We had high expectations for our International Summit for Learning Disability Artists and their Support Studios, and we weren’t disappointed!
For three days, our Trongate 103 studios were transformed into a fantastic platform where artists with learning disabilities from all around the world shared their practice, talked about the future, made work and met new friends! We couldn’t have hoped for a better mix of people and culture, we all shared a sense of community, with art at its centre. It was wonderful to see artists who had never left their country before come halfway around the world to showcase their work and participate in this unique event.
Our aim was for the Summit to be a relaxed and fun event, about and for the artists, with ideas being shared, work being made and with the possibility for everybody involved to discuss with each other and learn from each other. We will take a bit of time to analyse in depth the feedback and summarise these amazing three days, but in the mean time we wanted to say a big and heartfelt thank you to everybody who made this event possible! Thanks to all the artists who made the trip to Glasgow, and to all the supported studios staff, it was a pleasure to have you share your experience with us: Arts Project Australia, Action Space, Kaarisilta, Celf O Gwmpas, In-Definite Arts, Nina Haggerty Center, KCAT, Inuti, Venture Arts, Atelier 5. Thank you to Tanya Raabe-Webber for being part of the event through her evolving portrait gallery, capturing moments and expressions from the participants.
Thanks also to our absolutely amazing volunteers, who manned the café area (Morag, Stuart and Peter) and the gallery (Mary-Anne), as well as our brilliant documentation team, who spent three days filming, photographing and uploading live-updates on our social network platforms: Phoebe, Jen, Jemima, Katie and Simon.
At last, thanks to the Project Ability staff and to our funders Creative Scotland, the Paul Hamlyn Foundation and the Esme Fairbairn Foundation for making this event a reality.
“It was good to do it in a working place, and not a conference venue”
“The language of Art is international and universal”
“Amazing chance to talk and help plan our development plan over the next 3 years. Thank you PA team”
“The emphasis was on the artists”
The Summit is now over, but the exhibition ‘It is now’ will continue until Saturday 4th April. Make sure you come see it!