Angela Street: The Art of Scriptwriting. Image © Gini
We are an organisation led by disabled people, set up to advance disability arts and culture through the pages of our journal. Our raison d’être is to support disabled artists, as much as anything by getting the word out about the fantastic art being produced by artists within the sector.
We give disabled artists a platform to blog and share thoughts and images describing artistic practice, projects and just the daily stuff of finding inspiration to be creative.
We know that being an artist is a hard road to travel and that being a disabled artist takes extra layers of resilience and fortitude, so we give support by connecting you with like-minds primarily through our social media networks. In a more limited capacity we will respond to email requests for information and advice.
Primarily, we publish editorial, blogs and showcases of art, providing a place where opinion pieces, reviews and interviews can be shared and commented on. We have a small commissioning budget and are always looking out for pitches from disabled writers, so if you have a proposal for an arts opinion piece, review, or blog about your artistic practice then do email Editor, Colin Hambrook via editor[at]disabilityartsonline.org.uk
Disability Arts Online offers a means for the wider arts sector to engage with disabled artists by sharing professional opportunities on our listings pages, reading about their work on blogs and editorial and in some cases, with partnerships facilitated by our consultancy services.
Disability Arts Online’s listings cover disability arts and culture related events as well as accessible performances of mainstream work. The listings also has a section for arts jobs and career development opportunities, artistic commissions, residencies and competitions.
When and where we can, we like getting out and about to speak at conferences and to produce events at festivals. As well as doing Disability Arts Online, our Director Trish Wheatley has extensive experience as a producer of performance and visual arts, and our Editor Colin Hambrook has worked on many performance poetry events.
Our understanding of disability arts and culture is informed by the Social Model of Disability, as an antidote to the Medical Model of Disability, which assigns us as rejects in need of being fixed in order to conform to normative values. We see disability arts and culture as a supportive environment where experience of barriers we face as disabled people can be shared and our lives valued.
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