About Conversations Series 

Conversations Series is a programme of four artistic projects and residencies delivered by Venture Arts aimed at creating new work in a shared exchange of art and ideas. This programme brings together a range of learning disabled and non-learning disabled artists to develop collaborative, reciprocal learning and creative exchanges. Through this we hope to generate open conversations and new dialogues about the role of art in contemporary society.

OutsiderXchanges running in 2015-16, formed Conversations Series I, was the first pioneering project set up in partnership with Castlefield Gallery, Manchester and BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead. Over six months, twelve artists based in Manchester and Newcastle, shared a studio and collaborated as equals to produce experimental new artworks. This project culminated in a series of exhibitions and events, at nationally significant arts venues including BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art and the Whitworth Art Gallery.

Building on the legacy of OutsiderXchanges, this October 2018, Venture Arts launches Conversations Series II, in partnership with Castlefield Gallery and the Whitworth, which will support a collaborative residency bringing together three learning-disabled artists who are part of the Venture Arts supported studios, to work alongside the three visual artists from further afield. The group will develop shared ideas, create new work, and reflect on the labels placed upon us by society using the Whitworth’s extensive outsider art collection, the Musgrave Kinley Collection as a starting point.

Please visit our projects page to find out more about the next phase of this project, Conversations Series II.

Conversations Series is supported through public funding by Arts Council England.