Afrovibes: Opening Talk: Inclusive arts policy: resonances, regeneration and reach

In this keynote, Heidweiller searches for other ways and begins by drawing on resonances in the book Culture is Bad for You, Inequality in the Cultural and Creative Industries by Brook, O'Brien and Taylor. The book demonstrates how cultural employment remains the preserve of the most privileged, a "creative class" in society. Pursuing the notion that this legacy has made little room for any  golden age for social mobility in culture, the book shows how and why women, people of color, and those of working-class origins are missing from key parts of the workforce and audience for culture.

With this in mind Heidweiller proposes a regenerative vison that embraces another Legacy, that of  Indigenous art traditions that connects art directly with the earth through rituals and collective art experiences as a spiritual function. Heidweiller maintains that this art tradition once also present in Europe has been overcome by the influence of capitalism which fashions the arts as a model for profit, removing art’s original purpose. Driven by his sense of urgency and hope to create art that the world can give back to the earth, Heidweiller draws from his own involvement in Regenerative Art Education and talks to how surviving Indigenous art traditions explicitly shows us the inherent caring function in art without losing its autonomy. 

In this urgent and necessary address Heidweiller pursues these themes of legacy and regeneration, with an abiding motto in his work: ‘Trees that grow slowly develop deep roots.’