Creative Careers Week 2021
Check out the highlights from our October 2021 Creative Careers Week - a week of events, workshops, and talks for 15-24s exploring futures in the creative sector.
Day 1 kicked off with ‘What are Creative Careers?’ workshop led by Curator: Youth Programmes Amelia Oakley, exploring the scope of creative roles - what we already know and what we want to know.
Next up we had a ‘Speed Meeting’ session with Whitechapel Gallery staff, where the group could chat to staff and find out more about their roles - guests included Director of Education and Public Programmes Richard, Development Events Manager Alice, Assistant Curator Ines, Head of HR & Inclusion Smitha, and more.
Day 2 started with a talk from Whitechapel Gallery Director Iwona Blazwick about her career path and what is involved in the day to day running of a gallery.
In the afternoon, Assistant Curator, Wells led an Introduction to Curation workshop which explored the various elements of the curatorial process. We visited the Theaster Gates: A Clay Sermon exhibition together, thinking in groups about the process of interpretation, installation and curation. To round off the day we spent time imagining and planning a brand new exhibition - thinking about who it’d be for, what it would involve, and why it’d be a relevant show now.
Day 3 began with a session led by Curator: Community Programmes Siobhan, looking at what working in community programming involves. Together we focused in on a new community art project focused on Angel Alley, a street which neighbours the gallery - developing and presenting our own responses to the project brief, considering at all times the impact and legacy of the project on the local community.
The next session of the day involved working with Gemma, a freelance arts facilitator who specialises in supporting creatives in their career development. Through activities and writing exercises we worked on drawing out our own story as creatives, and thinking about how we can translate our skills and interests into CVs and application processes.
The penultimate day of Creative Careers Week started with a session exploring working in Communications, led by Curator: Youth Programmes Amelia. We spent time thinking about the different avenues in 'Communications' before spending time in the Simone Fattal: Finding A Way exhibition experimenting with creating social media content for the @duchampandsons instagram.
Hudda Khaireh, member of Feminist artist collective, Thick/er Black Lines as well as an associate of Numbi Arts and OOMK Zine and a founding member of the Somali Museum, led the afternoon session which explored finding your way as an independent artist. Through sharing and free writing exercises, we thought about ways in which you can look after yourself and nourish yourself creatively as an artist.
The final day of the Creative Careers Week was led by bare minimum collective – an interdisciplinary, anti-work group of artists. We focused on methods of working collectively, and imagining what our own creative futures and the creative futures of art spaces could look like. Together we visited the Theaster Gates: A Clay Sermon exhibition, and then spent time in small groups imagining and planning a re-curated version of the show.
During the afternoon we focused in on artist manifestos - what they are and why we make them. We worked on creating our own manifestos outlining our practice, our values, and our promises to ourselves.
You can find out more upcoming Youth events and Creative Careers workhops here www.whitechapelgallery.org/learn/youth/
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