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From the ChairOn 26 November 2019 CAWRI hosted its first symposium “Creativity and Wellbeing: Mapping the Territory”, which brought together academics and community stakeholders from various backgrounds to consider the relationship between creativity and wellbeing. We thank all who attended, and we are very grateful to the four keynote speakers (Professors John Sutton, Carol Brown, Charles Green, Tim Lomas) for their fascinating presentations, each of which highlighted a different perspective on the main theme. The ensuing discussion groups also fostered more in-depth consideration of emergent themes, including creativity and the body and the theory of distributed creativity. CAWRI is planning more events of this kind for 2020—so watch this space! Professor Jane Davidson Image credit: TerriAnneAllen BUSHFIRE SEASON 2020Creativity and bushfire recovery: explore resourcesThe devastation of the recent and ongoing Australian bushfires has both immediate and long-lasting implications. Safety and security in any disaster situation must take precedence over all else, and the University has provided a list of resources for those immediately affected by the bushfires on the Staff Hub. But losses experienced – family and friends, personal belongings, homes and townships, wildlife – can be traumatic in an enduring way and can require complex and creative responses. Such traumatic events can prompt us to question the status quo, to reconsider our relationships with one another and our sense of community, to reimagine our relationships with our surroundings and the environment, and to rethink the very stories we use to organise and make sense of our lives. Our website, offers a list of creative resources which are regularly updated. RESEARCH AND PUBLISHING OPPORTUNITIESRound 2 seed funding now openApplications close 1 March 2020. Our seed funding scheme is now open for grants up to $13,000 to support inter-Faculty research projects that explore the relationship between creativity and wellbeing. Projects addressing any aspect of creativity and wellbeing will be considered, although those focusing on the relationship between adversity, creativity and wellbeing are especially encouraged. PROJECT SPOTLIGHT Feral pedagogies: Exploring how queer performance builds queer community, resilience and wellbeing The CAWRI-funded project “Feral pedagogies” explores how creativity in arts festivals and venues functions as an element in the ecology of queer sociality, and as a key contributor to the wellbeing of gender- and sexually-diverse lives. Last month, the Feral Queer Camp event, a key component of this project, was held as a part of the Midsumma Festival and it sold out. At the camp, the cohort considered: how we learn (from each other) about what makes performance queer; how we talk about queer performance; how we make performance; how we might queer reviewing and funding; and, above all, how we might develop a network of queer thinkers who can talk amongst ourselves and to others about queer performance. JulieMc McNamara (a participant and workshop leader) said: “As a disabled artist and activist who has a disrupted relationship with higher education, this was a thrilling experience. I learnt so much about current thinking around queer performance and the complexity of queer ideas in approaching new work. I learnt more these last three weeks than I’ve learnt in the last five years.” The project leader, Alyson Campbell, also reflected on the event, saying: “the Feral Queer Camp created an intergenerational queer space, where we were learning together about (our own) queer identity and its relationship to arts and our sense of ourselves. One camper particularly cherished the absence of a demand for ‘outcomes’ as genuinely radical and liberating.” |