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SO, WHAT HAPPENED?

For all the write-ups and streaming audio files visit the PROGRAMME page. For photos of the madness all day, visit PHOTOS page or visit southeastlondon.org. But for the quick story, read on....

The event kicked off early Saturday morning. Bleary eyed, we put up paintings, set up chairs and fiddled with electronics till, at last we were on the road, about 45 minutes late. The day progressed with many hitches but with the variety of great speakers, massive vegan lunch and small evening do, it all made sense by the end of it.

First up we had Jochen, who gave his take on the Social Economy and introduced the conference and all the speakers. Next came Lisa, from the Lewisham LETS scheme who let us in on how they ran their scheme, how they used art and IT and went on to get feedback from the audience on how to give the scheme a boost. Then Ian Rawes of the Brockley Market Campaign took the stage, and gave one of the best speaks of the day (in my opinion), with his down-to-earth tips for website design, non-"polemical" approach and admirable determination for a good local facility. Onto the unbeatable Chris Cook, the man that is slowly getting his message of Limited Liability Partnerships onto the "alternative" scene. However, with time quickly marching on, Chris was only able to get out an introduction to the problem behind an debt-based economy and how a Limited Liability Partnership works. The impassioned Maria from SELEDA took the stage, running us through the numerous benefits the credit union, food co-op, local allotments, Timebanks and associated local projects have had on New Cross/ Deptford/ Brockley...another local hero. It was definately time for lunch, so we tucked into the mounds of vegan food prepared by Tamrin, David, Storm and Brian (thanks.....). Once the chatter subsided, it was time for Josef from the Open Co-op, who introduced us to the techie dream of a virtual social economy, what it would look like and how it could be used. Patrick of Radical Routes spoke next, showing films made by RR members and showing how RR used Art/ Media/ Design in promoting socially concious co-ops. Mauricio of Creekside Artists spoke even less and showed us film and slide-show about Creekside. Fatigue started to play on the audience and so we hurried the proceedings along by cutting our speeches a little shorter. Heather from the Arthouse went into how the Art House functioned as a co-operative, how they used the workshops, workspaces and gallery for the benefit of the community and how they had saved Lewisham Council loads of money with their voluntary labour. A suprise guest appearance from the Hacklab people: they renovate skipped/ donated computers and install them with free software programmes and platforms for anyone to use....great concept. Jochen again, now to speak about southeastlondon.org, his baby, its interactive features and platform for the local community. Then James was pulled out from behind his media desk and spoke about Sanford Housing Co-op, its Carbon 60 project and why Sanford has been the home to New Cross's greatest bands, websites and artists. And just when everyone thought they could go, on came Storm, to introduce the OLAN Trust. Storm's speeches are great (albeit a little long) and he spoke of the need for collabrative agencies and catalysts to make great ideas happen.....the future looks bright.

Big thank you to the following people:

  • Chris Ryan of Kill Casino (for dropping off the chairs, etc)
  • Tamrin, David, Storm and Brian for cooking a great meal
  • Iain (House 14) for the use of his projector and technical help
  • Ian (House 7) for DJing
  • Mark Pavey (OAP) for pulling out all the stops for the conference
  • Arofish, Agate, Ziev and Magali for the pictures to display at the conference
  • Pepys Co-op for the use of their video camera and paintings for the day
  • All the websites that put up a link for the conference (see Links page)
  • To all the speakers for coming to talk

This event was sponsored by:

Sanford Housing Co-operative &
Olan Trust

...and supported by:

southeastlondon.org

 

Here's what was supposed to happen on the day:

VENUE: Open Arts Platform, Old Seager Distillery, Deptford, London
DATE: Saturday, 29 October 2005
TIMES: 10am till 5pm
ADMISSION: Free

EVENT:
This year's conference will be following a slightly different vein to the usual "Alternative Housing" focus; instead it tries to fuse the aims of independent community/ co-operative groups in South East London that are aiming to realise the "Social Economy" in our area and "media-centric" groups which are trying to realise a means of networking the wide, disparate range of community groups. We shall examine what is happening in South East London, how community groups are using media (or not) to gain presence, how art/ media/ design could aid the social economy, demonstrating how the social economy is beneficial to the world of art/ media/ design, using real projects to demonstrate these points. The aim of the conference is to see how the two areas (Social Economy and Art/ Media/ Design) can aid one another in their aims/ goals and how media is being used in a constructive and positive manner.

The conference will be accompanied by workshops that will give those wishing to start a projects practical advice on how to go about setting up and how to finance themselves.

In addition, we will be filming the speakers to see if we can create a 30 minute short of the whole conference, with sound-bites and a bit of creative editing (thanks to the input from Pepys Co-op). We will also be recording the speakers for distribution from this website. The conference will be decorated with pictures, photos and grafitti by a variety of artists from New Cross/ Deptford, including Agate, Muun, Arofish and Pepys Co-op. Depending on whether there are enough people, we might be experimenting with a new type of "conferencing", whereby people interested in a certain topic gather in a room at an allocated time, introduce themselves and have a self-run meeting, discussing the topic and hopefully coming to some conclusion or a positive outcome. Whoever suggests the topic takes action point minutes and if one feels one is neither contributing nor learning, then one should walk (called the "Two Feet" Rule).

THEME:
The theme reads: "Progressing the Social Economy through Art/ Media/ Design and vice versa..." thus:
"Progressing": progress, taking further, enhancing, developing, evolving
"Social Economy": the economic system made up community/ co-operative/ business groups which embrace both financial and social goals, such as housing co-operatives, workers co-operatives. The social economy is the sector of activity that functions for social purposes. It seeks to achieve all or some of the following criteria: sustainable and self financing; activity of benefit to those who are involved in it; to address the needs of those who are currently disadvantaged; to encourage the ethic of self help; to replace dependency with self reliance; to enhance the social fabric of a community. For the full description visit the Social Economy Info Sheet
"Art/ Media/ Design": "Art" (any medium, galleries, studios), "Media" (radio, TV, music, print, advertising, internet (web and infrastructure)) and "Design" (graphic, interior, advertising, product) are wide, generic terms to incorporate a range of media options and infrastructure which relate to the making the Social Economy visible.
"vice versa": as art/ media/ design can help the social economy, the social economy can certainly help make art accessible to more people through its supportive network and cheaper living, working and running costs.