The Public Studio uses the artist’s studio as a site for creative problem-solving, offering space for engagement with new ideas, unlikely collaborations, and experimentation with raw materials. The three stages include the observation of a three-way discussion between a researcher, a practitioner, and a moderator, followed by separate small group conversations with one of the speakers, and then finally an open workshop where both speakers and participants apply creative thinking to a complex problem, be it social, political, medical, environmental.

This Public Studio on Resistance features a conversation between Megan Clinch, a social anthropologist working in public health and intervention design and socially engaged practice/art led methodologies; E, a multidisciplinary artist, producer and activist, and Lois Weaver, artist, activist, and Professor Emerita of Performance Practice at QMUL. Together they will explore the principles of resistance from the points of view of science, health, political resistance, and the arts.  They will then turn to the audience for small group discussions followed by an open creative design session looking at how these various disciplines and languages of resistance might inform new practices and strategies.

Megan Clinch is a Social Anthropologist from the Centre for Public Health and Policy at Wolfson Institute of Population Health (WIPH), QMUL. She is currently the co-lead of the the Public Advisory Panel theme for the WIPH. Her research explores the politics of participatory practice and the development of methods for more equitable and expansive health knowledge making.

E is a multidisciplinary artist, producer and activist. Their work spans across dance, theatre, film, immersive and museum performances, with movement as a core vehicle of expression. They are an organiser within several advocacy groups and create powerful interventions through art and direct action. 

Lois Weaver is an artist, activist and Professor Emerita of Contemporary Performance Practice at QMUL. Her experiments in performance as a means of public engagement include the Long Table, Porch Sitting, Situation Room, Care Café, Public Studio, and her facilitating persona, Tammy WhyNot.