About ART
In 1999, the poet Antjie Krog wrote that attending the public hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa was like being present at the birth of a new language. Globally, we are at such a moment of transition and contention, epitomised by the rise of post-truth politics and populism and its intersection with other crises (Covid-19, climate change, rising inequality and poverty, new and old forms of conflict). We live in a world where expert opinion is derided; truth as a category is questioned; and audiences, including the wider public, feel disconnected from human rights. While established languages of social justice, such as human rights, are under siege, new languages or idioms are struggling to be born. Our contention is that collaborative practices between visual artists and activists can generate experimentation, innovation, disruption and alternative human rights futures.
ART (2022-25) is co-hosted by the Centre for Applied Human Rights (CAHR), University of York, and the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Arts and human rights collaborators include partners with national and international reach - ActionAid International, the Art Gallery of Ontario (Canada), the Commission for the Clarification of the Truth, Coexistence and Non-Repetition (Colombia) – as well as collectives with deep local roots, such as the Casa Tres Patios, Medellín, and Más Arte Más Acción, Bogotá/Chocó (Colombia); and Pica Studios (York/UK). All of the partners share a commitment to art as a medium for active engagement in (re-) telling the story of place and history, and reimagining the future.
Our focus spans local, national and global levels; the past, present and future; and intersections between major contemporary crises. Specifically, ART will address:
1. Covid Legacies
2. Localising Human Rights in York
3. Imaginaries of Social and Environmental Justice
4. Reimagining Turtle Island / Canada
5. Narratives of the Future in Colombia
The research is organised in three stages. A first, scoping stage takes stock of existing bodies of work to identify emerging and innovative languages and idioms, and ongoing challenges. This analysis will inform a second, commissioning stage where new collaborations between artists and activists will be funded, and accompanied by real-time research, to explore a diverse range of potential human rights futures. A third stage focuses on outputs, dissemination, knowledge exchange and impact.
All three stages of the research will benefit from an interdisciplinary approach, drawing on human rights, politics, anthropology, sociology, and art history. Further, a decolonial perspective emphasises context, plural perspectives, and challenging Western binaries. ART will analyse and contribute to new languages or idioms of human rights, anticipating that these will embrace ambiguity, metaphor, irony, disruption, dissonance, plurality and multiple possible readings.
The images on this website showcase some of the artwork commissioned during the projects that feed into ART.
Home: Janín Garcín - Mexico - Arctivism
About ART: La Cachada Teatro - El Salvador - Arctivism
ART Team and Partners: Yuvraj Zahed A. Chowdhury (photographed by Emilie Flower) - Bangladesh - Development Alternatives
Publications, Resources and News: Shohrab Jahan (photographed by Kauser Haider) - Bangladesh - Development Alternatives
Covid Legacies: Jessica Warren - United Kingdom - Arctivism
Imaginaries of Social and Environmental Justice: Helen and Scovia (filmed by Emilie Flower) - Uganda - Development Alternatives
Narratives of the Future in Colombia: Alejandro Castillo - Colombia - Colombia Truth Commission