Work(shopping) Together

Now that this year is nearly over, (thank god) looking back it has been a year full of changes for the way I work as an artist. The pandemic is, of course, the main culprit,  but not the only event that made me rethink how I continued to work and how I wanted to continue working.

Last year while working at a 3rd sector conference organised by One Newham I became aware of local arts organisation Rosetta Arts, which was exciting as I was relatively new to the area and did not know that there was an organisation supporting Newham artists practically on my doorstep. 

At the time I was interested in being more involved in community-focused events and projects so it felt fortuitous when in the new year Rosetta invited me to apply for an artist’s accelerator course with a focus on working within communities.

Fast forward to now and not only have I learnt invaluable lessons on improving my professional practice I have also started creating and leading my own creative workshops. In my last blog post I spoke of how corporate clients were pivoting to holding events online - the same was taking place with charity/third sector organisations. With the Lockdown exacerbating inequality, isolation and loneliness it was extremely important to continue to find ways to reach and connect people within the community.

The workshops have ranged from fun illustration exercises for local young people to being invited by the Barbican to run a drawing workshop for their communities in residence programme in partnership with accumulate (a youth homelessness charity)

I have also had the opportunity to be involved in an exciting architectural project that required artists to deliver workshops where the local participant’s ideas and artwork would feed into ideas for the final designs. 

I learned not only how to deliver fun and engaging content via zoom but also how to set up COVID-secure workshops in physical spaces, ensuring that myself and the participants are as safe as possible at all times.

 I also learned how to create and edit pre-recorded workshops that would be sent to participants to watch on their own, This was most useful for situations where the participants wished to do the activities in their own time, such as students quarantining in their halls of residence or elderly participants who used the recorded workshop to familiarise themselves with an activity before a later live session. 

And I love doing them! I love thinking of fun and engaging ways to teach drawing or to encourage creative thinking, I love seeing people genuinely enjoy participating in something that they may have found daunting to begin with, I love the connection and working with the community. 

If you are interested in having a creative workshop designed and delivered by an enthusiastic and professional creative why not drop me a message at ada.jusic@gmail.com .