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Arlene Goldbard | Sophie Hope | Owen Kelly | François Matarasso
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once a week audio essays, conversations and discussions about cultural democracy, community-based art, and the commons.

  1. Position, influence & income

    2D AGO

    Position, influence & income

    Sophie Hope and Owen Kelly talk to Su Jones about the reactions she has received to her paper Artists' lives: ecologies for resilience, and what she hopes happens next.   Meanwhile in an Abandoned Warehouse | Episode 82 January 2nd | 2026   PARTICIPANTS Sophie Hope | Su Jones | Owen Kelly COMMENTARY Last summer Su Jones finished writing Artists' lives: ecologies for resilience, a report formed around case studies of 14 visual artists from three English regions. She had been working on it for the last two years. In this episode Sophie Hope and Owen Kelly talk to Su Jones about the reactions she has received, and her feelings about them. She discusses the position of an independent researcher and the influence she has, or doesn’t have. She talks about the precarious position that visual artists occupy in a country in which increasing numbers of people occupy precarious positions. Should artists receive a basic incomes, as they have in Irish experiments, or does that simply amount to special pleading? Would a better proposal involve everyone receiving a universal basic income which artists can use to enable them to practice as artists, golfers can use to practice golf, and chess players can use to practice chess? REFERENCES Su Jones: Artists’ Lives: ecologies for resistance, an overview Su Jones’ writings at Arts Professional Su Jones’ article at Arts Professional (paywall) Su Jones’ article at Arts Monthly (paywall) Ireland: basic income for artists

    24 min
  2. Redemption

    12/19/2025

    Redemption

    Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso talk about redemption: : the understanding that we can learn from experience and choose to realign some aspect of our lives to our deepest values. How much do people believe positive change is possible? How much are people’s ideas of possibility constrained by a certainty that our pasts over-determine our future?   DECEMBER 9 | SERIES 2025 STREAM A CULTURE OF POSSIBILITY | EPISODE 59   PARTICIPANTS Arlene Goldbard | François Matarasso COMMENTARY On episode 59 of A Culture of Possibility, co-hosts Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso talk about redemption: the understanding that we can learn from experience and choose to realign some aspect of our lives to our deepest values. We were moved to explore this by the prevalence of “cancel culture” in the US and to an extent, the UK.  Once a phenomenon of the left, now strongly influential on the right, people are singled out and vilified for things they said or did decades earlier, or they become targets of persistent, angry campaigns aimed at shaming or ostracizing them for using objectionable language or disagreeing with those in power.  Core to community-based arts is the idea that when people speak for themselves, representing their truths, they may influence others to listen deeply and reach a more loving or just understanding.  These days, how much do people believe positive change is possible? How much are people’s ideas of possibility constrained by certainty that our pasts over-determine our futures?  We support freedom of expression and believe in redemption. Can people like us influence cultures that don’t?  REFERENCES Shadow World: anatomy of a cancellation

    55 min
  3. The Intercessor

    12/05/2025

    The Intercessor

    When Arlene Goldbard is not being a cultural activist or a consultant, she paints. When she is not painting she writes. She writes essays and novels. Her latest novel The Intercessor has just come out. Owen Kelly talks to Arlene about how this specific burst of writing began, how the novel grew from the initial writing, and what she hopes the published book might achieve.   DECEMBER 5 | SERIES 2025 STREAM Meanwhile in an Abandoned Warehouse | EPISODE 81   PARTICIPANTS Arlene Goldbard | Owen Kelly COMMENTARY This month Owen Kelly discusses Arlene Goldbard’s new book, a novel titled The Intercessor, and asks why she chose to write this unusual kind of novel at this particular time. The novel offers a linked series of short stories, each foregrounding one character from a group whose stories eventually interlock. All of the characters have political, social or spiritual issues which come to seem less like categories than like different coloured lenses through which we can approach the world. The novel explores the Jewish Renewal movement, among other themes, without wanting its audience limited to Jews or even less to Jews with an interest in the Jewish Renewal movement. Arlene explains how this specific writing began, how the novel grew from the initial writing, and what she hopes the published book might achieve.  REFERENCES Arlene on Wikipedia  Arlene’s website  Arlene Goldbard: Clarity (2004)  Arlene Goldbard: The Wave (2013) Arlene Goldbard: The Intercessor (2025) Jewish Renewal, described on Wikipedia  Adin Steinsaltz: The Thirteen Petalled Rose

    49 min
  4. Fall of Freedom

    11/21/2025

    Fall of Freedom

    Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso interview Laura Raicovich about Fall of Freedom, which begins on the day this podcast drops.   NOVEMBER 21 | SERIES 2025 STREAM A CULTURE OF POSSIBILITY | EPISODE 58   PARTICIPANTS Arlene Goldbard | François Matarasso | Laura Raicovich COMMENTARY On episode 58 of A Culture of Possibility, Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso talk with writer and curator Laura Raicovich, one of the initiators of Fall of Freedom, an action beginning 21 November in the US, described as “an urgent call to the arts community to unite in defiance of authoritarian forces sweeping the nation,” “activating a nationwide wave of creative resistance.”  Artists and organizations are invited to participate by hosting public events of any size. We’ll talk about the organizers’ hopes and their sense of why and how art can resist authoritarianism. Since this podcast goes out on November 21, it could not be timelier. Listen to the podcast, go to miaaw.net to get the links, and then look and see what is going on where you are!  REFERENCES Fall of Freedom website Download the Fall of Freedom Toolkit

    54 min
  5. Cultural Coherence

    11/07/2025

    Cultural Coherence

    This month Owen Kelly looks at some of the deeper meanings of Katie Lam’s recent remarks on cultural coherence.   NOVEMBER 7 | SERIES 2025 STREAM Meanwhile in an Abandoned Warehouse | EPISODE 80   PARTICIPANT Owen Kelly COMMENTARY In this episode Owen Kelly looks into the idea of cultural coherence, something that bubbled to the surface after Katie Lam, a member of parliament for the Conservative Party used it in an interview with the Sunday Times. She appeared to use it one way, and then later claimed she meant it in a rather different way. What do people mean by cultural coherence? Should we regard the idea as dog-whistle politics, or should we see it as a useful idea we need to claim for ourselves, before it gets claimed by those who would whistle to dogs… REFERENCES Sam Leith: In Defence of the Rules-based Order, in The Spectator  Tali Fraser: The Tories and the search for cultural coherence on ConservativeHome The Sustainability Directory

    25 min
  6. Halloween at Faircamp

    10/31/2025

    Halloween at Faircamp

    In this episode we explore Faircamp again, trying to find something to celebrate halloween. Then we take a peep at what we can find at Tribe of Noise.    OCTOBER 31 | SERIES 2025 STREAM Friday Number Five | EPISODE 19   HOST Owen Kelly COMMENTARY Today (or tonight, depending on where you are) we have the final Friday Number Five of 2025. At the end of January we started another irregular series of Radio Miaaw: podcasts of music issued under Creative Commons licences; a theme we last explored four years ago.   This month have another dive into the contents you can find while exploring the Faircamp web ring. This covers a wide range of music so if one piece doesn’t grab you then rest assured: something different will be along in a minute or so. Since today is Halloween we also try to find some suitable music, fail, and see what we can find at Tribe of Noise instead.  REFERENCES The Faircamp website The Faircamp webring FAQ Johann Bourquenez: Diminished Epicness & more Blix Byrd, including Skinning a Tiger Voodoo Economics, the EP Nightmother: The Beach Boys In My Room A Companion of Owls: Sketches for Aural Ataraxia Ruby Louise Rose: projects, downloads, works in progress Helen Bell at Faircamp Helen Bell at Bandcamp Helen Bell: Molecule Olive: Halloween Party v2.0 at Tribe of Noise Rob Dell Music: I do believe in Christmas at Tribe of Noise

    39 min
  7. Water Talks

    10/17/2025

    Water Talks

    Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso interview Betsy Damon whose work with water has had a healing impact across the globe. She talks about her work from early projects in China to her current undertakings.   OCTOBER 17 | SERIES 2025 STREAM A CULTURE OF POSSIBILITY | EPISODE 57 PARTICIPANTS   Betsy Damon | Arlene Goldbard | François Matarasso COMMENTARY Betsy Damon is an internationally-recognized artist whose public work and living systems, such as the Living Water Garden, have received widespread acclaim.  In 1991 Damon founded Keepers of the Waters,[23] a nonprofit organization that serves as an international community to encourage "art, science and community projects for the understanding and remediation of living water systems." The nonprofit is run with a collaborative approach and was started with the support of the Hubert Humphrey Institute. In 2006, Damon, alongside a group of artists, scientists, and funders, met in Vancouver and created a summary report for UNESCO titled Art in Ecology – A Think Tank on Arts and Sustainability. UNESCO had commissioned a report in advance of this meeting titled Mapping the Terrain of Contemporary EcoART Practice, of which the meeting and summary report were a result. She is the author of Water Talks: Empowering Communities to Know, Restore, and Preserve their Waters. On episode 57 of A Culture of Possibility, Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso interview Betsy Damon.  Her work with water has had a healing impact across the globe and in this fascinating episode, she talks about her early projects in China and the work she’s undertaking now.  She also shares excellent advice for others who want to help.   REFERENCES   Betsy Damon’s website Betsy Damon’s CV Betsy Damon in Wikipedia

    47 min
  8. Artists’ lives: ecologies for resilience

    10/03/2025

    Artists’ lives: ecologies for resilience

    Susan Jones works as an independent arts researcher and writer who holds specialist knowledge and insight about the social and political environment for artists and contemporary visual arts. She has just completed her independent qualitative and longitudinal study Artists' lives: ecologies for resilience, formed around case studies of 14 visual artists from three English regions. She has been working on it for the last two years. She argues that successive policies since have marginalised artists’ position in the infrastructures and ‘ecology’ of the arts. Arts policy’s ‘market economy’ approach has the effect of undermining its stated aspirations to demonstrate equity and inclusion across the arts. Owen Kelly reviews a pre-publication version of the report, and comments on it. He notes that, rather than “the usual suspects”, the report has been sup­port­ed by Axisweb, CAMP: con­tem­po­rary art mem­ber­ship plat­form, and Cre­ative Land Trust.

    19 min
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About

once a week audio essays, conversations and discussions about cultural democracy, community-based art, and the commons.

Information

  • Creator
    Arlene Goldbard | Sophie Hope | Owen Kelly | François Matarasso
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    100
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Licensed as Creative Commons 4.0 CC BY-NC-SA
  • Show Website
    miaaw.net