Friday 02.02.24. 2.30pm–4.30pm. Free. Book here

We invite artists and audiences to join in a roundtable discussion where we will consider together the importance of solidarity and what it means to be in solidarity today, particularly as artists.

This roundtable has been organised in response to the current war in Palestine and also the ongoing war in Ukraine, in acknowledgement of the global social and political context in which our festival takes place.

We invite artists and audiences to join in a roundtable discussion where we will consider together the importance of solidarity and what it means to be in solidarity today, particularly as artists and creative organisations. Whether that’s through extending international solidarity, through how or why we make art, or through how we show solidarity to each other more locally as we work together as a community of artists across Scotland, dismantling systems of competitive individualism as we do so.

Through a series of provocations from invited artists, we will also consider what effective solidarity through the arts and across movements has meant in the past, learning from those who have come before, and asking ourselves about our roles now and going forward in how we make art and how we exist as artists, citizens, neighbours and friends.

Solidarity is important to the artforms and values that Manipulate Arts supports in a multitude of ways. It is a concept which means not only empathy, but cause for mutual support in the places where we meet. Like the performing arts, solidarity is a practice of individual and collective expression, healing and joy. Both practices require the acknowledgement that we live as interconnected peoples and as interconnected with the planet as we re-consider our relationships to land and the more than human world.

Curated by Emily Nicholl, Diane Thornton and Natasha Thembiso Ruwona.