A panel discussion of the ins and outs of advocating for our access needs as professional artists: with panellists to be announced. Suggested donation of £4, but no one turned away for lack of funds!

This public event follows an R&D period in which the co-op has sought out best practices for how institutions make space for access needs, with the aim to provide tools for cultural workers to engage with access needs and disability advocacy.

So far, their research output consists of this panel discussion in which people are sharing their first hand-experiences of access and advocating for their access needs within the arts, and will be followed by a workshop space in which not/nowhere workers are going to draft their own access rider documents. An access rider document is a document that tells an organisation what we need, what to expect from us and how we think we might make our working together a more sustainable experience.

This research and these events are supported by UCL East and Open City Documentary Festival. Internally, all three organisations are trying to embed a culture of care and think about access needs for ourselves as a coop and a festival and to think about what is in our capacity to offer to others, and how to embed a culture of disability justice into our working framework. What adjustments do we need to provide for ourselves, alongside how we can facilitate this for guests of our programmes. This has grown from the very instinctual establishment of a provision of financial resources for any needs that workers had during the initial heights of emergency in the pandemic. Now we are trying to embed culture and practice around that, understanding how to take better care of ourselves and our audiences.

Tickets available here.

About not/nowhere

not/nowhere is an artist workers’ cooperative that programmes workshops, screenings, exhibitions and other events.

“Our mission is to ensure that local artists who use new media in their work can access film and media equipment, and acquire the training to use these machines creatively. We are committed to Black and POC artists exploring new possibilities for owning the means of production of our work and finding sustainability in our practice.”

not/nowhere’s additional focus is to provide infrastructural support for artists working in all mediums, and enfranchise people living or working in London to take pleasure in expressing themselves creatively.