Dr. Dave O’Brien

Thinking about Some Cities

‘ultimately at times you delude yourself about working collaboratively, you’re the one selecting which images they take or whatever, put into a sequence and you’re still the main photographer and taking the credit for that….’

What is Some Cities?

Website Archive Talks/events Training courses Commissions Project leader’s practice ‘the unforeseeable and imagined activities’

What is Some Cities? Role of the University

As researcher As funder

Role of the Council Funder Contact and support

Role of ACE Similar to BCC, but more distant relationship

Role of local media Crucial to publicising the project

Role of local arts organisations

The evaluation

Influence of wider Connected Communities programme…

….along with critiques of evaluation methods for community and participatory projects…

…and use of innovative methods e.g. walking and visual methods in the overall project

The process

Stage one: recruitment and introduction to evaluation (N= 10, final N=5)

Stage two: gathering data and work with Some Cities

Stage three: follow up interviews (N=5) Stage four: Cultural Intermediation commissions

What we hoped for

Collect people’s stories about Some Cities Based on questions you’re interested in DO play around with the recorder DO think of your own questions DO email and talk to us and each other DON’T do lots of work! You’ve been kind enough

to volunteer as part of Some Cities

Some suggested questions

Can you tell me about the project you’re involved in?

How did you get involved in the project? What sorts of activities have you been doing? What has happened to you as part of the project?

Initial comments: a successful project!

‘I find it really enjoyable, the whole journey, the lectures that we had were quite cool as I learnt some new stuff, even though I did an A-Level in photography’.

‘its been really fun’ ‘im really happy with everything that its taught

me so far, I’m over the moon with the media response, the way people across Birmingham have taken to the project have got behind it and understood it.’

Social impact All participants stressed social aspects of the courses ‘its been great to meet everybody….its the social aspect of it…

it seems a shame as we’ve just come to the end and you’re comfortable now and you want to carry on’

‘it created a bit of a bond with me and one of the other students who was going through the same process, so afterwards we went for a drink to celebrate….there’s a lot to it’

‘the sharing, the understanding of the basics, the being confident, that all came with the course and I tried to apply that, that came through the sharing, it came through the listening and learning, and I tried to apply that to my own project….and I still do’

The idea of confidence Common to arts projects and reflected in Some Cities ‘I’ve learned to trust my camera more, I've given it a

name…and I feel more confident going out, composing shots and understanding the basics of digital photography’.

‘if it wasn’t for my camera, and getting to know the community and getting involved in the community here as a committee member I probably would have had another celebration where id stayed in my flat and kept away from it all. Its sort of given me confidence getting involved in the community and getting my camera to get out and about’

Technical expertise

‘I tried to haggle, a flea market in Paris….and it sounded alright but when I asked him how much he wanted, he wanted 80 euros, and I just said to him no and I don’t think he realised that I knew what I was trying to look for’

‘it’s a humbling experience and quite an eye opener, because of, really made me realise there's a lot of technical ability , probably sounds a bit arrogant, but I thought photography was quite easy!’

Birmingham

‘I found some cities was all of a sudden lots of people being interested in Birmingham and I wanted to be part of it’

‘I’m proud of what they (some cities) are doing. They are making Birmingham start to stand out, we need that, We get a lot of stuck us brummies do, especially for our accent’

‘the project has civic pride running through its blood’ ‘so many things I’ve missed in the city I’ve lived in all

my life and even now keep noticing new things, thinking oh god I’ve never seen that before’

Balsall Heath

Secondary site as compared to ‘Birmingham’ But all of the participants experienced a

relationship to it ‘I used to think it was a bit of a dump….it was

only until I got out of my car and started going there that I thought what a fascinating place, place where we’re doing the course, that building’

Impact of the archive and website

Identity work

Participants’ assignments were all personal One based on journey to work One based on walking and making connections by

talking ‘showing how everyone's united in the

community…I thought that was quite important to show how different cultures and diversities of people are all coming together’.

What is evaluation: A personal narrative

Diary keeping Self interviews Importance of identity work and social isolation ‘it created a bit of a bond with me and one of the

other students who was going through the same process, so afterwards we went for a drink to celebrate….there’s a lot to it’

Gender important here too (esp. introspection and its relationship to taste and cultural activity)

What is evaluation: A research project

Evaluation asked research questions… …of both self, other participants and the project

managers ‘are you saying that there’s some trust that’s

been built up with the some cities project…some trust and actually you are inspiring people in the way that you wanted to inspire them?’

What is evaluation: A record

Evaluation recorded the practice of developing film

Place crucial as the project was the darkroom Stress on project as the process of attendence

and learning ‘that’s the only problem with learning is the cost,

especially when there’s waste’ ‘I think we need to put the kettle back on really’

Everyday participation

Everyday cultural practices key to understanding social world

Sociological aspects to the narratives: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and Age all important

Photography as both an elite, a ‘middlebrow’ and a democratic medium

Forms of cultural competence in the interviews and recordings- all very different for each participant

Some Cities and Cultural Intermediation For Bourdieu Cultural Intermediaries were about

connecting and transmitting ‘legitimate’ forms of culture In Some Cities we find a different role Challenge to aesthetic hierarchy….but a controlled one Intermediation focused on connecting idea of Birmingham

to the cultural practices of the city Aesthetics Archives Personal narratives Civic pride

Limitations and next steps

Cultural Intermediation commissions in Salford and Birmingham

‘you’ve not to tell people what to take, but to give them some direction’

Importance of age and technology Power and the limits of participation Expertise and validation Evaluation vs. recording and the need for

numbers

Academic Partnerships: what are the benefits? What are the risks? How do they emerge and develop and how can they be sustained?

Evaluation: are there circumstances where we would never evaluate practice? Is it possible to balance the needs of funders and practice within existing approaches to evaluation? What does this tell us about the appropriateness of different measures to capture the value of the work undertaken?