Finding creative community, outside of art school

Bring back the crit

“Did we ever really need it? Can’t we leave all that stressful stuff behind?” we hear you ask. Often when we think about crits or peer reviews we think about them in a serious, academic context in which we present our work to a tutor and some fellow classmates, sweating, as we try to explain something we aren’t actually quite sure we understand yet, which is now free game for everyone to poke holes in. In reality, having other creatives involved in our work, and being there to question it, is one of the most integral parts of developing as a creative. This is something that of course we lose (maybe with a bit of relief) when we leave traditional educational environments, but we don’t have to! And the crits themselves don’t always have to be done in one way.

Having a group of people invested in the development of your work is the very thing that situates you within a community of practice. There are plenty of crit clubs or creative peer review groups to take your work to and get some useful ideas or problem-solving perspectives on what you’re making — even if it’s a new self-initiated project you’ve just started on the side for fun. 3D Women, a platform for women and non-binary artists run by Winnie Hall and Celeste McEvoy, hosts a monthly support group called How’s the art going?, at SET Social in Peckham, London. Meeting to “share advice, give each other feedback, sometimes just to moan but also have a laugh!” Winnie says, “we wanted an empathetic space where we could meet with other artists facing the same challenges and empower each other”. Artist Hannah Billet, a 3D Women crit goer shares: “I come to the support groups to keep my creative brain ticking. I like to hear from other people and put my thoughts/ideas outward and get feedback even if I can’t make artwork full time.”

Another space to find community in the form of peer review might be Blk-Anti-Crit: “an experimental crit space for self taught Black artists – demystifying the art world, one crit at a time”. Initiated by Maryam Ojikutu, off the back of their crit experiences during their BA, the crit group aims to create a safe space for those “who might feel alienated by formal art education, who are in search of an alternative space or community” both online and in-person. Maryam says: “Creating this space is vital; art schools should not be the only space for artistic reflection and self-development, especially with all the inherent issues with art schools for minority students and the systematic negation of minority people applying [...] BAC is a place to discuss art with other Black people, which is rare in formal settings.”

Whilst building smaller and more intentional communities of practice and support, these crit groups often welcome a broad range of practitioners from 3D designers, to filmmakers and illustrators etc. alike — making them a great way to meet different types of creatives and get to see work that you might not have been exposed to on educational courses that probably only centre one discipline. Maybe it’s time to seek out some multidisciplinary perspectives you didn’t know you needed or even create a small crit group amongst friends of your own.

A few more crit clubs and peer review groups we’ve heard about:

• Peer sessions is a London-based nomadic crit group run by Kate Pickering and Charlotte Warne since 2009, when the duo graduated from Goldsmiths MFA. They run inclusive peer review sessions using a silent crit model for artists to discuss their work at postgraduate level.
• Crit Club is a creative support group for artists to share and receive feedback on their work initiated by Henny Shaw. A project born out of art school shutdowns in the pandemic lockdowns, the group’s crits take place mostly online (with events in person in London), welcoming those from a range of disciplines and different levels of experience.
• Qrit Club is a queer crit club facilitating conversations for the LGBTQIA+ creative community in Northern Ireland, gathering to review literary and artistic work or production.
• Art’s Admin offer free one to one support sessions for UK-based artists at any stage of their career. The informal sessions are held online or in person at Toynbee Studios, in Whitechapel London.
• Art Hub has been running monthly artist peer review groups for creatives exploring health and wellbeing in their practice at the Southbank Centre in London since 2015. These sessions are open to all and facilitate artists gaining feedback and support on their projects.

Staying a student

You may have decided you do want to continue in education, that a learning community is the best kind of creative community to have around you in order to support your practice. With the rising costs of tuition fees for both BA and MA courses, and the general inaccessibility of ‘formal’ further education in the arts, this isn’t an option that is available to many. There are, however, a number of alternative arts education projects and collectives that are committed to free creative education and self-initiated learning in multi-disciplinary communities.

TOMA (The Other MA) is a free artist-run educational programme based in Southend-on-Sea. Supporting artists “who have faced barriers accessing arts education and the art world” the programme is a direct response to the slow dismantling of arts education in the UK. The experiment in creative education is intent on supporting artists to “see themselves outside of the art school” and prepare for practice in “the vastly changed art world landscape” – something that communities within formal education models might often fall short on.

If not an MA course, or something of the sort, there are also a number of arts groups and organisations that offer short courses, studio spaces or residencies where you can access resources and creative crowds that make you feel part of something again. Conditions is a low-cost studio programme in Croydon, London led by Matthew Noel-Tod that aims to provide an alternative route to the ever increasing costs of work spaces and education for creatives. With the loss of a space to maintain our practice outside of art school structures, we lose the small, spontaneous exchanges and collaborations that come from proximity. “We started Conditions as a studio programme, because we felt that having a physical space was important to gradually having a sense of belonging [...] the conversations, friendships, collaborations and knowledge sharing that can happen in a shared space are invaluable,” says the collective. Initiatives like this might be a way to get some of the magic back that happens in shared spaces.

Whether it is returning to learning together for learning’s sake, or having a new place to make things with others, alternative educational opportunities show us that whatever it is we end up doing, on our squiggly paths into industry, there are always quite a few different ways to stay a student.

A few more alternative arts education courses, learning communities, studio spaces and residencies we’ve heard about:

• School of the Damned is a free alternative arts education programme, often referred to as an ‘alternative Fine Art MA’. Collaborating with different spaces around the UK, the school is peer-led with no set space, structure or tutors – each year is different to the last.
• Out of the Blue Print is a Risograph studio in Edinburgh “supporting young artists in Scotland through the power of print”. Offering residencies, workshops, exhibitions and events, the organisation supports artists from a range of backgrounds with affordable means for production.
• MYOM is an alternative postgraduate learning programme, initiated by Stacie Woolsey in 2018 from briefs, mentorship and spaces she received from industry, when reaching out to creative professionals making her own master’s course. Now hosting a yearly cohort at Makerversity in London, the programme provides learners with a framework, methodology and community to learn within.
• Black Blossoms is an arts organisation that runs an online art school as well as a curatorial platform “exploring the multifaceted world of contemporary art”. Offering a range of short courses and workshops led by artists and curators, the organisation aims to provide creatives at all levels of artist ability “a deeper understanding of the cultural contexts that inform contemporary art”.
• Open School East is a free independent art school and community space in Margate that focuses on collective learning through the arts. OSE offers a range of programmes that focus on supporting cultural practitioners at an early stage of their career.

These are just a few of the many ways that you might be able to build networks of support surrounding your practice as you make moves into the industry. We often forget how much we feed off the creative energy of others and it’s really easy to stay focused on doing the work without actually sharing the joys and lessons of it around — or being there to hold others up. But things can feel much easier starting out when you are already situated in a few different creative crowds that can support all the varied things you do. Whether it’s going to crit groups to give and receive feedback, meeting new faces at creative events or even embarking on a new kind of educational course, the people we find along the way are often connections that remain for years to come.