MEAUSURING THE EXPERIENCE – 10
Does a studio group or any other artist-led resource provide anything more than affordable space or access to equipment?
As my Survey of group studio provision [1]indicated, nearly half of studio groups are involved in some kind of group activity, although it follows necessarily that the other half aren’t. Providing ‘affordable space’ was an oft cited aim, and in many instances, groups only undertook one collectively-organised activity annually – an open studio event or group exhibition in another venue.
In short, many group studios are simply a collection of individual spaces used by different artists at different times of the day or night rather than any kind of catalyst for visual arts development. Not withstanding this, they do provide a valuable arts equivalent to ‘starter-units’ for other kinds of business.
Communities of artists (whether in group studios or not) have sometimes played in leading role in community action. For example, the London Field Renewal Partnership’s campaign against a council plan to develop the area, and the E11 campaign, where artists and others in a community worked collectively to stop the building of a motorway.
[1] Produced in May 1995 as part of Stage 1 of this study
