The diverse community

I have worked as an educator and arts worker for many years with the belief that art has the power to effect positive personal and cultural change. I am inspired by community and the wonderfully diverse people and groups that populate it. Working in community arts has meant I have met people I never would have otherwise including people with disabilities, migrants, teenagers, elderly and children.

 I especially love working with young children and am constantly inspired by their imaginations and play activities. I am fascinated by how children fully commit to their own make believe play with an intuitive understanding that they are suspending reality. As a writer this makes me realise that when I’m writing fantasy fiction about parallel universes and dragons, my inner child is being indulged and given permission to come out and play in my own arts practice.

 Ever since I was very young I really wanted to change the world and was deeply affected by social injustice. Even as a child I remember my mother telling me to not carry the weight of the world on my shoulders. But I couldn’t help it. It’s just part of my nature. I suppose when I was younger the weight of the world felt heavier because I never knew how to change the things I saw as not working. I could see what was wrong but didn’t have any answers or solutions. I felt powerless and stuck in a system I felt critical of.

Never did I imagine that one day I would grow to up to become an artist and I certainly had never heard the term creative activist. I didn’t even enjoy art at school and it definitely wasn’t an encouraged career path back in the 70’s and 80’s. I kind of fell into arts when I began volunteering in a Launceston gallery many years ago. After coordinating various exhibitions I got inspired to take my own arts practice seriously and it all evolved from there.

 Now I’m a working artist who has had two solo exhibitions, developed and managed multiple community arts projects and events and I have a large scale sculpture on the grounds of Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery at Inveresk.

 Right now as an educator and arts worker I am taking action to keep community connected and creative through technological innovation. As a an online educator, digital artist and creative director of The Holographic, an award winning video production lab, I am well situated to do this. The Holographic is partnering with Interweave Arts, a not for profit community arts organisation, to deliver a project titled Remade Creatives Online, a media streaming creative club where artists and designers can connect, collect and skills-share from homes, studios, schools and work places. This project feeds into Remade Sustainable Wearable Art Show by Interweave Arts which promotes environmental sustainability by challenging artists, schools and community groups to design large scale wearable artworks made from recycled materials. Right now the project is in the grant writing phase and scheduled to start later in 2020.

Karen Revie

March 2020