This is a worrying time for everyone. Not only are we all facing uncertainty in terms of the health of ourselves and our loved ones, we are increasing dealing with precarity in terms of employment, housing, and long-term individual and social wellbeing. There is lots to be learned from this period (as well as lots to be angry about), and here at A Moment’s Peace we remain engaged in advocating for social, economic and racial justice at this scary time.
If we’re honest A Moment’s Peace itself is very unsure of how to negotiate this unknown trajectory and we are facing quite difficult questions about the organisation’s survival. But for now, we are still here and for the last few weeks Sara and I have been trying to figure out the best way for A Moment’s Peace to continue doing our work.
Our priority has been to ensure we remain connected with those involved in our two ongoing core groups – the Women’s Creative Company and the Shared Space. As well as trying to reach out to Social Bite’s women’s group. We are of course unable to meet any of them at the moment, and many of our community collaborators are simultaneously very isolated, very bored, very busy and very stressed. We’ve been in touch directly with as many people as possible to ensure they are accessing support services if they need them, and just to say hi. But we are now keen to continue providing folk with gentle creative opportunities/outlets during this time.
And so, this week we launched At A Distance Together. This project will involve us disseminating fortnightly creative tasks for our participants (not the wider public) – to undertake at home, out on their daily walk or whilst negotiating caring responsibilities. Some of these will come from me, and others from artists we work or engage with regularly. These tasks will be sent out via whats app / text / email / facebook private group and if necessary, post.
The tasks are intended to be gentle, reflective and enjoyable, and require minimal materials (other than found materials) so as to ensure as many folk are able to take place as possible. Some of the tasks may respond directly to what is happening in our lives at the moment, some may be more an exploration of imaginative spaces. They are entirely optional to undertake, and they can be shared with us or just kept as personal interventions. Where people do ‘complete their task’ and share it with us, we will create an archive of responses – and share some of these through our social media channels. But the focus really is on people’s personal creative process and interacting with other group members digitally if they choose to.
We will be complementing these fortnightly tasks with monthly online sessions, that focus on giving people a chance to share some of what they have created. These will be exclusively for group members, and as much as possible we will be providing participants with data/phone vouchers to ensure they can take part.
We anticipate this project going on for the next six months at least. While we may not be in lockdown for this whole time, it’s unlikely we’ll be in a position to gather groups of people for the foreseeable. If this changes then we’ll adapt the project plan at that time. But for now, our focus is to stay as creative and as connected as we can.
If you’re interested in finding out more about the project please contact sara@amomentspece.co.uk
We are sending everyone our love and solidarity, and look forward to updating you on the project as it develops.