François Matarasso

Questions I can’t answer

It’s messy, difficult, compromised—but at its best community art can be joyously emancipatory. It shows us that we will only find pathways to a better place if we work together. We need each other. And we need to keep asking questions we can’t answer.

The Ethics of Change

By what right does an artist set out to produce even the conditions of change in others? And what responsibilities does she have towards those who may be put in the path of change, without being fully aware of that possibility or its effects?

I remember workshops

For several weeks, I’ve been facilitating creative writing workshops in Leicester. The project, commissioned by Writing East Midlands with the local NHS Trust, is for elders, here meaning people aged over 55, a category that includes me. We don’t have very long—five ‘taster sessions’ with community groups, and ten two-hour workshops. At the beginning of…

Chór POLIN

The POLIN Choir is an ambitious and sustained initiative to develop the relationship between a new museum and the community in which it stands.

The gift of close reading

This week I received the gift of close reading in two reviews, both by people who have worked in this field for decades. As you’d expect, they brought immense knowledge and experience to the task. More importantly, they read with creative engagement, testing my thinking, not to prove it right or wrong, but to understand…

Other people’s books

Now that I don’t have to write, I’m rediscovering the pleasure of reading, especially around the subject that has occupied me for so long—the place of art and culture in social life. It’s the wider context that is often most rewarding because it gives a context to the professional preoccupations of those of us engaged…