workshop workshop
For six days at the end of August 2025, a red circle of wooden pallets was home to eighteen workshops created and run by artists, ceramicists, furniture makers, researchers, costume and fashion designers and musicians. All aimed at introducing more critical thought and engagement towards the art industry to the residents of Brackley.
The workshops varied from hand-building native flowers using found clay from a local lake to introductions to critical art theory through drawing sessions with a professional artist. Every day, three practitioners were invited to host a workshop based on their own knowledge and practice. When I commissioned each workshop, I requested both a physical/practical element in tandem with a more theoretical insight into what the attendees were being asked to do, taking inspiration from how Thomas Hirschhorn and STORE STORE run workshops. An example of this would be the ‘Mobile Making’ session, where attendees cut basic shapes and forms from coloured card and then sourced twigs and sticks to use as the horizontal frame. Whilst they were making their mobiles, I introduced them to artists such as Bruno Munari and Alexander Calder to show how physical making can exist in a larger, global framework of art and design history