Solitary Encounters

About

OSR Projects are excited to announce a one-day seminar, Solitary Encounters taking place on Friday 13 March. This event will bring artists, curators and cultural producers together in rural Somerset to consider the ideas, politics and experiences of solitude, loneliness and isolation through artistic practice.

As part of the Od Arts Festival 2020 – Alone with Everybody, this seminar is relevant to all creative practitioners with an interest in the opportunities as well as the challenges of being alone in the world. As well as presentations by inspiring speakers this event is a chance to meet future collaborators, share food and explore new perspectives through creative interventions and conversations.

Solitary Encounters features a programme of invited speakers and provocateurs including artists who are exploring different notions of aloneness:

For his latest artwork Seeing I 2020, artist Mark Farid will wear a virtual reality headset, experiencing life through the eyes and ears of one person; hearing only what they hear and seeing only what they see for two weeks.

Ten years ago abstract painter Angela Charles was diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa and following two years of dramatic deterioration her work has evolved into a material-led practice, and she is now coming out as a blind painter.

Based on Burra Isle in the farthest north easterly corner of the United Kingdom Gaada offer meaningful and critical art activities for the diverse communities of Shetland from their visual art workshop in a converted methodist church.

A performance maker and cultural worker based between Brighton and Lisbon, Xavier de Sousa explores personal and political heritage within the context of belonging, nationalism and migration, and he is co-founder of Migrants in Culture.

Solitary Encounters is part of Od Arts Festival 2020 – Alone with Everybody (15-17 May) organised by OSR Projects and supported by Arts Council England.