ZU-UK to Host Artistic Leadership Talk Series

Part of the MA Contemporary Performance Practices programme but open to the wider public, ZU-UK are hosting a series of four free talks exploring the role of artists today. Topics the talks will cover include how to lead from outside the mainstream, how leadership can be representative of diverse opinions, and how to make art with those of differing opinions. The series will be chaired by ZU-UK directors, and will feature four speakers from different arts practices, who will use case studies from their own diverse practices to explore artist-led initiatives and models within and beyond the arts.

Speakers at the event will be:

2nd March: Clare Qualmann is British multi-media performance artist and lecturer. She is a founding member of the international Walking Artists Network, and co-curator of Walking Women, a series of walks, talks and screenings bringing together fifty female artists. Her work centres around participatory methods to explore the routines and narratives of everyday life.

9th March: James Leadbitter from vacuum cleaner, an art an activism collective of one. Working across art-forms: including performance, installation and film, the artist addresses challenging and taboo issues such as consumerism and mental health. From one-man shows to large-scale participatory actions, his approach is both subtle and extreme, but always candid, provocative and playful. His work includes The Madlove project, a user-friendly psychiatric hospital.

16th March: Anat Ben-David, a video and performance artist, and a pioneer of the video-performance genre in Israel. Her work combines video editing and digital imaging as well as her skills as actor, singer and director of stage and video art. Anat has been a collaborator of Chicks On Speed since 2003.
23rd March: Deborah Pearson, co-founder of Forest Fringe. Deborah has won awards for both her solo practice and her work with Forest Fringe, including three herald angels, a Scotsman Fringe First, a Peter Brooke Empty Space Award and the Total Theatre Award for Significant Contribution.

ZU-UK's Masters Programme is run with University of East London. It's a contemporary focused programme that responds to the creative industry demands of today by developing artists with an interest in cultural leadership who will graduate as multi-skilled creative producers and practitioners. The programme is shaped around individual student interest, and offers a practice-based approach that works across disciplines from drama, music and dance, to applied/community based practices, interactive technology and game-design.

Formerly known as Zecora Ura and Para Active, ZU-UK is an established award winning independent theatre and digital arts company based in East London and Rio de Janeiro since 2001. Driven by an artistic partnership between Jorge Lopes Ramos and Persis Jade Maravala, ZU-UK aim to make transformational and unforgettable immersive art for the curious. As a British company that has successfully maintained a satellite base in Brazil for over a decade, ZU-UK has a strong track record of collaborating across cultures and artistic disciplines, delivering ambitious innovation with depth and integrity. Their previous events include 'What Makes the Perfect LAB?', sharing their first prototype version of a wearable tech and game design, and 'Dramaturgy of Participation', discussing best practice for immersive events. In 2015 the company also opened GAS Station in Stratford, a new space dedicated to projects, ideas and conversations that live somewhere in the intersection between Games, Live Performance and Technology.

Jorge Lopes Ramos said, "The Artistic Leadership Talk Series continues our commitment, which started with the opening of GAS Station, to address emergent topics head on and offer emerging artists support to develop their own models within and beyond the Arts Industries."

@iamzuuk | www.zu-uk.com | www.gas-station.uk

Listings information

GAS Station, Gainsborough Learning Centre, 1 Hamilton Road, London E15 3AE

2nd - 23rd March, Thursday 5.30pm - 8.30pm

FREE | zu-uk.com

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/artistic-leadership-talk-series-clare-qualmann-tickets-32259135944

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