François Matarasso

Signal Fires

In another time, I was asked by Fuel Theatre to write the introduction for a book called Signal Fires, collecting texts and images from a brave attempt to strike sparks of community in the depth of the pandemic. The original Signal Fires were lit in October and November 2020, from the Highlands to Cornwall, from…

Life interrupted

Some personal news on my other site:

Innocence and experience: John Fox’s songs

Regular readers (thank you for your interest) will know my admiration and affection for John Fox, Sue Gill and the extended family of Welfare State International. Their work caught my imagination 40 years ago, and remains a source of inspiration, perhaps because of its differences with my own. If you haven’t come across them, you…

Blinkered by my privilege

For decades, longer even, cultural policy in Europe has been imagined as a conflict between two ideas. The first is that everyone should have access to the greatest achievements of art and culture. The second agrees, but says that everyone should also be able to contribute to culture’s creation and evolution. In the language of…

Some thoughts on podcasting

In January, I began an experiment in podcasting, following an invitation from Owen Kelly and Sophie Hope, who host an excellent and varied podcast under the banner Meanwhile In An Abandoned Warehouse (no, I don’t know either, but it’s a nicely evocative name). They’d interviewed Arlene Goldbard, an American artist-activist and good friend of mine in a…

Safari park lions

BBC Radio has just broadcast a programme entitled ‘Everyone is an Artist’. It’s part of Archive on 4, a series that uses the BBC’s unparalleled historic recordings to reflect on the past and how we see it today. This episode, presented by Cambridge University art historian James Fox and inspired by a Turner Prize shortlist…