GRAIN Projects delivering Socially Engaged Photography (2015 - 2020)
By
Nicola Shipley | GRAIN Projects
Logo design for GRAIN Projects
GRAIN Projects has a bold vision to work collaboratively with communities, individuals and artists utilising photography to create positive change and ensuring that people from every walk of life can express themselves and create through photography.
We deliver high quality projects and activities with partners that are socially engaged, collaborative and that support artists and develop opportunities for participants and audiences. GRAIN Projects is a Community Interest Company (CIC) based in the Midlands. Our projects remove barriers between artists and audiences and enable people to develop personal creativity and reach their creative potential. We work with the best artists and photographers to engage with communities across the Midlands, to make work of the highest quality and ambition and to exhibit, publish and disseminate this work with regional, national and international partners.
The communities we work with are diverse and often underrepresented. We work with communities and individuals to express their own identity, to re-imagine and to develop new opportunities. Photography is the most democratic and accessible of artforms. Photography is also uniquely placed to allow us to reflect on and comment on society, to better understand our own lives and other peoples. GRAIN Projects is dedicated to supporting artists and photographers providing a range of high-quality professional development opportunities, support and activities to realize artist’s ideas and to develop new and ambitious opportunities in photography.
Our work includes collaborations with established, renowned and critically acclaimed photographers and with emerging photographers, graduates and students. We are guided by our core values: The arts have the capacity to change and enrich everyone’s life and how we see and act in the world. As a leader in photography, a regional network and hub, and as part of the national network for photography we also seek to improve the skills, opportunities and conditions for practitioners and to facilitate new ambitious opportunities for them.
We commission and produce photography projects, activities and programmes that utilise art photography across a diversity of locations and communities. Our programme includes temporary cross artform projects of scale and ambition which involve a broad range of non-arts partners and participants; exhibitions, publications and events that make a unique contribution to a sense of place and community and curated programmes which bring together collaborative partners under an innovative artistic vision. Each of these projects and activities feeds into and brings about public benefit, as per our governance as a Community Interest Company (CIC). Our programme also incorporates an Artist Professional Development Programme which includes bursaries, residencies, internships, masterclasses, surgeries, meet-ups and portfolio days. We work across the region to deliver these activities to emerging artists and with project partners nationally and internationally proving practitioners with steps to grow and expand their careers. Our programme is underpinned by our Audience and Community Engagement Strategy and our Photography & Public Art Strategy. We are passionate about photography as the most democratic and inclusive of artforms, socially engaged practice, community representation and creativity for everyone.
Our organisational model is based upon the combination of a programme model (dedicated to the curation, realisation and communication of an artistic programme) and a development model (focused on providing a network and hub for practitioners, professional development support and opportunities, knowledge sharing and skills development. We aspire to be a world-class cultural producer and development agency who uses our knowledge and skills to create exceptional opportunities for all our communities, artists and audiences. At GRAIN we are uniquely placed to drive change, are fleet of foot, experienced in commissioning and practice and based in the community and arts sector.
Our projects demonstrate the capacity for photography in the public realm to engage deeply and broadly. Our partnership and stakeholder relationships are strong and distinct especially our long-term relationship with our partners and funders Arts Council England and Birmingham City University. We also hold and foster partnerships in the community and ensure that collaborations are bespoke and relevant to our ongoing work.
“‘There is an overwhelming feeling of value and benefit from artists and stakeholders about GRAIN’ Lara Ratnaraja, Consultant, Helga Henry, Consultant ‘Open, accessible exhibitions of high quality with work that speaks to places, people and cultures’ Mark Evans, Associate Dean, Coventry University ‘GRAIN deliver professional practice which is vital for the development of the regional photography community’ Michael Sargeant, MAGNUM Photos ‘GRAIN is very efficient and effective in what they do and the photography sector in the Midlands would suffer massively if this asset was lost ‘ Karl Greenwood, Creative People & Places ‘Experts in their field. I can think of no other organisation like this. They are confident, exciting and interesting’ Toby Watley, Head of Exhibitions & Collections, Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery ‘I think GRAIN engenders a sense of community regionally and nationally and offers great and much needed networks and professional development support. It also ensures there are high quality photography projects and commissions in the region and as such it is a flagship for photographers. It is amazing how much they punch above their weight!’ ”
More information: www.grainphotographyhub.co.uk
