Blak Outside
Creative Resilience Pt1
Multidisciplinary creative collective Blak Outside will host Creative Resilience Pt 1 through spring and summer 2021, an intergenerational after-school club for Barking and Dagenham-based foster carers and looked after children.
Creative Resilience Pt 1 will meet regularly through a series of sessions at The White House’s Beacon Garden to explore cultural, ancestral and communal knowledge.
Together, the group will examine the changing use of and access to gardens and land through two historic London housing estates, Becontree in Dagenham and Peabody Blackfriars in Southwark. This year both the Becontree estate and Blackfriars estate have significant anniversaries, the former will be 100, the latter 150 years old.
Through a programme of growing, cooking, walks and mapping the group will explore connections to and experiences of being outdoors, developing tools to decolonise knowledge, ancestry, plant history, nature and the built environment, and to celebrate being safely and proudly outside.
Carole Wright is a creative urban activist, community gardener, beekeeper and founding member of Blak Outside, Peabody Blackfriars Community Garden London, 2020 Photo © Anna Deacon
About Blak Outside
Blak Outside is a multidisciplinary creative collective providing culturally diverse and inclusive events. The collective host the Blak Outside Festival, an annual grass roots, intergenerational event supportive of working class social housing residents and the QTIBIPOC (queer, trans, intersex, Black, indigenous, people of colour) community.
Carole Wright, founding member of Blak Outside, is a creative urban activist, community gardener and beekeeper. Wright currently works with Tate Modern, Landscape Institute, Urban Tree Festival (UK) and Peabody Trust. Wright has previously worked with Tate Britain, The Showroom, Whitechapel Art Gallery and St Mungo’s to develop creative community projects, lead workshops and walks. Wright regularly works with primary and secondary school students, housing estate residents and housing managers, church users groups and local councillors. Wright currently manages two community gardens in Southwark, South London.
Recent projects include Blak Outside 2020 Festival (The Garden Museum and Peabody Blackfriars, London, 2020); Walking my Manor (Cordwainers Grow, London, 2020); Walking whilst being Blak Outside (Industria Publication, 2020); IFLA World Congress (Oslo, Norway, 2019), The Big Lunch (Eden Project, 2019); Penfold Medicinal Garden (The Showroom, London, 2018). @blak_outside
Blak Outside: Creative Resilience Pt1 is commissioned by The White House as part of New Town Culture, a programme of artistic and cultural activity taking place in adult and children’s social care and curated by the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham. Creative Resilience Pt 1 forms part of a broader programme that marks the centenary of the Becontree estate in 2021. This commission is funded by the GLA’s Young Londoners Fund, the MOPAC Violence Reduction Unit, Paul Hamlyn Foundation, City Bridge Trust and the National Lottery Heritage Fund.
About New Town Culture
New Town Culture is a programme of artistic and cultural activity taking place in adult and children’s social care across the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham. We work with artists, social care staff and carers to develop creative ways to support systemic change in social care and to unlock the value of art and culture for all communities. New Town Culture celebrates the incredible stories, knowledge and skills of the residents of Barking and Dagenham through workshops, clubs, exhibitions, live performances and training for the staff and users of social care services.
This ambitious project was piloted with the support of a Cultural Impact Award for the London Borough of Culture, a Mayor of London initiative, and is now extending its scope through further funding from the Young Londoners Fund, the GLA and the MOPAC Violence Reduction Unit.