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Another year collides

20 Dec 2010
Philip Patston started this year’s The Creative Collide with a new format and focus, wanting to e

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Philip Patston

Philip Patston started this year’s The Creative Collide with a new format and focus, wanting to engage you in a dialogue about how the creative sector could help solve social problems.

In his final post for 2010 he reflects on his conversations with you — about crime, androgyny, rugby and changing gear.

 

 
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Starting the year on a light note, in Criminals...or just kids? I discussed my concerns about children who end up as criminals, when really they are children from troubled backgrounds. I said, “I think it is wrong to put children in jail, no matter the crime. I think we need another system that reparents and ‘reloves’ troubled children who have committed crimes.” My next post, Creatives before criminals, asked how we could help young offenders become creatives before they become 'criminals', improving on prison art programmes, which help turn 'criminals' into creatives. I imagined a future where young people who break the law get taken as far away from prison as possible.
 
Though you didn’t say much to begin with (perhaps you were a bit put off by the dodgy vlogs), you got all fired up over A Typewritten blog, where I reflected on the state of education and the place of creativity. I quoted famous guys like Sir Ken Robinson, Edward de Bono, and our very own Gordon McLaughlin.  Andrew said, “Schools are slow to catch up with current thinking and teaching on arts and creativity,” and Richard thought, “we need to re-look, re-invent, re-open the issue to new minds, new thinking, removing academia from the equation. Academia and politicians are a major part of the problem, period.” Indeed.
 
Inspired and guided by your words I designed A Creative Learning Vision — an educational future that brims with creativity. It was a future where "Diversity in Learning" was the motto of a new Creative Learning Movement.  Everyone, regardless of their capacity to function, was involved and valued for their unique contribution to the learning experience.”
 
In my own unique way I lurched from education to gender fluidity, androgyny and intersexuality and, in Mr, Ms...or both?, asked, “Can we get through this next phase of diversity with a bit less head-banging, resistance and angst than we have in the past?” Judging by your silence you either weren’t sure or you were slightly alarmed by my own androgynous image.
 
Undeterred, I continued my inquiry, asking how the creative community could be continually delighted by humanity's diversity, in Gender, creativity and conjoined twins. I confessed, “I get disappointed when artists and performers exhibit prejudice towards diversity, such as gender fluidity, because I expect them to be able to think more creatively about the world than ordinary folk.” I mused that, perhaps, when it comes to diversity, all people really need to know is how to work out what changed since yesterday. I took your silence as tacit agreement.
 
In A little about a lot I worked hard to explain what I do in a way that makes sense to people who may know 'an awful lot about awfully little'. I outlined my plans to attend a social change conference in New York, “Performing the World”. Sadly I was unable to realise my goal to meet up with “a few people who mix the harsh world of reality with the amazing realm of possibility.”
 
The ballet of rugby  defied probability and introduced the 82-year-old tradition of the Selwyn Ballet who boast rugby players as members. “If only there were some way of these boys holding onto this unique sense of themselves,” I mused, “and imbibing the rest of society with a looser interpretation of what's ok and what's not.”
 
Then in The movement for inclusion  I discussed  the art of creating an inclusive practice and a welcoming environment for all people, including those who experience disability or unique function. Following that I shared my own experience of employing people to support me, in Better work stories. “You would think it would be the easiest role to recruit for – [and] in some ways it is. But it's also the most difficult because, let's face it, helping someone put their socks on sometime between 8:07 and 8:23 every morning isn't quite better work stories, whichever way you look at it.”
 
When I suggested peer support as an alternative to young people learning from their elders as mentors, in The new mentor is a peer, you joined in the conversation anew. Ande was clear that “we stand on the shoulders of giants in every technological, scientific, moral achievement known to humankind. We need to know where we've come from in order to progress.” And elders, Renee reminded us, “have energy, talent and curiosity long into their creative lives, and are no doubt invigorated by their interaction with newer artists.”
 
My curiosity was stirred when applying for arts council funding and I compared the decision making process of funders and business investors and asked some candid questions of decision-makers, in Funders anonymous. That sparked Andrew to share that he “can't be bothered going through the hoops and just look[s] for sponsorship and the usual do-it-on-a-shoestring approach.” He concluded, cynically perhaps,  that funding is “a crap-shoot, a lottery, but that's what we've got in the absence of a rich patron a la the Medicis of Florence.”
 
As the year began to draw to it’s fourth quarter, I asked How does diversity really work? and called for a more in-depth dialogue about diversity and offers a creative opportunity for artists to participate. This announced Diversityworks Trust call for expressions of interest from artists for an exhibition at ARTstation, in 2011, centred around the theme “How Diversity Works.” EOIs are welcome until 1 February 2011. Visit the Diversityworks Trust website to apply.
 
I returned to the arts funding theme and reflected that I had “been going like the clappers for the last week, trying to complete an application to Creative New Zealand.” But it wasn’t just me who thought we need to respond to more and more opportunity by Changing gear, rather than continually accelerating. “I totally agree with the need for us all to pace down and increase the resolution,” said Ben. “That's when we do what we do best.”
 
Finally I reflected on the movie The Black Balloon as an example of The denial-of-diversity drama, fueled by fear, denial and a failure to accept reality.

And that, my friends, is the wandering dialogue of the Creative Collide for its second year. Thank you for engaging. I hope you have a relaxing, inspiring holiday break and I look forward to returning, in an as yet undecided form, in the New Year.

"We do not stop playing because we grow old. We grow old because we stop playing." — Unknown

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