Repair Acts, Bristol

Dillon, Teresa

Abstract

This workshop brought together practitioners from a variety of fields to discuss critical forms of repair. Part of an interlinked series of workshops titled CECE – Critical, Essential, Craft and Economic our guest speakers included the artist Linda Brothwell, whose practice draws on the intersections between repair, care and craft within urban settings. To support our collaborative thinking, workshop participants also brought an object with them, which illustrated a repair or story around repair. In terms of our critical inter-thinking our mapping activities focused on sharing theoretical frames, applied and artistic practices. Workshop guests included the photographer, co-founder and Director of Toxic Links, New Delhi Ravi Agarwal and the artist Ben Gaulon.

Focusing on objects, the material and the built environment central to the discussion was the importance of the local in relation to repair, referring to daily care and attention that is required for more sustainable and just material relations to exist. We concluded that within the discussions that the care for the system relations, meaning the relations between things, people and the environment was central. With the systematic breakdown of such relations, leading to material breakdowns. Questions of scale and limitations were also touched upon. Concern for the overuse of the term repair particular when applied to people or communities (i.e., the notion that people or communities are broken and/or need fixing) was flagged with the group acknowledging this use not only as problematic but also as detrimental.

The day closed with a visit to the see the work of the artist Kathy Hinde at We the Curious and followed by a public discussion hosted by Urban Knights at which Ravi, Ben and Dr. Lara Houston spoke about their work.

Agenda
11.00 : Registration, tea and feral coffee provided and introduced by Kate Rich
11.15 : Welcome, Teresa Dillon and Caitlin DeSilvey
11.30 : Repair Practices, Linda Brothwell
12.00 : Points of View/Repair Objects
12.30 : Mapping Activity 1: What does repair mean to you?
13.30 : Lunch
14.00 : Mapping Activity 2: Theoretical frameworks
14.30: Mapping Activity 3: Applied and artistic practice
15.30 : Discussion led by Teresa Dillon and Caitlin DeSilvey
16.00 : Summary
16.15 : Gather and walk to We the Curious
16.30 : Tipping Point, presentation by Kathy Hinde at We the Curious

Workshop participants: Ben Gaulon, Caitlin DeSilvey, Carmela Pietrangelo, Chloe Meineck, Christoph Woiwode, Elena Blanco, Jess Young, Kate Rich, Kathy Hinde, Lara Houston, Linda Brothwell, Penny Evans, Sophie Zajicek, Steve Bond, Teresa Dillon and Zoe Bank Gross.

Citation

Dillon, T. (2018, March). Repair Acts, Bristol. Presented at Repair Acts, Bristol

• Presentation Conference Type: Other
• Conference Name: Repair Acts
• Conference Location: Bristol
• Start Date: Mar 13, 2018
• End Date: Mar 13, 2018
• Deposit Date: Mar 10, 2020
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/5636106
• Publisher URL: http://repairacts.net/programme/workshop/