Since my first encounter with community art I’ve known what I wanted to do with my life and why. How has been more problematic. The world has changed so much since then, and me with it. Ideas and ways of working that made sense under Margaret Thatcher or Tony Blair are now outdated like shoulder pads and pagers.
Each decade or so, I’ve been confronted by the need to rethink my work from the ground up, and that led me into new fields, such as research and policy. The last time it happened, I found a way forward in Regular Marvels. I started blogging, which I saw as ‘thinking in public’ and so demystifying knowledge creation. Today, a new period of transition is leading me towards a personal and, I hope, radical rethinking in A Selfless Art, and I’m asking myself what tools I might use to support this new process.
The blogs seem to have served their purpose. Regular Marvels and Parliament of Dreams have gone quiet and will be taken down once I have archived the material they contain. (Two project blogs, eight years old now, will also go dark). That will leave this blog, and I’m not sure what to do with it. I have begun writing, not very well yet, about A Selfless Art here, but the difference between that book and its predecessor make them uncomfortable companions.
I’m wondering about moving to a new place—Substack—with a focus on writing that suits what I’m trying to with the new book. But I don’t know whether, this time, it’s wise simultaneously to write and to write about the writing, as I did with Regular Marvels and A Restless Art. Nor do I know whether anyone is interested in reading something more inward-facing and philosophical than the material I’ve shared here.
Those doubts have echoes in the podcast I’ve been doing with Arlene Goldbard since 2021. I’ve never felt audio was a good medium for me but our conversations with people working in community art and cultural democracy are fascinating, and I love working with Arlene. We’ve just agreed to try something new, inviting people to send us questions or topics that might be explored in future conversations, but I’m unsure how much to take my thinking about A Selfless Art into that space.
So, if you’ve read this far, I’d be grateful for any ideas, responses or suggestions as I decide how to go forward. In particular, I’m wondering:
- Is it worth writing about A Selfless Art as it develops, or shall I just wait until it’s done? (If it’s done.)
- Would it be better to move it to another home, and leave this site to focus on art projects, history and other concrete ideas?
- What is the place of the podcast in all of this, if any?
- Is it time finally to give up on Twitter, as it plummets from bad to worse?
- If so, is there another way—Instagram?—to nourish and be part of a wider conversation?
Do use the comments space or email me directly if you’ve any thoughts about this. Either way, I expect the doubts and questions will resolve themselves as I go on.
PS – My commitment to access won’t change: if I do start using Substack, my work will remain freely available.
François Matarasso 