Bev Hayward is a practising artist, poet and educator. She is an advocate for supporting working class, women returnees with learning differences and disabilities to education. Actively seeking to promote the advantages of being a lifelong learner, she is keen to show that opportunities are possible for all minority groups. Being seen as an artist and educator is paramount for those that are underrepresented and one such way is to exhibit and publish to ensure voices are heard. She teaches on the master’s programme, Education, Social Justice and Change at Birkbeck College. She is a member of the Feminist Imaginary Research Network and this engagement is the inspiration for the current body of work.
Emotions, Collage and Creativity
Co-presenting with Maxine Chester
Visual presentations and storytelling, collage workshop
The contribution consisting of three parts will explore emotions and creativity by referencing materiality and using visual collage techniques.
Part one delivered by Maxine Chester is a short visual presentation positioning collage within an historical and contemporary context. The concept of materiality -vibrant matter – will be drawn upon for its focus on the agency of materials, the tactile and its ability to articulate emotional experience.
Part two delivered by Beverley Hayward brings together materiality and storytelling. The narrative weaves fact and fiction in the telling of a local event – the closure of the University for the Creative Arts (UCA). This will serve as starting point for part three; a hands on, collaborative workshop where participants are invited to express their emotional responses to the closure of UCA and to the impact this is could have on the community. Participants will be invited to use a range of materials, including fabric, yarn, printed materials and drawing materials, in the making of co-created visual collages. The collage making will also provide the opportunity for participants to put into practice some of the ideas and principles relating to materiality and collage covered in part one. The aim is to represent emotional responses to this local event and its broader socio-educational ramifications by engaging with the creative process.
It is estimated that the whole session would take 80 minutes .
Part one – Visual presentation – 20 mins.
Part two – Storytelling – 20 mins.
Part three – collage workshop – 40 mins.
Art Exhibits
As a member of a research group that promotes the global art-craft of women, engaging in creative activities, Bev co-created a found poem from the data gathered from the 2022 conference. The asymmetrical, messy outcomes represent the messy journeys of wandering women, as they find their way to creative imaginaries.
Title of work: Wandering Women: A Journey as Feminist Imaginaries
Artwork Size 265mm x 245mm;
External Size 427mm x 407mm
Medium: Found poem machine and hand embroidered on calico
A co-designed, found poem, created from research gathered at the Feminist Imaginary Research Network conference 2022.
Title: Seeing Feminist Imaginaries Dimensions
Artwork Size: a bit bigger than A3
Medium: Found poem machine stitched on calico
A co-designed, found poem, created from research gathered at the Feminist Imaginary Research Network event at Birkbeck College October 2022