Collected ideas on Collaboration

Through five artists meetings and through eight interviews to date, there is some cohesion of thought as to what collaboration means and what makes for most successful or positive collaboration. This is a summary of the findings so far:

• Artists have collectively agreed that the process involves communicating and being clear in your communication; explaining what you do and being assertive in your working methods.
• The process itself is referred to as a 50/50 exchange, as reciprocal sharing between the artist and the child. This sharing refers to ideas, skills, creativity, workload. The artist can have a technical or a physical input into the creative process or both.
• It is expressed as a fusion of ideas and then again as a method of art-making in itself.
• Ethically, the process involves valuing the input of every individual involved, along with willingness and respect and open-ness.
• Practically, it needs time; for meetings, planning, dialogue, notes, diaries, to make decisions, to reach deadlines.
• Those involved in the process need to be realistic, to have clearly defined aims and objectives, to recognise the different roles and strengths of the collective. These elements can be, or should be, put in place at the designing, planning and creating stages of an artist’s engagement on a project.

Image of artists in discussion at a recent Practice.ie Professional Development Day