Know your place

A Midwest events programme in Birmingham:
Wed 7, Thurs 8, Fri 9 March 1830 – 2200: UCE, Margaret Street
Mon 14 & Tues 15 May 1000 – 1700: 22 Green Street

Know Your Place seeks to examine the potential for artist-led policy intervention via a series of events. The events are designed to offer artists & visual arts practitioners and policymakers from the West Midlands and beyond a platform to engage with the fundamental issues facing visual arts policy development today.

With contributions from UK policymakers and European artists who have each contributed directly to cultural policy development in response to their geographical or socio-political ‘situation’.

Know Your Place will:
- demonstrate how the geographic and socio political situational contexts of the contributing artists and policymakers have influenced their strategies for policy development and intervention.
- develop a collective ‘situational analysis’ of Birmingham and the West Midlands to inform future artist-led policy development and intervention in the West Midlands and beyond.

7 March: 1830-2200 
Beatriz Garcia (Impacts 08, Liverpool) www.beatrizgarcia.net
Asier Perez (Funky Projects, Bilbao) www.funkyprojects.com

8 March: 1830-2200      
John Holden (Demos, London) www.demos.co.uk
Nis Romer (Free Soil, Copenhagen) www.free-soil.org

9 March: 1830-2200 
Tot Brill (Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London) www.rbk.gov.uk

Claudia Eipeldauer and Martina Reuter (Wochenklausur, Vienna & Berlin) www.wochenklausur.at
Chaired by Jonathan Vickery (University of Warwick)

14 & 15 May: 1000-1700  
Gerry Hassan (Demos, Glasgow 2020) www.glasgow2020.co.uk
Maria Lind (IASPIS/European Institute for Progressive Cultural Policy, Culture 2015) www.eipcp.net

Led by Chris Seeley (Visiting Fellow of the Centre for Action Research in Professional Practice at the University of Bath). www.bath.ac.uk/carpp

Each event will include: presentations from contributors and workshop activities designed by Chris Seeley in order to develop a collective analysis of the Birmingham (and West Midlands) ‘situation’. We hope that the event will be of interest to artists, visual arts practitioners and policy makers in the West Midlands, UK and elsewhere who will actively participate in the development of a Birmingham (and West Midlands) ‘situational analysis’ via the workshop activities designed by Chris Seeley.  To be used by West Midlands practitioners to develop and intervene in future policy. And to act as a case study for (inter)national initiatives.

HOW TO BOOK YOUR PLACE

Places are limited: booking is essential
Due to the participatory nature of the events, places are limited to 50, making booking essential. Please book ASAP to avoid disappointment, by emailing info@midwest.org.uk giving the information below.

Booking is free but Midwest reserves the right to invoice £25 for non-attendance.

BOOKING INFORMATION: email info@midwest.org.uk
The following information is required to apply for a reservation at
Know Your Place: 7, 8, 9 March and 14, 15 May 2007.
1. Which events you would like to attend.
2. Your name
3. Home address
4. Phone number
5. Email
6. Your occupation (artist, curator, policymaker etc)
7. Organisation you are representing (if appropriate)
8. A statement acknowledging that if you do not cancel your reservation 24 hours in advance you accept that you will be invoiced £25 for non- attendance (at the stated address).
9. A short statement describing why you would like to attend, and what you feel you can contribute to the collective analysis.
10. Thank you!

Priority will be given to representing a range of practitioners in the West Midlands with some places reserved for (inter)national attendance, to ensure multiple perspectives.

All travel and accommodation expenses are the responsibility of the attendee. Light refreshments will be available at each event. More information will be circulated in advance. Thank you.

With thanks to all contributors and the West Midlands based artists who have introduced the policy makers to the West Midlands ‘situation’ (as they see it), in advance of the Know Your Place events.

To read or contribute your thoughts or suggest links or papers relevant to the content of the issues addressed in Know Your Place please visit the Know Your Place noticeboard at www.midwest.org.uk