CivicLAB Symposium proceedings

Civic LAB is a collaborative research Civic Lab is an interdisciplinary research group centred on participatory culture, creative dialogue and experiential design for social impact. How do we build communities (Manzini, 2019) and how can we create the conditions in which those communities can sustainably develop, innovate and thrive within the social, economic, environmental and cultural challenges of the 21st century? Researchers and practitioners in the Lab amalgamate a diverse span of creative practices and perspectives across the arts and social sciences to contribute to this burgeoning field of enquiry; interrogating, extending and redefining the value of creative practice to the public sphere. As a research forum for partnership and transfer of knowledge and best practices, the lab offers thoughtful and provocative readings of this sphere, through practical and theoretical acts of research and dissemination.
The LAB promotes and supports a wide range of multidisciplinary creative research activities working with external cultural partners, public, commercial and third sector organisations, educational institutions and international networks. Through public engagement, participation and collaboration we aim to develop, deploy, evaluate and publish projects, works and methodologies which engender sustainable social, environmental and cultural impact. This research group is aligned to The Digital and Material Artistic Research Centre (DMARC) at the University of Derby, which addresses the shifting boundaries within the terrain of creative and artistic research. The work of the lab articulates a public pedagogy which effaces the boundaries between research, teaching, and the University’s civic agenda to create a positive impact in a range of contexts including, but not limited to:
• socially engaged artistic research practice
• health and wellbeing
• social justice, mobility and inequality
• participatory placemaking/place-reshaping
• play, pedagogy and educational development
• cultural heritage and belonging
This is the first Civic LAB Symposium Civic LAB is a research group that sits within DMARC – the Digital Material Artists Research Centre based in the College of Arts, Humanities and Education. As a LAB we very much support and encourage a cross university way of working both internally and externally with stakeholder and the public. We want to use this symposium as a platform for profiling the brilliant research that is being undertaken by colleagues here at Derby but also those from other H.E institutions, such as University of Nottingham, Swansea University, University of Helskini, University of Manchester, University for the Creative Arts. We also have colleagues joining us from Derby County Community Trust, Derby Cathedral and Derby Theatre. We are joined by The Council for Higher Education in Art & Design (CHEAD), East Street Arts, Cumulus the only Global association to serve art and design education and research, The Mighty Creatives and European Cultural Academy, Venice. This fantastic group of organisations and individuals will enrich our thinking and sharing of methods of best practice and research and regroup our thinking in what we mean by Civic Life, and its impact on and relationship to each of us as academics, as citizens and industry professionals.

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