KArtsCon2023: An Overview
The 2023 conference was hosted by Music & Audio Technology, School of Arts, University of Kent at the Historic Dockyard in Chatham, Kent with the theme of “He(Art): Emotions and Creativity“
We partnered with Medway Council, the University of Kent’s Department of Music and Audio Technology (School of Arts) and Halpern Charitable Foundation to make KArtsCon2023 happen.
Day 1 kicked off with a welcome by all the principals from the organising bodies. First speaker, Bryan Hawkins, presented a compelling tale of ‘ghosts’ and forgotten narratives and bringing their stories to life. Dr Matina Chronopoulou looked at the art of using flowers for healing, emotionally and physically. Dr Julian Ng stepped in to do a quick presentation on music and how it influences emotions.
An arts and health roundtable by the University of Kent was chaired by Dr Dieter Declercq with presentations from Stella Bolaki about artists’ books; Dr Ruth Herbert about health musicking; Caroline Eastwood about film sound and empathy, and Allyson Trostle-Bath about the representation of female mental illness in fiction.
Over at the Galvanising Workshop, Ting Xu ran a session on how we can learn from break-up films while Tetiana Marinicheva got everyone’s hands creative and dirty with a fluid-painting workshop.
Valeriya Korchagina brought a bit of Hollywood to Chatham with her masterclass on special effects and how they are used to wring emotion out of audiences. Svetlana Higgins espouses the benefits of playing the piano, while Liz Atkin conducted a workshop on slow-looking and drawing.
Jasmine Ng won plaudits for her heartfelt plea to help children with special needs, while Nina Atkinson and the Loop Dance Company presented an energetic workshop cum performance.
Mona Campbell made the final presentation of Day 1 with an interesting talk and showcased some of her beautiful artwork. The children’s art competitions were on hand to receive their prizes as well. Congratulations to them all!
Day 2 started with a bang as Dr Urs Hauenstein talked about the most important competency of all: creativity. Dr Harris Khan demonstrated how fibre art such as macramé and knitting can be good for mental health. Meanwhile Maxine Chester was running a collage-making workshop at the Galv.
Bev Heyward read out a found poem that she created based on the messy journeys of creative women, while Lisa Lobanova made us gasp with the synergy of conventional and mobile photography when coupled with AI.
Chloe Cooper and Jackie Walduck form Vibin’ and Marblin’, which demonstrated how to create art with sound and emotion, while Dr Ayodele Adewunmi presented the significance of photography in Nigeria through Zoom.
Dr Pamela Hatton related stories of emotion and art, while Dr Sumita Chauhan explained the importance of her project of using art to help people with dementia. Tetiana Marinicheva ramped up the AI narrative with a workshop on creating art using just that.
Nadia Perrotta and Dill Tasker gave high-energy performances combining music with comic books. Dr Peter Gregory challenged us to think of how we are shaping the narrative for youngsters through school curriculum by determining what is ‘good’ art or artists.
To round up day 2, Stephen Turner talked about nature as an infinite source of emotional and artistic associations, while Dr Eleni Karasavvidou spoke about using art against the exclusion of certain groups, for example victims of domestic abuse. A soap-making workshop by Lin Mei-Ling from Taiwan gave participants their own pieces of soap to take home. Meanwhile, Jay Patel and Emma Sutton showed how reflecting on other people’s work can help to inspire one’s own creativity.
Day 3 was filled with invaluable roundtables focusing on creative heritage, creative and mental health, the impact of the performing arts on wellbeing and the ability to measure this. A whole host of arts professionals and creatives made this day an engaging and thought-provoking one. There was even the opportunity to meet with funding organisations.
A special demo session showcasing virtual and augmented technologies was held at AΦE Labs. Thank you to everyone who made this conference so special. We look forward to seeing everyone again next year.
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