Good deeds, smallest evils or pacts with the devil?
April 26, 2014
Good deeds… is a series of workshops investigating how ‘cultural’ and ‘creative’ work is tied up in processes of urban regeneration. The next in this series of events, 'Instant ‘Community’ versus Long-term Involvement', takes place on 26th April 2014 and will focus on the significance of time, duration, process and different understandings of ‘community’ for artists’ and architects’ involvement within regeneration agendas.
Regeneration is often understood as nominally for the improvement of people’s lives but often in fact exists as a strategy of capital accumulation, benefitting from the exacerbation of existing and new inequalities and oppressions. Who is involved in leading and shaping regeneration processes, for how long, and with what influence are significant questions.
This session aims to establish what the differences are between superficial consultation, participation, and collaboration and to discuss whether there is a merit in short, symbolic or exemplary projects as instigators for real change. It will also try and investigate whether there is an actual relationship between duration and the types of change occurring and whether time is an important unit of measurement in this context or just conveniently quantifiable within feedback loops of policy development, commissioning and project reporting.
Practitioners from the fields of art and architecture whose involvement with specific regeneration processes ranges from a few months to decades will present their experience of these shorter and longer periods of engagement and discuss whether their activity has changed its purpose or focus because of this length or brevity and how (counter-)strategy responds to changing conditions. Their case studies will be framed by a theoretical discussion of what community is and how it determines itself and its aims.
26th April 2014, 10am- 3pm
The Sir John Cass Faculty of Art, Architecture and Design
Central House, 4th floor
59-63 Whitechapel High Street
London
E1 7PF
For more information and a free ticket click here.
