presentation SIMM @ Reseo conference: getting closer: authentic collaboration through opera, music and dance

The 2019 RESEO Conference invites SIMM founding director Lukas Pairon and Imogen Flower (PhD-researcher within the SIMM-PhD-programme at Guildhall School in London) at the Brussels National Opera (la Monnaie / de Munt).

Challenges of Change: issues in collaborative artistic work within marginalised communities

 

Dr Lukas Pairon, director of SIMM (www.simm-platform.eu)

Imogen Flower, Guildhall-SIMM PhD candidate

 

The arts are increasingly being wielded as vehicles for social change, offering valuable platforms to otherwise silenced voices. More projects are emerging with the aim of enacting transformation, by including diverse, marginalised and vulnerable groups in the creation and performance of work. In this keynote, the speakers will explore some of the challenges to which these collaborations might give rise, asking questions of intention, control, and sustainability.

 

Lukas will briefly present the Brussels-based international scholarly association SIMM (Social Impact of Music Making), which he founded. SIMM works with scholars, practitioners, funders and governmental representatives to investigate the role of music making in social and community work with disadvantaged people. In 2018, SIMM established a PhD programme with the Guildhall School of Music, in London.

 

Lukas has recently completed PhD research in Kinshasa, DR Congo, with so-called ‘witch’-children and with former members of violent gangs. He will present the main findings and recommendations for practice that came out of his study. Imogen’s research focuses on Sex Worker’s Opera, a musical theatre project developed by and for sex workers who advocate for the decriminalisation of sex work. She will use the Opera as a case study, giving insight into a grassroots model of collaborative artistic practice and elucidating some of the relatable challenges faced by artists in these settings.