out of the house. Opportunities for connection that were available to parents pre covid often aren't now, like community or library meetups and coffee groups. Many people were speaking of coming to Inhabit  as the first time they’d been to a group outside the home, there is a lot of isolation and fear out there, and a deep lack in support services. A few people who weren’t parents had some very interesting interactions with the space as an artwork, which I found fascinating. Some really generative conversations came from them being confronted: that they were coming to a public  exhibition, and were questioning ‘what is this?!’ I had very interesting conversations with other artists about what participation looks like when you’re not a parent. For parents their participation was organic but for others, it felt very different. They accessed it through my facilitation and it was interesting seeing them sink into comfort because they were being cared for; getting down on the floor and playing with Indigo. Having some soup, and learning about traditions of postpartum care and methodologies. I’m interested in pulling back the veil on this kind of care work because we can all benefit from learning how to tend to our communities and families. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Milan Maric Another highlight was my involvement with Little Shadow. They run perinatal mental health support groups in the Wellington region and virtually across the motu. They were so supportive of this project. They really saw the power of what Inhabit created in offering an entrance point  to conversations about perinatal mental health that are softer and more nurturing than how it’s often tackled when people are looking for support within a healthcare system. Inhabit provides nourishing food, a space to express yourself creatively, a place to move your postpartum body,  and a room full of folks on a similar path. Once there, we are able to get into the nitty gritty of what we are all experiencing because the space itself is so tended to. Something that I repeat all the time is that I’m examining patterns of care, whilst caring for our communities. I want to decolonise postpartum care so that we may all gain the knowledge of how to care for each other. Then there was that final reveal, pulling back that curtain. I felt I was truly being seen as my whole self in the work. Before that point I was a shapeshifter facilitating everybody else's journey. But at that moment I was in my deeply creative space of making and mothering as I  finished the project. It felt like closure and an answer to that question of how I can be an artist, make work and be a parent. It struck me how that question has deeply impacted my relationships with people and how I move in the world.  In my first few days in Wellington I had a clear vision of that image we captured at the  end. I saw the room glowing with light, semi dark outside and the interior being a place of making and of process. A gallery, and a living room and a studio and a feeding place. Where bums are getting changed, a place where all of life is happening at the same time. And that the public are walking past and peeking in. The labour of parenthood and of artmaking is usually so invisible. That moment at the end just felt like: let’s get it all on display! <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Milan Maric <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Milan Maric Anne: I love what you say about risk. Because if art doesn't involve risk it doesn't leave the opportunity for engagement - If it's there and says it all it doesn’t ask very much of people. The way both your processes of making and lived experience are entirely central to the work raises questions for people coming in off the street  - challenging their notions about art - and confronts them with the invisibility of the post-partum experience. Can you talk about how Inhabit is an evolving work? How it’s more than  a one-off event where communities come together and are potentially transformed. How is the  website a part of the evolution of the work? Holli: If you are thinking about community engagement and looking at different types of communities' needs then you’ve got to move around those communities. My vision for Inhabit was always that it would move around the motu. One of the things I thought was important about the experience in Wellington was that it felt disruptive. It felt radical. It was an  interesting way to inhabit vacant space in the CBD and disrupt a community. It ignited something that people were aware they needed, but no-one knew how to connect on and build.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Anne Noble I think there’s a lot of power in Inhabit travelling around regionally and disrupting systems in ways that are really positive and ignite connection. I think of little things growing, sprouting. And of having this homebase of an archive online where we can collect and hold these postpartum stories and learn from what we’ve been doing here to better support communities. Anne: Thanks Holli - for the pleasure of being a small part of this project with you.  Anne Noble (Laureate), ONZM, is a photographer and curator whose work spans still and moving image, installation and international curatorial commissions. Over multiple projects Annne Noble has considered the significance of memory and imagination to personal and cultural narratives of place and belonging.Holli McEntegart is an interdisciplinary artist using social practice, video, performance, photography and text. She holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts in Photography (NZ), and a Masters of Visual Art and Design from Auckland University of Technology (NZ), which included a one year MFA scholarship at Carnegie Mellon School of Art, Pittsburgh (USA). In 2014  she was an artist in residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture in Maine (USA). Her work has been performed and exhibited throughout the USA and New Zealand. In 2018 she trained as a Full Spectrum Doula after giving birth to her first son in Brooklyn, New York. Returning to Aotearoa in 2020, where she continues her work as an artist and as a Reproductive Justice Advocate. Holli is now an island named Mother to two boys, aged 4 and 9 months.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Holli McEntegart | Multiples Feeding Support Group - From left; Anon, Georgie Manning, Jessie [^1]: Aileen Burns, Tara McDowell, and Johan Lundh, The Artist As Producer, Quarry, Thread, Director, Writer, Orchestrator, Ethnographer, Choreographer, Poet, Archivist, Forger, Curator, and Many Other Things First. Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Curatorial Practice at Monash University, Melbourne and Sternberg Press, 2018.

    • Making the World by Stella Peg Carruthers
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > A Place for Local Making - Xin Cheng & Adam Ben-Dror | Image - Markuza Maric More than only fixing things, the Urban Dream Brokerage facilitated makerspace and online platform ‘A Place for Local Making’ took making to the next level of resourcefulness. Artists Xin Cheng and Adam Ben-Dror (with support from Grace Ryder) recently ran the pop-up focusing on creative remaking in central Wellington.  Taking pre-loved materials as the basis for creative exploration, Xin and Adam forged local connections within the fields of waste-minimization. Equally, by hosting convivial events which opened up questions around the right to repair and the role of the designer in contemporary society, they fostered an alternative view towards cultures of making and living together. Through re-visioning the acts of designing, making, using and remaking, it was not only objects being re-created but also notions of community. Informed by Free University principles, resourceful makerspaces such as ‘A Place for Local Making’ meet the issue of waste head on in an egalitarian manner.  Applying local practices to address global issues, resourceful makerspaces can be platforms for genuine community connection. This re-making of waste materials within a community context felt particularly pertinent in Wellington – a city recovering from a violent protest, with the cloud of Covid-19 still hanging low. Through coming together to fix and transform broken things and waste materials, people engaged with their material surrounds in new ways. Repair and remaking together can also regenerate community cohesion. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Creative Mending Circle coordinator & writer - Stella Carruthers | Image - Markuza Maric With a background in community education, textile crafts and a passion for sustainability, I joined ‘A Place for Local Making’ as a co-facilitator for the workshop ‘Creative Mending Circle’ in April. Influenced by strong ecological ideals and my own low-waste lifestyle, I was attracted by the resourceful use of waste applied in a community setting.    To fix rather than throw out is a philosophy that serves both people and the planet. It is one I personally adhere to. It is also at the heart of Xin and Adam’s creative practices where they consider conviviality, sustainability, and ways of living in a waste-conscious way. As Adam said, ‘Sometimes it is hard to connect the act of gathering and working with these “waste” materials with global societal changes that have to happen in order for us to come into more harmony with the rest of life. They just seem so small. Xin pointed out to me though that these practices add to the diversity, that the world is a richer place because someone is practicing this kind of thing. It opens possibilities for other ways of living and adds up to something greater than the sum of its parts.’ As artists, Xin and Adam have been growing this idea of opening new possibilities through sharing the process of re-making. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Creative Mending Circle at A Place For Local Making | Image - Markuza Maric De-stabilising traditional hierarchies through re-making practices can democratise creativity. In the mending workshop I co-facilitated with Xin, we supported everyday people in giving new lives to clothing. Snaps on a shirt were both strengthened and adorned with brightly-coloured stitches. Meanwhile, children’s clothing and hard-wearing socks were patched to extend their useful lives. Taking an egalitarian approach to making, anyone could learn to add to and alter their world through making and remaking.  As we face the challenges of the 21st century: the effects of the Anthropocene and the climate crisis, the COVID pandemic, a myriad of issues around waste... What is the role of the artist and the designer today? What kind of creative practices could there be, with locality and community at the centre? Xin and Adam approached their position as artists and designers by taking on a facilitator role. Whether it is running a practical workshop or hosting a reading group, both artists work with materials and ideas. More than ‘Think Globally, Act Locally’ – their approach is about thinking locally as well. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Frugal Electronics Workshop | Image: Markuza Maric Through amplifying and sharing innovative ways of (re)making at A Place for Local Making, fellow human beings were supported in designing to meet their own needs. This approach is based on Ezio Manzini’s ideas of diffuse design: people revisioning reality in a manner meaningful to their own context. The principles of small, local, open, connected help communities reimagine new ways of providing for their needs and community life. Adam and Xin talk about sharing resourcefulness, re-making and repair as ways of changing the culture of living. By taking the time to fix things at hand, doing so through working with our hands, and learning from each other, we are envisioning the possibilities for a different kind of collective future. In this future, social connections are made through non-hierarchical skill-sharing, across generational and demographic diversity. In the mending workshop I co-hosted, participants ranged from the elderly to early twenties. I enjoyed seeing a middle-aged mother showing a young man how to hem a shirt. Next to them, a younger woman helped thread a needle for an older lady. These exchanges are beautiful examples of people approaching repair as both life-enhancing and pleasurable. More powerfully, they are also moments where everyday people practice new (and ancient) skills for an uncertain future. Local skills and resources are utilised in the broadest sense, both in accessibility and value. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Frugal Electronics Workshop - Curator Grace Ryder & Artist Adam Ben-Dror | Image Markuza Maric Value and the associated idea of abundance are central to the discussions of making and social innovation at ‘A Place for Local Making’. Cherishing small acts of making, re-making and caring can reshape our mental models which give rise to values in life. ‘Time’s gone by so quickly!’ I overheard one participant say. ‘This mending thing, it’s slow… but it’s fun!’  Here, time became valued once again–not only for the results of the work done, but also for the creative enjoyment and the human connections which grew from time spent together. As a creative adventure, mending and (re)making is as much about the process as the end result.  In their time at ‘A Place for Local Making’, Xin and Adam facilitated process-based creativity. They asked questions around waste and wants, value and needs, and they did so through reaching out rather than drawing in. Instead of making artworks to display on a wall, they supported community creativity through researching local waste streams and stories of remaking, gathering reclaimed materials for communal use and facilitating public events. Through the workshops and numerous examples of local (re)making documented on the online platform, we can see that with the toolkit of resourceful making and thinking, we can reconsider how we relate with our material surroundings. A product or object may be repaired to fulfil its original designed purpose, or adapted to new, future lives. To consider what happens to an object when it eventually leaves a person’s hands gives new meaning to the word resourcefulness. Here, as we learned at ‘A Place for Local Making,’ it can be fruitful to think of materiality in terms of what a thing is made of, how it is made and remade, who is doing the caring and remaking, as well as what it could become within a constantly changing, living world.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Contributors links Writer - Stella Carruthers Project - A Place For Local Making Artists - Xin Cheng + Adam Ben-Dror Photographer - Markuza Maric

    • Commonspace - Live laugh love the alert levels
      • Commonspace is a ‘living room’ for the city, located at 113 Taranaki St until October 31st… so what happens when the room is closed in a nationwide lockdown? Courtney Rose Brown followed up her original writing about Commonspace asking Mouthfull (Ollie, Jack, Sarah and Racquel) about emerging from the lockdown. First from Courtney... <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Commonspace: 113 Taranaki St - Image credit: Markuza Maric Enjoy an excerpt from Courtney’s reflections of being able to attend a few of Commonspace events at level two. “Last week I got to see the lovely quirky cult classic Harold and Maude, take part in a journaling workshop, and join in on a meditation. I’m pretty easy breezy with what films I consume, I don’t hunt out rare finds, and can be quite content with whatever Netflix serves me up. So having a film screening of something I’d never find or watch on my own is always quite a thrilling experience. If you’re unable to make a film screening, I’d recommend noting down the movie title so you can watch it in your own time. I’ve come to realise that the space is more than just about connection to oneself and the community, but also practice of presence. I live a heavy screen led life, with my day job online all day, a bit of Netflix and Homescapes in my down time, it’s not often that I’m not checking my phone, even for work. So having dedicated time to exist in a space, post lockdown with strangers being still and present was surprisingly easy to wiggle into. Normally meeting new people is something that I do reluctantly, or with great anxiety, but the warmth around Commonspace cancels that out as on Saturday, most of us who showed up for the journaling workshop did so alone. In lockdown I had a Zoom counselling session and I heard a new term, existential grief. Grief about being alive in this moment, in a large chapter of history, with climate change effects burning the edges, it can be quite hard to wish to be introspective. To plan for a future so uncertain, in the midst of a pandemic and flooding cities. As an artist, I believe that being introspective is key to creating. So it’s not surprising that over the last two years I’ve tried to close that door and have tunnel vision. So to journal and unfilter was a truly freeing experience. Journaling with Paula is a recurring event on Saturdays, so I do encourage you to go along. If you’re unable to make  a session, do touch base with Commonspace so they can pass along her prompts.     The mediation was digital on Instagram live and I felt stoked to be able to do something I find challenging, on an app that often is the opposite of mindfulness.  This past week was Mental Health Awareness Week, and the awareness of self and mental health continues. Commonspace is a great place to connect with yourself and others to recharge your well being. Invite a friend crush, your actual crush or take your lovely self along to as many events as you can.” <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Commonspace: Somatic Incubator - Image credit: Markuza Maric Now over to Mouthfull… What did you miss the most in lockdown?  Mouthfull: We missed the communal dinners, we missed the spontaneous comings and goings of all sorts of different people connecting in the space over time. We missed the Briscoes pot mural out the window. The hardest thing was not seeing familiar faces almost every other day, being in the space where there is always a flow of friendly faces about. Not having that for a few weeks was a tough adjustment as zoom and the digital realm can not fill those needs!  How does Mouthfull describe Commonspace?  Ollie: Alive, enlivening, orange, yellow, indigo, humble, fulfilling, zesty.    Jack: Good vibes.    Sarah: A crackling camp-fire to sit around with friends!    Racquel: Consistently warm and welcoming  Alert levels adaptations like jazz  Mouthfull: We improvised the alert levels like jazz. But we did know that the pandemmy had a real possibility of affecting our activities and knew we wouldn’t be able to conventionally connect with the community. Luckily one of our kaitiaki is an expert of digital permaculture and had a card up their sleeve – Naomi built us an online commonspace on the platform gather.town. Having seen many successful online spaces last year, it seemed only natural to lean into it during level 4 & 3. Level 2 is an interesting one, but we are softly welcoming people back into the social /IRL space, in a socially distanced (but not distant) way, providing slightly altered versions of our programme.     With the adaption of alert levels there’s been a mix of digital and in person sessions. Anne-Lisa Noordover one of Commonspace’s ‘artists in residence’ is actively developing their practice in the space. Anne-Lisa runs ‘poetry with pals’ in person every second Friday 2pm - 3pm and is currently painting a mural. ‘Waking up with pals’ started over lockdown and ran every Thursday morning for four weeks in order to create a regular rhythm to morning routines when we were all in separate bubbles. These morning sessions included an international ‘good news’ segment, book reviews, yoga and stretches, dance parties, writing prompts and hot drinks. All who attended saw the beauty in collectively waking up and sharing the same media while physically distant. Mouthfull have been talking about how to extend this vision to moving images and make something of a ‘community tv’ with news, interviews, reviews etc. live and direct. Anne-Lisa also started the ‘Tapestry Tales’ project to bring people’s creations over lockdown together to weave a beautiful big wall hanging.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Commonspace: The Art of Journaling w Barbara - Image credit: Markuza Maric How was it having to shift to digital space and upholding your kaupapa at the same time?   Mouthfull: It was difficult because our kaupapa exists to bring people together, nurture whakawhanaungatanga and breathe life into community spirit & human connection. When most of our day-to-day experience is filtered through screens, much of the nuance, essence and feeling is lost in translation. In saying that, we were mindfully attempting to activate digital commonspace through hosting several online events and also acting as a node to point out other peoples/initiatives online activations. There were live DJ parties in virtual 2D space, local album/EP releases, videos made by artists/facilitators shared on IGTV, live streams, radio broadcasts and many many zoom calls.    Adjusting to level two in the space  Moutfull: Coming out of lockdown, too much social stimulation can be overwhelming and de-centring for many people. We have been finding activations more suited for intimate settings and personal kanohi ki te kanohi connection. There has been a lot of reflection and vulnerability in the space post lockdown, leaving people feel more empowered and less alone than when they entered. The needs and expressions of people have become more vital as we collectively got another taste of what the alternative to real life community is - humanity mediated via pixels, accentuating the isolation that is already so prevalent in a neoliberal society today. The aliveness is more and more palpable inside the space as people bring their own spaces, stories and energy into commonspace. We are filling up (carefully).   <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > The Art of Seeing w Ella - Image credit: Markuza Maric Art and soundtracks for lockdown  Ollie: I listened to this beautiful album called ‘Schaum’ several times, finished The Bone People and finished Legend of Korra. Started watching ‘The Panthers’ on TVNZ (highly recommended!), an online series on Youtube called ‘Yoga with Adriene’ and a bit of Twin Peaks here and there.   Sarah: I spent lockdown mostly reading and listening to lectures as I fell off my bike on the first day of lockdown and injured my hand! I read Raymond E. Feist’s ‘Magician’, and David Epstein’s ‘Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialised World’ (both very comforting). I went down a youtube rabbithole of lectures on utopia, social imaginaries, our history as a species of trying to send information forwards through time from ancestor to future descendant. The lecture that’s stuck with me most is called ‘Utopia is No Place: The Art and Politics of Impossible Futures.’     Jack: My favourite piece of art I consumed in LD was an audio performance from Silo Theatre based in Tāmaki Makaurau called “Mauri Tau.” Wonderful reflections to accompany a walk.     Raquel: I spent most of the time cooking and creating beautiful and nourishing meals, I found this a really grounding process as making food and enjoying it was really meditative. Most of the resources and art that I indulged in were cookbooks and Budget eats on youtube. I love watching people get creative and funky with food, it inspires me a lot to learn about how to nourish my body and eat cheap!   Was there a particular art practice you all explored, tried or continued to do in lockdown?   Ollie: I truly loved being a participant in the Commonspace online schedule(!), to risk sounding mawkish! Drawing with Ella, Singing with Violet, Journaling with Barbara, Meditating with George, Yoga with Bridget - I dabble in these practices but having them on a schedule knowing that a group of other individuals are engaging with them simultaneously was quite a special reassuring sharing of experience.   Sarah: Dancing around the city in the middle of the night! There’s something magic about going for a walk through a sleeping city and having it all to yourself, just wandering and listening to a good album! With limited dexterity I did lots of collage, but mostly just did research into mediums I want to explore through spring. The money I’d usually spend on day-to-day recreation like coffee with friends was redirected to craft supplies, fabric, and a dremel!    Jack: I managed to fill up an entire book of abstract single colour oil pastel pictures which was great practice.     Raquel: I painted with acrylics and was fortunate to paint my window sills some groovy colours to spice up my room. Got a huge canvas sitting in my room right now, but it's pretty intimidating as I am not sure what to put on it! It's about the size of me.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image credit - Markuza Maric E noho rā Taranaki Street  Mouthfull: Our last day is on Sunday October 31st. We were funded for three months: to pay the artist facilitators and kaitiaki on shift. We have accepted the transitory nature of the project and deeply appreciate our time here. There are still many activities in the final month, it will be a full time.   Commonspace 2.0 will be active over summer and next year, activating other ‘common spaces’ around Te Whanganui-a-Tara. We invite you to participate in the programme as it emerges and contribute to the conversation of how we can be conscious and creative in public space. Urban Dream Brokerage are legendary fulcrums of 21st Century life force here in this ecological landscape, thank you for having us.   Check out Commonspace’s new events here. We would like to acknowledges the support of WCC, CNZ and Ash Holwell of two/fiftyseven

    • Commonspace - Who is this Mouthfull?
      • Urban Dream Brokerage is proud to have our second commissioned project open - Commonspace by Mouthfull Collective - with further support from Wellington City Council and Creative NZ. An arts based youth lounge based at 113 Taranaki Street, open Wed-Sun 10am-10pm, open until mid October We asked writer Courtney Rose Brown to explore who Mouthfull are and a look at what they are offering... <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image credit: Markuza Maric A Living Room for the City I first heard of Mouthfull when I attended Eyegum’s ‘Welcome to Nowhere’ Festival earlier this year. In the sole patch of shade was fabric bunting, an old typewriter, and myself. In the heat of a summer’s day, I found a very special space. As a classic arty millennial who has owned a typewriter but didn’t know how to work one, I wrote nonsense poems with fading red and black ink, letters overlapping, and unpredictable spacing. Draped between trees was a sheet of parchment open for all to draw on. Mismatched paint, drawings and quotes, were stitched together by a group of people out in Whanganui for the weekend. It was a time capsule of calm and joy, in the late summer of 2021.  I was stoked to find out that the people who crafted this had found a space in the heart of the CBD. There’s a unique and quite indescribable feeling of discovering a space that your heart yearns for. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image Credit: Linda Lee So who are the wonderful people behind Commonspace and how did Mouthfull come to be?  Mouthfull is made up of Jack, Ollie, Raquel and Sarah. Back in 2016 Ollie and Jack met and since then, the collective has welcomed in Raquel and Sarah. They were brought together through their shared passion and discussions of a multi-medium artistic-like platform so that events could be collectively hosted, music shared, and movies made.  Jack Gittings (he/him) Taurus Sun, Libra Moon, Cancer Rising.. Jack has just finished reading ‘The elegance of the Hedgehog,’ and a small book about silence. He likes toast with Peanut Butter & tomato, and consuming lots of radio. He is @hello.vera__ on TikTok. Ollie Hutton (he/him) Libra Sun, Aquarius Moon and Pisces Rising. He is currently watching ‘Legend of Korra’ season four, ‘I May Destroy You’ episode ten, and two thirds through ‘The Bone People’. He likes a bit of Tumjal eggplant relish with most dishes. He is @aweloveart on Instagram. Raquel Manks (she/her) Pisces Sun, Virgo Moon and Aries Rising. Raquel’s been playing the groove armada album “goodbye country (hello nightlife)” a lot which are such feel good tunes if you need a recommendation. She could eat kumara everyday as well as bananas and peanut butter on toast. She is @raquel.meihana on Instagram. Sarah Lee (she/they) Virgo sun, Virgo moon, and Taurus rising. Sarah’s fav food is their mum's Christmas roast lamb, with the kumara roasted in the same pan. Recently they checked out development proofs from Cody Ellingham's photography exhibit 'New Zealand Nocturnes’ which appeals to two of their fav things: night walking and explorations of home. Have a peek. They are @officialsarahlee on social media. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image credit: Linda Lee Who and what has inspired you as creatives? The natural environment of Aotearoa, The KLF, Twin Peaks, Geocaching, The Briscoes Silver Pots mural on Taranaki St, Chloe Swarbrick, Sophie Jerram, Mark Amery, Helen Kirlew-Smith, the music of Heavy Chest, countless friends and comrades who inspire us with their creativity and presence. Who are some artists that we should know about? Some local artists Mouthfull highly recommends being familiar with are Chevron Hassett, Robert Laking, Vishmi Helaratne, Bena Jackson, Ana Te Kōtiro, Bek Coogan, Nikau Te Huki, Heleyni and Marika Pratley. How did the idea of Mouthfull come about and what led to the decision to create a Commonspace? There was a whisper in the air (as always present in Wellington) for a cafe/record shop/makers station/creative hub where people could go to meet like-minded others and drink coffee, make art, listen to music, experience something awe-inspiring in the everyday. Trying to figure out how to get there was a bit funny. Andre Smith, Liv Gallagher, Ollie and  Jack started hosting some gigs and gatherings in the city. From there it all evolved into collaborations with Mimicry Journal, UDB(1.0), a collection of our favourite festivals (What if the City Was A Theatre?, Welcome to Nowhere, Tora Bombora, Bush Bash to name a few.), and some amazing NZ artists (TOI, EDIE, Dr Reknaw, Heavy Chest, O & the Mo etc). The form dictated the process and every project had a different concoction of requirements and lessons to draw upon.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image credit: Jack Gittings Commonspace was born from conversations around human connection and community. Mouthful felt that the city was in need of a ‘revival of spirit’ post COVID-19 lockdown and wanted to conjure enchanting experiences of humanity, beauty, unity and creativity. Asking how we can be together, how we can learn from one another, how we can exist in our city without needing to succumb to Western consumerist ideals. Nodding at the current climate of unaffordable housing, we decided a ‘living room for the city’ was a nice concept to imagine (considering many renters in Wellington are having to convert the ‘living room’ at their house into another bedroom so they can afford to live there). We heard about the Letting Space/UDB commission and made a proposal last year which was accepted. Why should people check out Mouthfull and the Commonspace? You can work from here, all the events are free (including awesome workshops and talks), it’s a neutral space for connection, there are foot massagers, moodbank, free tea and peanut butter toast, you can use the space how you like (so long as it doesn’t impede on other scheduled gatherings). We love to meet new people and share stories too.  Mouthful has an incredible kaupapa as a company and for the space, so I’d recommend grabbing a cuppa and having a read of their values.U <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image credit: Nicoletta Mancuso This week they have some choice events that will definitely inspire you to leave the house despite the weather! Catch Thursday’s Film Screening of ‘Paris, Texas’, some mid day poetry and dance on Friday, yoga on Saturday morning, Mouthfull Radio live broadcast and don’t forget their recurring Sunday dinners! Mouthfull’s Commonspace has a place for everyone so update your calendars, catch up with old friends and rock up early so you can nab those foot massagers first.  Now if that all sounds like your cup of tea or you’re interested in trying something new you can check out their events here.  Ka kite!

    • NEXT GENERATION COMMISSIONS ANNOUNCED FOR WELLINGTON CITY
      • Five public art commissions for vacant city spaces funded by Wellington City Council’s City Recovery Fund have been announced by public art organisation Letting Space and vacant space brokers Urban Dream Brokerage. They will be produced by artists over the remainder of 2021 and early 2022 with spaces brokered for them by the brokerage.  Included are a space for a younger inner city community to grow, a place to acknowledge the wairua of the city through matauranga Māori and rongoa, a makerspace employing thrown out materials from local businesses, a ‘housing crisis reflection and assessment centre’ and a centre to examine our community, cultural and familia approaches to postpartum (post-birth) care. The projects will be led by Mouthfull; Tanya Te Miringa Te Rorarangi Ruka; Xin Cheng and Adam Ben-Dror; Bek Coogan and Heleyni Pratley; and Holli McEntengart.  Founding brokerage managers Letting Space have selected the projects, and their delivery will be managed by new Urban Dream Brokers Maverick Creative.  Aside from these commissions, the Urban Dream Brokerage remains open to anyone with an innovative, participatory project to apply for the use of a vacant space. A sixth commission, artist and critical engineer’s Julian Oliver Electromagnetic Geographies occurred in May in Wellington’s Cuba Mall.    Project summaries   Mouthfull:  Commonspace How can a space nurture a sense of hope and interconnectedness? This project creates a central place of being and belonging, learning and connecting, through de-siloing knowledge and cross-pollinating disciplines, holding whanaungatanga for a younger inner city community to connect more consciously. Commonspace will hold similar behaviours to a library and allow participants to play with a critique of what it is to belong in ‘the commons’, exploring space outside of traditional transactions. It will provide an enlivening space to incite creative collaboration alongside a guided programme of kōrero, learning, stillness, sensation and wonder.  The purpose of Commonspace is for the public to step out onto the street feeling more connected and alive than when they entered. Mouthfull is an arts collective of young film-makers, space creators, digital artists and social facilitators guided currently by Jack Gittings, Raquel Manks, Sarah Lee, and Ollie Hutton. Through creation, curation and facilitation of artworks, experiences and spaces - Mouthfull manoeuvres an experimental and collaborative approach to explore the notion of consciously consuming in all its forms. Taking shape in immersive installations, guided tours, workshops, improvised performance, radio broadcasting, and being together in creativity.   Tanya Te Miringa Te Rorarangi Ruka: Rongoa Māori Rongo-marae-roa-a-rangi: He moemoeā.  Rongoa Māori – Acknowledging the wairua of the inner city. Tanya Ruka’s project will map the inner city with the mātauranga Māori concepts māramatanga, kāitiakitanga and mānakitanga. It asks how we protect and enhance the Mauri, the life force within urban environments, and suggest that when we look to regeneration we must first go back to the source, what was here before and what has happened since. Ruka will explore how we communicate with the wai and awa below and what is the wairua of the land being shared with us. The project will also explore how we introduce biodiverse ecosystems into this place of concrete. How do we plant the seeds?  Tanya Te Miringa Te Rorarangi Ruka is of Ngati Pakau, Te Uriroroi, Te Parawhau, Te Mahurehure - Ngapuhi, and Waitaha descent. She is an artist, designer and independent researcher active in environmental issues from an indigenous perspective in Aotearoa and globally, working with the Waitaha Executive Grandmothers Council and the Common Earth Indigenous Working Group.  Last year she founded the online Region Net Positive community platform. A video and performance artist who has exhibited nationally, Tanya has shown with the Circuit agency since 2016 and was artist in residence at Corbans Estate Art Centre 2018-19.    Xin Cheng and Adam Ben-Dror: Inner city resourceful makerspace Exploring resourceful ways of living and making in the city, this project will provide a makerspace and non-hierarchical 'art school' open to all, focusing on handmade technologies. There will be materials to make things with, including waste from surrounding businesses. The showroom will include a library of useful and enjoyable things which have been made, found and sourced plus locally-sourced tea and snacks, a worm farm, and simple screen-printing facilities with eco/homemade-dyes. Also planned are reading groups and workshops on specific skills such as thrifty book-making, macrame with unconventional materials, and the repurposing of E-Waste. The project will be open to other participants/collaborators running their own workshops related to resourceful living.  Adam Ben-Dror is an artist-inventor currently teaching design at Victoria University Wellington. He recently turned a toy Lamborghini into a tele-presence robot roaming around the city making friends. Collaborating with Xin they made two films on inter-species kinship within Te Whanganui-a-tara and Te Awa Kairangi for the Dowse Art Museum. Adam studied fine arts at the University of Auckland, design at Victoria University Wellington and robotics at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA. Xin Cheng is an artist and researcher currently teaching design at the University of Auckland. She has been researching everyday resourcefulness around the earth since 2007. Recently she has been recording the sound of the dance between wind and trees. Previously she was a co-director of the artist-run space RM in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. Xin studied social design at Hamburg University of Fine Arts, Germany, and ecology, psychology and fine arts at The University of Auckland.   Bek Coogan and Heleyni Pratley   These two artists are joining forces to engage the public in their responses to the housing crisis. Heleyni presents The Housing Crisis Community Reflection and Assessment Centre. This builds on Heleyni’s themes of anti-capitalism and community empowerment in her work, including her recent painting ‘We Never Walk Alone Together’, permanently on display in Wellington Trades Hall Museum, and video music work ‘We Survive’. “Through organising, mentoring and empowering fast food union delegates and members, through workshops, education and struggle," says Heleyni "I’ve seen people stand up to their boss in moments that seemed impossible.”  Bek pushes her responses to the neo-liberal housing crisis that is Aotearoa further by developing on her recent art show We’re all Hostages held at Te Whare Herā, 2020.  Here Bek compulsively 'rescued' 100's of shards of Rimu sarking destined for landfill, in a ‘raged’ response to the housing and economic situation. This Rimu wood also calls to the underlying truth of the ecological impacts of settler-colonial land ownership and misuse. Part of the outcome of this solo show was the reality that these issues can’t be dealt with in isolation, so Bek looks forward to this collaboration with Heleyni to get help and support with the ongoing questioning. Can Bek get on the Ladder? What are the options? And how are we even feeling? “Thank goodness for the ‘The Community Housing Crisis Reflection and Assessment Centre ’ “ says Bek.  Heleyni Pratley is a visual and performance artist who worked for Unite Union as an organiser and co-president (2015) for six years. Bek Coogan is a Te Whanganui-a-Tara-based artist and musician, performance artist, whose work orbits the meeting points where real life meets art. At the last bi-annual Palmerston North Mayday Concert 2021, Bek sang with her mum’s political choir, The Brazen Hussies the song ‘Where Have All The Houses Gone..?’ Holli McEntegart: Held Space (working title)  Held Space is a place to examine how community, cultural and familial postpartum care has changed in Aotearoa: how we share our experiences in the time after childbirth, in real time and as oral history; what we know about our lineage's postpartum traditions and experiences; and, how we can “incorporate community care to collectively heal across generations.” By bringing diverse voices into conversation to explore systems of change, Held Space sits at the intersection of birth and reproductive justice activism, public art and social practice.    As an artist McEntegart uses social practice, video, performance, photography and text. She holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts in Photography and a Masters of Visual Art & Design from AUT and received an MFA scholarship to study at Carnegie Mellon School of Art, Pittsburgh, USA. She has exhibited extensively in New Zealand and the USA, and after being awarded a fellowship to attend the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture in Maine, took up residence in New York where she exhibited and trained as a Full Spectrum Doula. She has recently relocated back home to Aotearoa.   Julian Oliver: Electromagnetic Geographies  May 2021 (now complete) In this workshop participants built and used inexpensive antennae with open source software to reveal and study an otherwise unseen world of signal in the city - a richly diverse Electromagnetic Geography. In doing so, participants learnt not only how our invisible interactions with communications infrastructure can be used to study us, but how battles over public space also play out in the spectral domain - a fight for the Spectral Commons and our basic rights of broadcast. Work done and skills learned formed the basis of projects of an artistic, practical or purely hypothetical nature, for show in a 2 week follow-up public exhibition.   Julian Oliver has lectured on the technopolitics of network infrastructure and communications technologies in conferences and festivals throughout Europe and the US, from Princeton and Berkeley, to Transmediale and the ZKM. He has given intensive hands-on workshops on these topics in over a dozen countries worldwide, including summer schools at Weise7 in Berlin, and at the former Soviet spy station 'Little Star' in Latvia. https://julianoliver.com

    • The role of vacant urban space in a Covid crisis
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Jan Bieringa, Sophie Jerram, Linda Lee and Jason Muir with 'Exquisite Kaitiaki' by Miriama Grace-Smith, Xoe Hall and Gina Kiel at Urban Dream Brokerage and Brokered Dreams book launch, 2/57, Wellington. Image: Ebony Lamb Wellington communities need more creative and public spaces as inner city population booms and housing crisis puts rental stress on the young and vulnerable  Covid-19 and economic recession leaves empty shops and buildings empty in Wellington Urban Dream Brokerage programme will resume connecting artists with owners of unoccupied property Applications for artists to run projects are now open online www.urbanddreambrokerage.org.nz  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Ariki Bloomwell presenting welcoming karakia. Image: Ebony Lamb As the residential property market escalates, and as increasing numbers move into city apartments, a need for inner city spaces for exchange and community is growing.  With significant growth in commercial property left vacant since Covid-19 hit, the programme Urban Dream Brokerage is relaunching in Wellington to provide vital spaces for people to exchange, meet and help the city develop.    Following its first run between 2012 and 2018 in response to the Global Financial Crisis, creative space programme Urban Dream Brokerage (UDB) has been relaunched funded by the Wellington City Council Tipu Toa: Build Back Better / City Recovery fund.  <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Ebony Lamb The relaunch is spurred by a rise in unoccupied property around Wellington city due to the pandemic, and the need to create shared public spaces and experiences in a central city whose population is growing fast. The programme continues to run in Dunedin and has previously run in Porirua and Masterton. After the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake many buildings were taken off the Wellington market for strengthening, meaning fewer spaces could be used. Now property owners are embracing the renewed opportunity to enrich the city with artist and community occupied spaces.  “We have a commitment to a city that feels good for the most vulnerable and gives space to the most generous. We see ourselves as intentionally curating projects that will provoke change, for example decarbonising and indigenising the city,” says UDB co-founder Sophie Jerram. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Victoria Singh from The Waiting Room Image: Ebony Lamb “Other cities across the world including Brussels and Barcelona are taxing buildings that are vacant for more than three months, providing incentives to keep buildings occupied, something that could work well when property is surging in value.” The aim of the brokerage is not just to help restore the city to pre-pandemic levels and types of activity, but to help create a new and better place where art acts as a bridge that welcomes all comers.  UDB co-founder Mark Amery makes a case for culture providing a vital sense of place and meaning for city dwellers that leads to economic development.   “A cultural recovery in Wellington is more than about attracting visitors through events.  Culture is fundamental to our wellbeing and a sense of ownership of the city for those who live here. And we also invest financially where we feel a sense of belonging.” <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Mark Amery and Helen Kirlew Smith. Image: Ebony Lamb A book of past projects  Brokered Dreams: 98 Uses For Vacant Space has just been launched. “We also need to test new models of living space as we face environmental and social crises. Artists and community groups are leading the way,” says Amery. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Brokered Dreams: 98 Uses for Vacant Space. Image: Ebony Lamb Wellington City Council is supporting the brokerage to re-enliven the city in 2021 with activities, including support for the performance programme The City as a Theatre and a rejuvenated Cubadupa. UDB is produced by Maverick Creative, managed by dynamic Political Cutz performer Jason Muir with Linda Lee from Shared Lines Collaborative. Muir is already visiting property owners to find homes for projects. “UDB rules! My creative practice emerged from Urban Dream Brokerage so now I feel proud to manage the project and look forward to enabling others on their journey, to share their dreams with the people of Wellington,” says Muir. Urban Dream Brokerage was established in 2012 by Sophie Jerram and Mark Amery as part of their Letting Space entity under the umbrella of Wellington Independent Arts Trust. UDB found spaces around New Zealand for over 120 creative projects, some short and some long term with more than 40 property owners, allowing the artists’ work to infuse energy into the properties while new tenants were found. Some projects continue in the properties where they started - Come Sew With Me in Masterton’s Queen Elizabeth Park is celebrating this month its third anniversary, while others like Coliberate a ‘mental health gym’ are now successful innovative businesses.  Brokered Dreams: 98 Uses for Vacant Space - the book is available at www.urbandreambrokerage.org.nz/book or at Unity Bookshop Wellington. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Evzen Novak, Thomas Lahood, Darcy Case Laurie Foon, Suzanne Tamaki and Gerry Paul during karakia. Image: Ebony Lamb <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Sam Trubridge. Image: Ebony Lamb <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Crowd at two/fiftyseven. Image: Ebony Lamb <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Image: Ebony Lamb

    • We're back!
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Young Visionaries Tēnā koutou katoa  We come with great news! We are delighted to write that the Urban Dream Brokerage is relaunching in Wellington city (see the website), with support from the WCC City Recovery Fund for the first year. We are now open for new applications from both citizens with new ideas for vacant space to increase public participation in the city, and from property owners with vacant space that needs enlivening.  UDB continues to be funded through the Wellington Independent Arts Trust but Letting Space (Mark Amery and Sophie Jerram) are announcing the handover to Maverick Creative led by broker Jason Muir and staff Linda Lee and Tallulah Farrar. We have been in discussion for some time, and Mark, Sophie (and past brokers Helen Kirlew Smith and Tamsin Cooper) are professionally involved in training and overseeing the establishment of the UDB over the first six months. Excitingly, Letting Space are also curating six commissions with WCC funding for UDB in 2021 (details here).    Pencil in the busy Xmas diary a rather special launch celebration for Thursday evening 17 December 5.30pm at Level 2 57 Willis Street (above Unity Books) which will see the launch of a UDB Book 2012-2018, Brokered Dreams, and the introduction of a raft of exciting programmes for early 2021 Theatre as a City with Performance Arcade, Cubadupa, and the dynamic new artist powered work space we are in for that evening Two/Fifty Seven. More details to follow. RSVPS required,. Many exciting ideas and property relationships are already in development and we are all so thankful for the support and enthusiasm this is already receiving at a vital time for Wellington city, and indeed the planet, to look for new models of being together in urban environments as we see apartment blocks rise, income and property inequality issues, significant wasted vacant space as we potentially face a recession and dramatic new challenges with Covid and environmental factors. Urban Dream Brokerage is a mechanism for all in our community to lead. Our aims remain as follows: Increase diversity and community through living spaces in the city. Reduce vacant space and increase citizen ownership in towns and cities. See stronger representation of mana whenua in the city. Increase professionalism and help innovate business development. See creatives, artists and community service groups resident long term in the CBD. Increase mixed use of the city's building stock. Increase public engagement in the city See our cities known for their innovative use of space and public interaction. We are excited to be working in closer partnership with major creative partners like PlaygroundNZ and Creative Capital Arts Trust, WCC, Wellingtonnz and major property partners to support independent artists, community organisations and creative-minded citizens to occupy this special city.  We are a service for the whole city and want to hear from you. We can’t wait to celebrate together.

    • Embedding Artist Space in the City: Co-Design the Manifesto
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > People’s Cinema, Urban Dream Brokerage, Manners Street, 2013-15 Tuesday 12 March 2019, 10am-5pm Atrium, Te Aro Campus, Victoria University of Wellington, Vivian Street $25 - Covers Lunch. Register Here Now Enquiries: mark@lettingspace.org.nz Temporary art projects in cities are well and good while there’s space for them. As seen in Wellington with Urban Dream Brokerage, Letting Space over the last 9 years, and in numerous independent examples over decades: they enliven, develop city identity, transform spaces and seed new arts infrastructure. But, when a city is gentrified – with artists’ residence safely contained within events – the ability to enable the change artists inspire and provide in a city is limited. It is in allowing for the common spaces that things seed in vibrant, resilient cities. This is a call to artists of all stripes to join Letting Space and the artists in the city for a day to sprint-write a manifesto of actions to support artists with space in Wellington to be presented to Wellington City Council for its Decade of Culture (2018-2028). This is our shared development space for independent artists in Wellington. What models do you like? What has worked here? What are the opportunities we could be taking up? How do we seed more permanent development space? From big ideas – taxes on empty buildings – to the more immediate actions - guidelines on working with property owners. From new performance residency spaces to artist group housing, these models have proven to be vital to cultural cities’ vibrancy. Let’s empower change together. Best, Sophie Jerram and Mark Amery February 2019

    • Embedded Artist proposal
      • This link gives you access to a document presented to Wellington City Council. proposing an Embedded Artist pprgeamme in 2018 The project remains unfunded. Feel free to use (cite as from Wellington Independent Arts Trust) and let us know how you get on. Onward… With love, Sophie, Mark and all at the Wellington Independent Arts Trust

    • Upcoming talk on pathways to arts employment
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > As The former Social Development Minister Paula Bennett said in 2011 "As valuable as the arts are to our society, "now is not the time to be turning down available work to follow an artistic dream." But what if we treat art as real work? That was the ambition of the last Labour Government’s PACE scheme – Pathways to Arts and Cultural Employment- launched in 2001, which was credited as giving much needed space to develop a career for everyone from Taika Waititi to successful band the Phoenix Foundation. A programme where artists signing up at the WINZ office didn’t need to pretend to want to take on work in another field but could get a benefit in return for proving on a regular basis they were producing and showing their work. Under a national government the scheme dwindled to nothing, but now Prime Minister and arts, culture and heritage minister Jacinda Adern has pledged to explore the best ways to bring back PACE and explore other new pathways for arts employment – which the arts community have lobbied as a desperately needed priority. Over several decades arts tertiary education and arts production has grown exponentially, yet the infrastructure for arts training has arguably eroded. And PACE is by no means the first scheme in New Zealand or internationally to see more artists getting a living wage – schemes in New Zealand run back to the late 1970s and have been fundamental in the careers of some of the leading arts professionals in the country. Who should be responsible and what are the best models? And thinking more widely, what chance of a universal basic income, such as implemented last year in Finland? Something such no-hopers as Mark Zuckerberg, Stephen Hawkins and Elon Musk are all proponents of? In this discussion we bring together Finance, Associate Arts, Culture and Heritage and Sports and Recreation Minister Grant Robertson and Luit Bieringa, documentary maker and former Director of the National Art Gallery and Manawatu Art Gallery, who has assisted many early career arts professionals through employment.

    • Urban Dream Brokerage to close in Wellington with a call to support artists developing work independently in the city
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Brides, Barbarian Productions, Bowen House, 2013 A letter to our city, our artists, our property owners, our supporters.   We have loved changing Wellington City’s dynamic through Letting Space’s Urban Dream Brokerage service - with thanks to some remarkable creative people, property owners and the funding of the Wellington City Council and Wellington Community Trust. Over the past five and half years, Urban Dream Brokerage in Wellington has placed over 300 creators and artists in 45 spaces with 61 projects. Images and details of these can be found here, including three new, current projects. Some have been short, others have lasted much longer – the amazing group Coliberate have just finished 18 months running  a mental health gym in Featherston Street, for example. On 30th June we come to the end of a three-year contract with Wellington City Council for the delivery of the service. Letting Space has made the decision not to renew this contract. Rather we will do new work under the auspices of our trust, the Wellington Independent Arts Trust.  We all continue to look for ways to make Wellington a diverse and people-oriented place. In terms of the brokerage, property owners will tell you they are facing unprecedented issues with earthquake strengthening plus a far higher demand for retail spaces in the city than when we began, during a recession. It has got harder and harder for us to find spare spaces in a popular little city. It remains key work to provide infrastructure for independent artists. This is our challenge to council, to organisations, to all: if you wish Wellington to remain creative you need to prioritise directly supporting the city's most dynamic artists, through funds or resources such as space. It is in their hands, not established organisations or events, that the future lies. This needs new and different energies right now. We also need to celebrate and thank our city. The UDB projects have seen artists and other creatives consistently and uniquely challenge the expectation of the city’s offerings. They have helped us recognise that our city needs to provide diverse living spaces for all, where many people feel included and new ideas can take shape. Where artists and other creatives have the space to grow new enterprises and ways of working, developing their own interaction with the city. This has led to us working in Dunedin - where a programme now thrives, and programmes in Porirua and Masterton, as well as providing inspiration and advice to other cities nationwide and overseas. We’ve helped along the way with the development of proposals with many groups and in this last year have offered a monthly lunchtime gathering and podcast and, currently, a mentoring programme. We’ve loved working with artists and makers, helping them see their ideas to fruition. Many have gone on to develop stronger practices and businesses as part of the city. We continue to believe this kind of work is vital and special to Wellington’s identity. A place where artists feel they can be part of the city’s fabric. It’s something that helped the notion of being a ‘creative capital’. We’re thrilled to see artist run spaces like Te Haukāinga, meanwhile and play_station join others in the CBD in the last two years – artists are stepping up and taking on property.  Others also need to lead and some are looking for space. In May 2017 we conducted focus groups and surveyed of artists with experience in working in unconventional spaces about what they really need to stay active and sustained in Wellington.  A report on this can be found here. We think it’s time to heed the lead of authorities like Dunedin City Council currently and work actively to see how artists can be more embedded in infrastructure. Artists need more than event presentation space and promotion - they need space for development, where they can collaborate and be more part of the city. They suffer from a lack of the working spaces and connections that other creatives are gaining from co-share working spaces. Artists need to be funded to be artists - to develop, think and contribute to Wellington’s public, private and government institutions. It’s about artists working to be more embedded dynamic activators of the city. And it’s about recognising artists’ time and need for development potential, rather than seeing them as temporary pop-ups, or as free agents of lightweight cool projects. It's about seeing them as contributors to our city’s development. We hope Urban Dream Brokerage has helped challenge what exchange means for Wellington’s CBD - non-commercial activity as a vital part of the urban infrastructure. Projects like Moodbank, People’s Cinema, Co-Liberate, Political Cuts, to name a few, have gone on to have lives in other places, following the legacy of Letting Space produced and curated projects in the city like Kim Paton’s Freestore.  Temporary sometimes leads to permanent, but even without physical legacy we think the traces of the network that has been created have a lasting resonance for many creators in Wellington. Urban Dream Brokerage ends in June but we are encouraging others to pick up the challenge to do this work. Never underestimate the generosity there is amongst property and business owners who understand how value in a city needs to work in different ways and are committed to Wellington’s arts ecosystem. Expect knockbacks, but hold to your vision! We are making our resources, forms and processes available through Creative Commons for anyone to pick up. A link to these will be posted on our website, our blog and through our social media threads soon. All three of us are looking forward to continuing to work with our many dear friends and valued colleagues to continue to make Wellington such a special place to live and work. Thank you for the amazing work you do. Ngā mihi, Helen, Mark and Sophie Letting Space          

    • COME TO AN URBAN DREAMS LUNCH TO TALK THE ART OF STAYING IN BUSINESS
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > The latest in our monthly series - we introduce two artists both interested in working in a variety of different ways with the public and communities. Kerry Ann Lee is a celebrated visual artist, designer and educator who uses hand-made processes and socially-engaged projects to explore hybrid identities and histories of migration. She creates installation, publication and image-based work and has a long practice in independent artists’ publishing. Sacha Copland is a dancer, choreographer and the Artistic Director of Java Dance Theatre. As she told The Big Idea here she believes in the power of dance to build empathy and her works aim to permeate and dissolve the distance between people by creating dance that “clambers into your senses and gets underneath your fingernails.” Founded in 2003 Java is a professional dance company that presents dance theatre nationally and internationally often working in site specific locations, or creating work around specific themes that engage new audiences. May 8: On creating creative capital. Mayor Justin Lester  A discussion with our mayor who holds the arts and culture portfolio on what is needed to take our creative scene to the next level. All events are free. You are very welcome to bring your lunch. For podcasts of the 2017 series go here.  

    • Mentoring announced for three Urban Dream Brokerage projects
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > 'We Spoke', Candace Smith, Performance Arcade, Wellington, March 2018 Letting Space's Urban Dream Brokerage service is thrilled to announce three artists and projects in Wellington that have been given mentors in a new peer-to-peer mentorship programme for artists working in new spaces in the city.  Candace Smith will be mentored by artist Vivien Atkinson, who works across a variety of media and is known for her work with The See Here and Occupation Artists (website here). Candace's series of public works has commenced with installation 'We Spoke' at Performance Arcade, in which the public generated energy with a bicycle,  operating fans within a transparent space,  sealed from the wind, which gently moved mobiles made from umbrella parts (themselves deconstructed by the wind). A performer joined the work in response to the cyclists at night. Candace is interested in creating installations of reassembled objects which explore ideas around the fragmentation and reconnection associated with migration. Rosie White and the project Playdate will be mentored by Jo Randerson, artist and co-producer of Barbarian Productions (website here). White has recently completed a Masters of Fine Arts at Massey's College of Creative Arts and will work with collaborators' on a project that is a work of craftivism or art activism, concerned with a social issue: slavery, with specific concern to the significant numbers of people in the world today trafficked for sex. New Zealand says Rosie is not exempt and the project will seek to highlight the issue. Visual artist Mark Antony Smith and his project The Lost Future Exchange will be mentored by theatremaker Leo Gene Peters of company A Slightly Isolated Dog. This is a project Mark Antony is starting in 2018 to gather stories, dreams and remembrances of place in the central area of Wellington. It is an evolution of Ghosting About a project he did for his Masters study at Massey which included work 'Imperial Ghosts' concerning Dixon Street's Imperial Building for Lux Festival. Mark Antony Smith's previous shows also include Black Dog: Failure at Toi Poneke Gallery 2015. We hope to announce a fourth mentored project shortly. Initial information on the kaupapa behind this mentoring scheme can be found here.  

    • Announcing Urban Dreams Monthly Lunchtime programme 2018
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Thomas King Observatory, Wellington, work residency for artist Julian Priest in 2018 with thanks to the Wellington Museums Trust. Introducing for your diaries the Urban Dreams Monthly Tuesday lunchtime programme for March to May 2018 at Toi Poneke. We've got a great set of guests, across artforms: Leo Gene Peters, Julian Priest, Sacha Copland, Kerry Ann Lee and our mayor Justin Lester. We're always aware of the holes in knowledge between artforms even in a small city, so read on for more details on these strong artists. First gathering: next Tuesday March 13. An opportunity for artists or all kinds to network and discuss ideas working in new ways in Wellington city. Tuesdays 12.30-2pm March 13: On being embedded. Working with other industries and groups - what is the potential for residences or having artists embedded in different spaces in the city? We talk with two artists who have been working in work residencies and have an interest in how their work can interact in new ways through this: theatremaker Leo Gene Peters, and visual artist Julian Priest. Leo Gene Peters is a theatre director and maker and founder of A Slightly Isolated Dog who have been creating celebrated devised work since 2005. “We’re trying to have a conversation with the public about what matters to each of us… and through that conversation we’ll create performance work. The goal is to find new and different ways to use live performance, conversation, virtual platforms, social media (and other things) to create a space where we can meet and reflect together. A space where we can discuss important questions in our lives that we normally don’t talk about with strangers.” A Slightly Isolated Dog are currently in residence at Creative HQ. who aim to help develop and grow businesses in Wellington through “nourishing entrepreneurial talent and driving innovation.” Julian Priest is an artist working with participatory and technological forms and recent work explores relationships to different infrastructures including time, energy, security, health and communications. In 2017 Julian created the Citizen Water Map Lab with Letting Space as part of the Common Ground Public Art Festival where Hutt City residents and community groups were invited to collect ground water and bring it to the lab and test it with data represented in an illuminated installation that produced a map of local water quality. Julian was co-founder of early wireless freenetwork community Consume.net in London. He became an advocate for the freenetworking movement and has pursued wireless networking as a theme in fields of arts, development, and policy. Julian is currently undertaking a residency at the Thomas King observatory Wellington (supported by the Wellington Museums Trust), an old 1912 observatory which is part of the Carter Observatory complex. April 17: On the art of keeping in business. Sasha Copland and Kerry Ann Lee. The realities of the business of being an independent artist. We introduce two artists both interested in working in a variety of different ways with the public and communities. Kerry Ann Lee is a celebrated visual artist, designer and educator who uses hand-made processes and socially-engaged projects to explore hybrid identities and histories of migration. She creates installation, publication and image-based work and has a long practice in independent artists’ publishing. Sacha Copland is a dancer, choreographer and the Artistic Director of Java Dance Theatre. As she told The Big Idea here she believes in the power of dance to build empathy and her works aim to permeate and dissolve the distance between people by creating dance that “clambers into your senses and gets underneath your fingernails.” Founded in 2003 Java is a professional dance company that presents dance theatre nationally and internationally often working in site specific locations, or creating work around specific themes that engage new audiences. May 8: On creating creative capital. Mayor Justin Lester  A discussion with our mayor who holds the arts and culture portfolio on what is needed to take our creative scene to the next level. All events are free. You are very welcome to bring your lunch. For podcasts of the 2017 series go here.

    • Dunedin artists boosting environmental awareness and biodiversity
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Josh Thomas (an Urban Dream Brokerage Advisory Board member) heads the water diviners at the opening of Awa HQ. Image: Justin Spiers. Water divining in the Dunedin town belt has kicked off the first of two innovative public art commissions, which sees artists respond to the city’s environmental needs as part of Te Ao Tūroa, Dunedin’s Environment Strategy. In a programme called Environment Envoy, Dunedin’s Urban Dream Brokerage announce two projects following a call for proposals in August: Awa HQ, a collaboration by Angela Lyon, Aroha Novak and Charlotte Parallel dedicated to Dunedin’s Toitū stream, and What Grows Where You Live, a project led by artist Ruth Evans involving revegetation and artwork creation with native plant species. The commissions, worth $6500 each, are part of Dunedin's Urban Dream Brokerage service, funded by Dunedin City Council and supported by national public art organisation Letting Space. “We are working to encourage Dunedin’s community to see their local environment in new ways, and specifically to get more action happening to increase biodiversity,” says Dunedin City Councillor and Te Ao Tūroa Partnership Chair David Benson-Pope. “The city is also using and creating strong partnerships between different sectors to deliver a better natural environment. Artists have a vital role to play in all of this – from making new connections and encouraging partnerships to enabling people to see their world from completely different perspectives.” Awa HQ acknowledges Toitū stream, hidden within Dunedin’s CBD, provides a vital connection to Dunedin’s environment and heritage. The project looks at the history, condition and relationships of the stream by gathering together diverse stories, experiences and responses. Treating the stream as a living entity, the artists were inspired by the passing of the Whanganui River Claims Settlement Bill, which in March which gave the Whanganui River, Te Awa Tupua, the same status as a legal person. The project was launched with a picnic and a water divining hikoi with Stephen Kilroy and Taonga Pūoro artists Jennifer Cattermole and Jessica Latton on 25 November. They are now inviting other artists to respond to their call this coming weekend Saturday 9 December 12pm to 4pm by presenting work at Awa HQ, an empty lot at 175 Rattray Street, Dunedin, beside the now concealed stream. Featuring a range of performances, actions, discussions and picnics Awa HQ will culminate in a final hikoi on Saturday 17 February 2018. The second project What Grows Where You Live embraces the biodiversity available in Ōtepoti/Dunedin. Focusing on the plant species raupo, harakeke, kowhai and poroporo, the project begins by working with private and public landowners to introduce native flora across the greater Dunedin region through planting schemes. Materials will be gathered from these sites to be used in constructing art works hosted in a vacant space in Dunedin’s CBD in April 2018. The exhibition will feature workshops for skills and knowledge sharing, and a zine providing understanding of where these plants grow, how to source them, and their traditional application in Māori society. “The Environment Envoy projects will engage more of our community in the work to achieve the goals of Te Ao Tūroa,” says Councillor Benson-Pope, “and also strengthen collaboration between artists and the public, iwi, scientists, councils, business and community groups. We all have a key role to play in enhancing our environment.” For more information: contact Katrina Thomson email: envoy.udb@gmail.com

    • Supporting working in city spaces
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Sora Ami, Yasuaki Igarashi, Shared Lines: Wellington, October 2017. image: Ebony Lamb Wellington is full of independent and strong minded creatives.  Our artist and producer-driven initiatives have been profoundly influential in the development of Wellington's ‘creative capital’.  We have so much history and experience to share -  learned the hard way. So Letting Space is introducing, the UDB mentoring scheme! As part of its Urban Dream Brokerage Programme Letting Space is offering four artists or collectives peer-to-peer mentoring to help them deliver independent arts projects in public or unconventional spaces in early 2018 in Wellington city. We want to hear from artists now, with their project ideas for the city and their mentoring needs. First deadline Friday 8 December (there will be a second deadline in February, but note its first come first served). We want to help artists share knowledge to produce independent work that interacts with the city and its publics in new ways across all artforms. For more information email urbandreambrokerage@gmail.com or contact Mark Amery 027 3566 128. And make a submission using our online form here (where we ask you to present your project idea and requirements also).   We’ve expanded our reach to meet the needs we’re hearing from artists – that means assisting in the development of projects for public and underutilised as well vacant spaces, and providing mentoring and more support networks. Producing work in these spaces often involves working independently with a broad skillset. Artists also lack curatorial and governance feedback that others may have, and can be isolated and stretched in their resources as they develop bold new platforms. Let’s help each other! Following the inspiration of the much-heralded Handshake project for independent practising artists (with an applied arts base) the kaupapa is that established artists and producers hand-over some of their quality knowledge but, as Handshake say “it is a two-way project that encourages symbiosis and give and take.” Let’s empower each other to think differently, and to make new kinds of stakeholder relationships in the city. This series is working in tandem with the Urban Dreams monthly podcast and conversation series which you can listen to here.  

    • Knitting the Sky in Wellington
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > “Knitting nets is universal. If one can knit a net, one can cross the ocean and connect with people. Knitting nets is part of human wisdom. If one can knit a net, one can transcend time and connect with people of the past and future.” Artist Yausaki Igarashi From Wednesday 18 October for a week a giant colourful fishing net will rise out of Whairepo Lagoon on the Wellington Waterfront, near the Wharewaka, while a second will call out to it across the water from Frank Kitts Park. The nets are Sora-Ami (Knitting the Sky) made by Japanese artist Yasuaki Igarashi in collaboration with communities from around Eastern Japan in the three years following the Shiogama earthquake and tsunami in 2011. They are part of Shared Lines: Wellington - which Urban Dream Brokerage is supporting - a special programme of discussions and exhibitions in Wellington on 17-21 October that open out discussion about the role artists and urban design plays in earthquake resilience and community building post-earthquakes. The installation of the work at the Wellington Waterfront Lagoon acknowledges the importance of this area to mana whenua Maori, Taranaki Whanui, as a place of fishing and connection. The origin of Sora-Ami (Knitting the Sky) is a voyage made by the artist after the Eastern Japanese Earthquake and an encounter with a fisherman living on Miyakejima – a volcanic island in the Pacific south of Tokyo that erupts about once every 20 years. Here the artist learned how to knit fishing nets. Since the encounter in June 2011, Yasuaki has brought people together “to knit” in nine different locations throughout Japan, from the temporary housing facilities in disaster-stricken areas like Kamaishi City of Iwate Prefecture and the Urato Islands of Shiogama City in Prefecture Miyagi to Asakura Jinja in Tokyo – the Shinto Shrine whose shrine crest is a net. The installation of the work at the Wellington Waterfront Lagoon acknowledges the importance of this area to mana whenua Maori, as a place of fishing and connection. The official launch of Sora-Ami (Knitting the Sky) is 10am Wednesday 18 October outside Te Wharewaka o Poneke. The installation will be up for one week only. The Wellington installation of Sora-Ami (Knitting the Sky) will be the first of three installations as the nets journey to the South Island to be displayed in Christchurch and Kaikoura in a gesture that connects people from these different islands and helps to share experience and ideas.  

    • Holding the Space for Mental Wellbeing in the Wellington CBD
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > "Our popular date-night relaxation choice: Mindfulness with Clay." It’s been a year of holding the space for mental wellbeing at the second floor of 111 Customhouse Quay in the middle of the ‘business’ end of Wellington, for Co-liberate, a project the Urban Dream Brokerage service has assisted.  It’s not a typical hang out for theatre graduates, surrounded by small businesses, fluoro lights and blue carpet.  Bop, Jody and Sarah have made it feel strongly welcoming with some simple paint and design solutions, cushions, plants and colouring activities. Now, after a year, CoLiberate are trying to work out how to make their popular workshops and activities, based around pro-active wellbeing, pay.  “Most mental health services in New Zealand are there for people after they’ve crashed - but preventative care is hard to fund,” says Bop. She mentions the bleak experience many freelance actors and performers have trying to keep themselves ‘up,’ and thinks they have a lot to share. “Artists have this underlying expertise - people care and building self-worth.  As performers we needed a process that helped people feel buoyant – when the people are the work, you have to find a way to help them be well. Good theatre is so close to wellness.” In this guest blog the CoLiberate team look back on their first year. Not too long ago, an email popped up from the Urban Dream Brokerage team to let us know that it’s CoLiberate’s one year anniversary at the Studio, the space we have held on Customhouse Quay since the 31 July 2016.  At first we didn’t believe it. A whole year? The UDB team were among the first to get excited with us. Back then we felt like three little mice with a big vision. We were dreaming about a gym culture for mental health. We knew it mattered. But we had no idea where to start. UDB are longtime believers in transformation, so they could see the value in drawing together a community around a radical idea - to invite all kinds of people to give emotional workouts a go. To open an ongoing workshop programme to absolutely everyone. To support people to prioritise their mental health just as much as their physical health. Somehow they got their hands on the key to everything for us… 111 Customhouse Quay. It turns out the place to start was right at the heart of Kiwi mental health: in the middle of the CBD, where so many people struggle to find balance and stability in a relentless Monday to Friday 9-to-5 routine. We barely had time to do an excited victory lap of the Biz Dojo before we set-to on transforming what had most recently been a law firm’s officeinto Wellington’s first mental health gym. Somewhere purpose designed to help all kinds of people feel at home as they take on a new bold and open attitude to their self-care. A year ago, we were full of ‘maybe’s and ‘what if ’s.. A year on, we are proud to say that we are an organisation of 11 who have delivered over 250 wellbeing workouts, hosted events, taught programmes, advocated for positive mental health on the TEDx stage and to 2000 plus people at various events around the country. It’s taken us a year at our Customhouse Quay home to build a community around this idea. And now that we have seen the impact, we know how much bigger this needs to get, and fast!  UDB helped us make the jump from talking about real change, to actually doing it. Now it’s the individuals in the studio who are doing the transforming - and wow it’s been incredible to watch. We get to see all kinds of people developing self-awareness, new skills and habits, connections to purpose and identity, growing their sense of self-worth, and developing strong friendships.  The transformation is personal and powerful and a privilege to be a part of - and it’s still only the start!  The emotional workouts running every week at the moment are Reflective Writing, Wellness Wānanga (for sharing wellness hacks and verbally exploring our inner worlds), Creative Movement, Yoga, and our popular date-night relaxation choice: Mindfulness with Clay. We can’t believe how much this testing ground has unlocked for us in a year -  we look back on how telling people we ‘needed a mental health gym’ didn’t cut it. But putting out a timetable of emotional workouts for mind health is activating real change. It has also tested us. More than we ever would have known when we first received those keys. The perseverance and patience we’ve had to muster as we continue to learn hard lessons about how long change takes to create. About how to pick up and carry on after a no-show session in the early days when no one knew we were there. About how to fund the infinite cups of tea that are a must-have on either side of any good emotional workout! About how to value diverse or even opposite experiences in the very same moment. About how to curate a professional environment to prototype a business model, while still maintaining a homely readiness to host individuals in need of a sanctuary that doesn’t feel like their work environment. We’ve been blown away by how people from such different demographics and backgrounds can find common ground so quickly in a space like the CoLiberate studio. We’re inspired by the brave individuals who keep turning up to discover with us. To play. To explore. To lean into the hard conversations that can make all the difference in their lives. Those who are proactive about their wellbeing. Who won’t accept New Zealand’s current mental health prognosis. Who want to be a part of a better way. So what now? We’re working on preparing our community and workplaces to know what to do in times of mental crisis and to know how to invest in their business’ biggest resource: their people.  Mental Health First Aid for the public is on its way, and we won’t stop until we have a country that knows how to cope with anything.  We’re on track to build the Les Mills of mental health so that we can make positive mind health available to even more Wellingtonians.      

    • Urban Dreams Wellington Podcast #1: on mana whenua with Liz Mellish
      • If art has a role to play in creating public space, how might it better acknowledge the ground, the very context in which it takes place? Its environment, its heritage, its politics. How might it more deeply offer alternatives to the treatment of land as an exchangeable commodity? Let’s start in Aotearoa New Zealand with mana whenua. In this short lunchtime conversation at the Wharewaka on Wellington’s waterfront with Liz Mellish we talk on the meaning of mana whenua, the role of Te Atiawa ki te Whanganui a Tara (the people who lived around the harbour) and ways artists might better work with mana whenua.  “Sometimes it feels a bridge too far for people,” says Liz, “and in our country it shouldn’t be like that, it should be easy.” Key to Liz’s korero is Wellington’s Wharewaka, established in 2011, as a lynchpin for a change in view of the Wellington CBD. Liz touches on how it operates as “a whole village in one building” and some powerful stories: the rock that became the Michael Fowler Centre, and Te Atiawa’s relations with the eagle rays, penguins and homeless who visit and reside in Frank Kitts lagoon. We also hear from artist Kedron Parker on her relationship with mana whenua working at the CBD’s Kumutoto stream. Liz Mellish is a director of the Wharewaka and Mana Whenua o Poneke, chair of Palmerston North Maori Reserves Trust and member of Urban Dream Brokerage’s Wellington advisory panel. She is in conversation with Letting Space’s Mark Amery. This is the first of a series of planned recorded monthly conversations in Wellington conducted by Letting Space’s Urban Dream Brokerage service, with support from Wellington City Council and Wellington Community Trust. They are recorded over lunches open to all attend which aim to support artists across disciplines playing an active role in the city outside of conventional venues.   

    • Urban Dreams Wellington Podcast #1: on mana whenua with Liz Mellish
      • If art has a role to play in creating public space, how might it better acknowledge the ground, the very context in which it takes place? Its environment, its heritage, its politics. How might it more deeply offer alternatives to the treatment of land as an exchangeable commodity? Let’s start in Aotearoa New Zealand with mana whenua. In this short lunchtime conversation at the Wharewaka on Wellington’s waterfront with Liz Mellish we talk on the meaning of mana whenua, the role of Te Atiawa ki te Whanganui a Tara (the people who lived around the harbour) and ways artists might better work with mana whenua.  “Sometimes it feels a bridge too far for people,” says Liz, “and in our country it shouldn’t be like that, it should be easy.” Key to Liz’s korero is Wellington’s Wharewaka, established in 2011, as a lynchpin for a change in view of the Wellington CBD. Liz touches on how it operates as “a whole village in one building” and some powerful stories: the rock that became the Michael Fowler Centre, and Te Atiawa’s relations with the eagle rays, penguins and homeless who visit and reside in Frank Kitts lagoon. We also hear from artist Kedron Parker on her relationship with mana whenua working at the CBD’s Kumutoto stream. Liz Mellish is a director of the Wharewaka and Mana Whenua o Poneke, chair of Palmerston North Maori Reserves Trust and member of Urban Dream Brokerage’s Wellington advisory panel. She is in conversation with Letting Space’s Mark Amery. This is the first of a series of planned recorded monthly conversations in Wellington conducted by Letting Space’s Urban Dream Brokerage service, with support from Wellington City Council and Wellington Community Trust. They are recorded over lunches open to all attend which aim to support artists across disciplines playing an active role in the city outside of conventional venues.   

    • Making Masterton Dreams Realty
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > On Wednesday 28 June a spirited group of Masterton people came together for an open community meeting at Te Patukituki (the former Greenworld with its beautiful wooden open ceiling), 15 Queen Street to hatch connections and ideas for the pilot Urban Dream Brokerage in Masterton. It was time for many introductions, percolating ideas and wishes, plus an impromptu display from Heather Bannister of some beautiful vintage sewing machines -  which she has schemes (with at least 100 she says in her collection!) to see not only on display, but in use by young and old. It was a pretty remarkable group of about 20 representing a diversity of the community: young and old, Maori and Pakeha, newcomers to the region hungry for initiatives and older timers with a lot of history to share. Even those who professed to not being creative expressed interests that suggested they had plenty to bring. Jade Waetford of Te Patukituki opened the hui. Te Patukituki is a fledgling community and carving space with some beautiful vision for enabling more young and Maori to feel part of the Masterton CBD, run here in this special space with the support of the Masterton Lands Trust. We’re really looking forward to working with them in partnership to see more community life in this special northern end of the CBD.  Things are seeding in Masterton. Our call out to all in the community is to think about what causes they’d like to further, collections they know of in backrooms and garages that deserve wider exposure, or ideas for the CBD they could trial (be it an event in open space or project in a vacant space). What ideas could be brought to life that demonstrate some different aspects of this town? If you’ve got something even starting to percolate drop Anneke Wolterbeek the Urban Dream Broker a line at udbmasterton@gmail.com to talk more on how a dream could be ‘realty’.   Images: Anneke Wolterbeek <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " >

    • Sharing and learning in Europe
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Julian Priest with Sophie Jerram in Helsingor, Denmark We asked Letting Space's Sophie Jerram what’s she doing in Europe currently for 6 weeks and this was her response: Primarily I'm retrieving my 15 year old son who has been living here and found Denmark to be a very welcoming and easy place to be 15 in.  But also I’ve been flown to Helsingør (thanks Danish Arts Foundation) - home to Kronborg Castle where Hamlet was set - to present our work and the Urban Dream Brokerage as a potentially radical model of working with artists and communities in incubating new ideas for the town. Recently colleagues from Copenhagen University launched a co-design project that's been almost a year in design and execution - a park co-designed with children aged 10-12. I helped paint and stencil some of the kids' designs onto wood to help meet the deadline this week.  I taught at the Urban Intervention Studio too with colleagues there - some may recognise Anne Wagner who visited New Zealand recently. I've just attended an incredible international municipalism summit in Barcelona 'Fearless Cities' with people from 180 countries. In Barcelona in 2015 a group of self-organising activists were voted into key roles in Council, including Mayor, through the platform Barcelona En Comu. Lots of food for thought about how we might be more inclusive in our community planning. I heard about one small town in Spain - Celrá - who used participatory budgeting with residents, and now fund a drop in psychological service in the town, and a service that rings all the elderly residents to wish them a good morning. I’ve just spoken about Urban Dream Brokerage at a Landscape Futures conference, and my final gig on 10th of July in Utrecht, Netherlands is with the International Association for the Study of the Commons. I will be visiting Urban Commons in Rotterdam and connecting with the great art and policy organisation, Casco. Looking forward to sharing ideas about co-design, municipalism and landscape with New Zealand on return in August. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Teaching at the urban intervention studio, Copenhagen University

    • Urban Dreams Wellington: A Review 2017
      • A review of the needs of artists working outside conventional venues <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Unsettled, Rana Haddad and Pascal Hachem, Letting Space May 2017. Image: Gabrielle McKone Introduction This review has brought together the feedback of artists and arts producers across arts disciplines with extensive experience working in public space outside conventional venues (theatres, galleries and auditoriums). We believe this to be a vital, distinctive aspect of Wellington’s cultural identity past and present. This is part of an organisational review of the Urban Dream Brokerage (UDB) service in Wellington, run by public art and urban revitalisation organisation Letting Space.  Letting Space and the UDB have played a strong role in the last seven years in brokering spaces and facilitating projects that work in this area. We are two years into a three year contract with Wellington City Council and want to ensure our work is meeting the needs of the diverse, strong practice of artists of all kinds working outside resourced venues, and provide some wider advocacy on their priorities. Consultation was undertaken with 65 experienced respondents, with a written survey and two two hour hui.   “Artists are the life and soul of the city, yet there is no infrastructure for them to develop their companies. There needs to be support for them to be sustainable businesses, like there is support for start-up tech companies.”   Summary Strong calls were made for: More access to development, performance and presentation spaces that allow companies to work together and learn from each other. Mentoring at all levels, with more fluid models. Despite extensive experience, 66% of survey respondents would find mentoring of use in developing professional practice working in new spaces in the city. The establishment of mixed-use spaces that allows for collaboration, community, experimentation and development of audience across producers. More active work by WCC and others in support structures for emerging artists. Involving artists in urban design and other place-based work from early in the process. The retention of a brokering role that assists with negotiating property, public space use and regulatory requirements. The sharing of resources and information between producers and with local authorities, using digital and physical means. Assistance with funding management/applications and process. 89% of respondents would like more opportunities to work in space outside of existing venues in Wellington 41% of respondents do not have sufficient access to affordable space for their practice. 28% said they have sufficient access to affordable space for their practice most of the time but there are times when they could do with more.   “For us the issue is in accessing large spaces which are already there e.g. the St James or Opera House. Because they are run by PWV, they become very difficult to access, financially and also with management.”   What is needed for artists working outside conventional venues in Wellington? Ground-up responses SEEKING A SENSE OF PERMISSION There have been dramatic changes to Wellington over the last 15 years which have impacted on the ability for artists to contribute to the city. Respondents have commented much on the conditions that allowed the development of artists and arts organisations in the city in the 1980s and 1990s and how conditions have changed. It is perceived that there were less regulatory issues to doing work outside venues in the 1980s and 90s that led to a fertile emerging culture. Property was easier to access, event culture less formalised, it was easier to survive as an artist financially and contribute, and the media and cultural communities were less soloed and more artist-run. More recently access to property has become more difficult due to constraints placed by the 2011-12 and 2016 earthquakes. It was acknowledged that their have been strong artist-run initiatives established in recent years in terms of visual and performing artist studio, office and exhibition space, yet there is a pervading feeling that artists feel less permission to exercise their use of public space.    “Engage Pasifika and Tangata Whenua in decision making processes about how space is used... The art world can have very fixed ideas about how space and resources should be shared. We need to learn about having face to face conversations, hui and meetings. At which we welcome and feed people.”   Common concerns Generally there was a very strong call for working more in public space, enabling artists to be relevant and have strong social and political connection in people’s lives. An opportunity was recognised by many in independent feedback for Wellington to be far stronger in how it enables artists to contribute to the city. Respondents felt Wellington could really lead in the way in how it approaches funding and considering artist’s regulatory needs in working in public space, building on its solid reputation with innovative art in public space initiatives. Others: Building on Wellington’s ‘liveable city’ image in enabling the arts to lead in sustainable resource use. Platforms for Maori and Pacific Island practitioners and processes with which they feel comfortable. More mobile, pop-up venue options developed Stronger mechanisms to get mana whenua feedback and meet mana whenua and hui. Changes to the Positively Wellington Venue Subsidy scheme to allow more Wellington artists to use these venues - as venues have become more developed access has also diminished. Clarity on regulations in the use of public space and an agency to assist with this. Artists working in residence and as part of planning from early on in process with WCC and businesses. Dealing to the gaps for artists coming out of university education and transitioning into building professions - there were seen to be more pathways created by these emerging artists themselves in the 1990s “Forums or open conversations where people who have less connections can meet other artists and/or pitch ideas and gain collaborators... Additionally, offering feedback and/or mentoring artists through application processes for unconventional venues might be helpful.”   Survey results in graphic form <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " >   Verbatim - a selection of comments “I think the need for UDB / Letting Space is more urgent than ever. Because we now live our lives on-line, we are all part of fractured audiences and our common civic conversation is on the brink of disappearing.” “As an artist I end up being an administrator, facilitator, and negotiator. I need support with these elements so I can focus on my work.” “Publicly funded spaces which afford full autonomy. Toi Poneke is a fantastic example of the more formal model that could be adapted. 19 Tory St etc... We shouldn't have a single artist leaving art school without access to space to develop and show work.” “WCC need to invest in real estate for artists… use more empty space around town, Wellington seems to have heaps (indoor and outdoor). Temporary projects (sculpture garden, open studios, short term residency space for locals with community engagement). We would like to shortcut getting more art in people’s lives, visible to a general audience.” “Prepare to partner up together with allies and resource share to help make new spaces more viable for people to create their work within.” “Artists often struggle to build relationships with property managers directly.” “Some more opportunities for temporary sculptural interventions supported by the Council would be ideal.” “Greater collaboration between local and Wellington-based businesses… there are almost no New Zealand-based corporate responsibility programs that have a focus on engagement and support of the arts... Collaborating together, this partnership would definitely deepen the role of arts to make it a vital part of our city.” “Discovering new spaces that are opened up for public or artists allows a deepening and a connection to a place… I want artists to be valued and given trust, time and resources to develop those deeper and more visible roles…” “Potentially UDB could do a 6 monthly PI mini fest........it would help get the word out and also give a variety of performers a chance to investigate what it means....” “Encourage artists to be bold and creative within our city-bounds, and resource them more financially, so that they can really commit to telling their stories, and sharing their love of the city, and be less stressed on just surviving. We can't dream effectively if just there for survival. It really is a time of student artists and young artists being forced out by rising rents… WCC must step up and acknowledge we are in the midst of an economic crisis that will drive artists, arts agencies and youth out of Wellington.” “At Tory Street Studio we have been working closely with the council and our neighbours to reinvent our block of Tory St since being cordoned off after the earthquake. We are thinking about our place in the city and our sense of belonging and finding ways to contribute from the very earliest stages of planning. We see potential for this process to be used again in other sites. We need to re-connect with audiences. People are no longer so committed to attending at commercial venues. People want to engage with work in public spaces.” “See the council working actively with a range of artists when working on public projects (community centres, public space development, etc) involving the extended arts from the beginning in projects.” “There needs to be more visible platforms to create momentum and lift the profile of what artists are doing. Regularity and consistency is the best way to support growth. Currently I don't think the arts are well connected with each other in Wellington.” “Spaces that encourage development in audience and art form. Spaces that don't gobble resources that could be used more effectively in helping to pay artists and performers. Spaces that enable and encourage art practice.” “Working with different industries: scientists, politicians, economists, medical profession, food and nutrition industry to look at ways in which the arts can respond to and communicate issues that exist across our society. Encouraging discussion around issues, engaging communities who feel strongly about issues to speak and aiding in making them heard.” “Over the last couple of years we have attempted to make connections with some of Wellington's migrant communities, and to encourage for those communities to present concerts at Pyramid Club. A concert of Persian music last year was an example of a real, positive interaction between a community of fairly recent migrants and the community of an independent arts space. I would love to be able to instigate more events like this.” “Need to keep producers in Wellington, for Wellington-made events - need more support with this - exciting to imagine a space where producers can work/network/share resources.” “If we want citizens to engage we need to educate them about the complexities of urban problems. Then we need to unleash the utopian vision. Why not start with kids?  Kids, Schools. Maori and Pasifika communities are doing some of the best work in this area.” “You have changed the landscape of people using public space and done many good things. I think you need to expand your artists you work with and consider the processes you use to get people involved. I also think you need to protect artists and their projects…  I would like to see a more collective and open approach to developing in the future. People from diverse communities are the ones who know what those communities need. How can you partner with community leaders to listen to and learn from them?” “The extent of the ongoing positive effects of your work is immeasurable. I have seen many many people transformed through the work carried out in Porirua City alone. There has been a dramatic shift in the city and community thinking which has been amazing to witness and be a part of.” “I would encourage UDB to go deeper to understanding the needs of the communities of artists with which they work, to make sure that their agreements between building owners and artists work with the needs of the artists.”   5. Conclusion and a call for action Wellington is known for its the multi-disciplinary arts and culture projects that occur outside of conventional spaces. This has a rich history, past and present through events, festivals and artist run spaces. It has been vital in shaping the city’s identity but also fundamental in the development of our stellar artists and their producers. It is our belief that conditions that allow artists to grow as part of the city is vital to any city’s health. Wellington is a city that artists want to be in conversation with, and this has been recognised by the leading role taken by Wellington City Council in public art, and in the growth of some cornerstone event and festival based organisations. We would like to work with other organisations towards : A programme of mentorship and ongoing conversations that inspire artists to share resources and feel more permission to interact with the city. Advocating and assisting with the activation by artists of public space and underutilised space (as well as vacant commercial space) that speaks directly to the city’s future needs and is in conversation with its history and environment. Clarifying and communicating the requirements for artists wishing to use space outside conventional venues. Assisting in the growth of more artist mixed-use spaces for collaboration, development and presentation.   Advocating the distinctive role in Wellington artists have in a creative use of urban space that involves innovation and participation.         Appendices The online survey Sent to 100 identified artists and producers across all disciplines with strong experience working outside conventional venues. We had 35 strong responses. The full survey responses are available as a spreadsheet (anonymous) here. The respondents (individual comments are not attributed): Claire Mabey  and Andrew Laking (Pirate and Queen, Litcrawl, Loemis), Gabrielle O’Connor (artist), Sam Trubridge (Performance Arcade), Kedron Parker (artist), Sian Torrington (artist), Anton Carter (DANZ), Gina Matchitt (artist), Jordana Bragg (artist, Meanwhile), Jo Randerson (Barbarian), Erica Van Zon (artist, WCC), Robbie Whyte (artist), Gina Matchitt (artist), Barry Thomas (artist, Yeti Productions), Joel Baxendale (Binge Culture), Ania Upstill (artist), Jhana Millers (artist, 30 Upstairs, The Seehere), Sian Torrington (artist), Andreas Lepper (musician), Leo Gene Peters (theatre, An Isolated Dog), Bryce Galloway (artist, Massey), Ebony Lamb (musician), Kerry Ann lee (artist), Daniel Beban (musician, Pyramid Club/FREDS), Debbie Fish (producer, Goldfish Creative), Hannah Smith (Trick of the Light Theatre), Kirsty Lilico/Ruth Thomas Edmond (artists, Tory Street Studios), Linda Lee (artist, produced Shared Lines), Lucy Marinkovich (dancer, Borderline Arts Ensemble), Malia Johnston (choreographer, Movement of the Human), Marcus McShane (light artist), Mark Williams (Circuit), Paul Forrest (artist), Ruby Joy Eade (artist), Sherilee Kahui (Hank of Thread), Sian Montgomery-Neutze (artist, Toi Wahine), Sophie Davis (Enjoy Gallery) and Tanemahuta Gray (choreographer, Kahukura Taki Rua Productions). B. Two two-hour Hui These were held with an open invitation and attended by 30 people. We were very pleased with the interest and the high calibre of experience brought together. We identified projects historically that have been significant and considered the conditions that enables them, shared our dreams for the city and discussed some practical tools going forward. The combined minutes of these hui are below. <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " >

    • Masterton brokerage open for creative ideas
      • <figure class=" sqs-block-image-figure intrinsic " > Children engage with Liana’s Parlour of Natural Beauty, a recent project by Liana Stupples in Lower Hutt which brought all the natural goodness of the surrounding environment into a vacant retail space. Image: Dionne Ward A new programme in Masterton wants to help you realise your urban dreams. Part of the Our Future Masterton programme, the Urban Dream Brokerage is calling for ideas for activities and uses for vacant commercial and public space which explore new ways to use space and give more life to the Masterton CBD. Following workshops held with the community in 2016 and recently through Unicef with school students, the call is for ideas that are innovative and participatory, and speak to different options for changes to the town centre Proposals are due by the last Friday of every month, starting this month. Ideas may be proposed by a webpage or discussed with Masterton’s recently appointed ‘urban dream broker’ Anneke Wolterbeek (udbmasterton@gmail.com Ph. 027 5664600). “We’re interested in all innovative ideas that help create a better connected community, strengthen connections between age groups, and recognise and build capability for mana whenua,” says Wolterbeek. “The community has asked for projects that create more shared spaces, strengthen connections between spaces and represent Masterton’s heritage, culture and amazing environment. There is so much potential here. Ideas should operate differently to businesses and activities already in existence - who we want to support by bringing more people to the centre.” Urban Dream Brokerage is a programme run by public art and urban revitalisation organisation Letting Space, who already run such a model successfully in Wellington, Dunedin and Porirua. The programme will run as a pilot until the end of this year. The brokerage service has facilitated over 70 projects, and has been heralded by property owners, community groups and councils alike nationally. 70% of the 34 properties occupied in Wellington over the last four years have been re-tenanted since the programme began. Ideas have ranged from a political hair salon, where young people are encouraged to discuss politics, to an ‘Imaginarium’, a playspace for young and old alike who are welcomed to create their own cardboard constructions. There have been illuminated bike parades, fashion recycling workshops, a video game museum and a bicycle library. The latest project in Dunedin Sunroom brings the sun into a vacant shop using projections beamed from solar telescopes around the world. Local Masterton broker Anneke Wolterbeek is being supported by a local advisory group. “ Lots of strong common ideas have already come through from the workshops” says Wolterbeek, “in terms of a keen desire for changes to CBD spaces and the kind of activities that our Urban Dream Brokerage can help enable”. A former secretary and committees’ chair for the Rotary club of Masterton, Wolterbeek has been an active member of the EOC team (Wairarapa Emergency Operations Centre) of Wellington Region Emergency Management Office (REMO) and Chair of the Rotary District International Friendship Exchange Committee. Passionate about community development and sustainability, she is treasurer for the Wellington Region Waste Forum, club secretary for the Wairarapa Beekeepers Club and the organiser of the monthly Wairarapa Dogwalk Club. Wolterbeek previously worked for the Greater Wellington Regional Council as a Environmental Policy Advisor in Masterton. “I enjoy being able to positively influence and improve the physical and social environment of our community in Masterton,” says Anneke, “and have plenty of work and life experience in other parts of the world as well. This job as part of the Our Future Masterton project is special to me: it is a chance to help the community realise creative ideas with business, property owners, Iwi and council that explore vision for the future of Masterton.” The Urban Dream Brokerage Masterton is part of a wider Our Future Masterton programme, which is being run by Letting Space in partnership with the Toi Aria Design for Public Good programme at Massey University. It is being funded by the Masterton District Council. Following a series of community workshops in 2016, Our Future Masterton is now getting up and running to help enable a citizen driven 50-year vision for the Masterton town centre. “The nature of our town centre is changing, and this programme recognises that,” says District Council chief executive Pim Borren. “It puts more of the ownership and control of planning for our future in the hands of the full diversity of the people who will inherit it, not just council staff or any particular interest group in Masterton. We very excited to sponsor this project.” Reports from the 2016 workshops are available to view here on the Masterton District Council website, and a Facebook page is a portal for information about the project. Here the public can keep up to date with updates. As part of the programme, an interactive hub space is being created by Toi Aria which will allow the public to continue to make contributions, showcase the community’s ideas and visualisations of options for the CBD, including past proposals. The focus is on trialling ideas that lead to a 50 year vision for Masterton that recognises that real substantive changes happen in towns when the community feels enabled to realise their ideas and lead over time. When people are empowered in a community where they can make a difference, a partnership and trust can happen with their local government.

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