SOAL: Ambassadors and Storytelling for Artists 2022

Introduction

SOAL: Ambassadors and Storytelling for Artists grew from Axis’s Models of Validation research and the development of the Social Art Library (SOAL) — the UK’s first artist-led digital archive for and about social practice.

Funded by Art Fund in 2020–21, this programme deepened the Library’s artist-led approach by commissioning artists to test new ways of documenting social practice and by supporting them to tell the stories of their work through writing, workshops and public events.

Background and Aims

Building on insights from Models of Validation, the programme recognised that socially engaged art often lacks visibility and archiving infrastructure. It aimed to change that by:

• Creating an artist-led system for archiving social practice.
   
• Supporting participatory artists to share their work and respond to the Covid-19 crisis.
   
• Developing practical methods for documenting process-based art.
   
• Establishing transferable learning for museums and galleries.

Axis invested core resources to build the digital platform, while Art Fund’s Small Project Grant enabled a national programme of micro-commissions, storytelling workshops and live events designed to make the archive truly user-led.

Storytelling for Artists

The Storytelling for Artists season, led by writer and performer Debs Newbold, invited artists to explore storytelling as a tool for reflection and connection. Three workshops and masterclasses helped artists shape narratives of their social practice and prepare submissions for the Library.

Bursary artists:
Letty McHugh, Gimara Duncan-Rice, Wendy Charlton, Elspeth Penfold, Monicah Becoming, Matthew J Dowell, Sille Kima, Lucy Hutchinson, Christopher Jarratt, Helen Nelson and M Sorya.

Each received a bursary to develop a story or artwork reflecting their practice and community collaborations.

Public events and commissions

• Shy Radicals – Film screening and Q&A with Hamja Ahsan and Black Dog Films, exploring introversion, activism and creative resistance (May 2021).
   
• The CREative UNDERClass – Talk with Tyler Denmead (University of Cambridge / New Urban Arts) on youth, race and gentrification.
   
• Of One (h) Being, Is One – Poem and performance by Monicah Ayoub, reflecting on diaspora identity and self-awareness.
   
• A Portrait of a Studio in the Time of Covid-19 – Essay by Gimara Duncan-Rice, documenting art education during lockdown.
   
• How a Personal Event Influenced My Work – Story by Wendy Charlton, connecting personal experience with her Homes & Housing collection.
   
• 5 Tips for Telling Your Story – Guide by Debs Newbold, offering practical advice for artists on structuring and sharing their own social practice stories.

These commissions extended SOAL’s purpose: to help artists express and archive their processes in ways true to their values and those of their collaborators.

The SOAL Ambassadors

The SOAL Ambassadors programme commissioned twelve artists to explore innovative ways of documenting and archiving social practice. Working with Lucy Wright (Social Art Librarian) and R.M. Sánchez-Camus (Lead Artist), each Ambassador developed new content for the Library that captured artistic and community responses to the pandemic.

Ambassadors and projects:

• Jennifer Booth – Is that really necessary…? – collaboration with DLAB and People’s Express exploring gender and youth voices.
   
• Wendy Charlton – #HomesHousing – curated collection of art addressing home and housing themes, co-developed with Sally Labern (The Drawing Shed).
   
• Sarah Dixon – Phone Box – participatory community project using a public phone booth as a site for connection.
   
• Gabriella Gay – Kwanzaa Collective Archives – poetic documentation of walks with Black and Brown women.
   
• Anna Horton-Cremin – Mycelium Mail – postal game encouraging neighbours to connect through play, growing and sharing.
   
• Emma Long – The Vital Role of Hands – reflecting on care and volunteering through Mutual Aid during lockdown.
   
• Kaajal Modi – Kitchen Cultures – collaborative project exploring food, waste and migration.
   
• Sara Qaed – Akml – series of political drawings on continuity and communication.
   
• Studio Polpo – ds2 – documentation of a mobile drawing studio as a model for collective practice.
   
• John Wild – Machinic Dreamings of Limehouse Foreshore – podcast linking walking, mapping and data infrastructures.
   
• Carmen Wong – Jar Squad – community food initiative around waste, surplus and collective jam-making.
   
• Nathan Frost – Digital Engagement Toolkit – resource exploring participatory digital work with young people.
   

Together they produced 19 new uploads, enriching the Library and forming a collective record of artists’ social responses to a time of crisis and change.

Evaluation and Learning

An independent evaluation by Lawrence Bradby (2021) found that the Ambassadors project:

• Created a functional, artist-led digital archive for social practice.
   
• Supported artists to share participatory work and reflect on pandemic-era projects.
   
• Archived timely responses to social and environmental change.
   
• Contributed to a collective history of social art practice.
   

Artists described SOAL as 

“a shop window for social practice” and 

“a database of projects we can learn from and build on.”

The report also identified future opportunities to expand creative, co-produced archiving approaches and embed evaluation within future phases of SOAL’s growth.

Legacy and Impact

SOAL: Ambassadors and Storytelling for Artists demonstrated how artist-led archiving can both preserve and energise social practice. It strengthened Axis’s collaboration with Social Art Network, introduced new models for storytelling and documentation, and made visible a body of work that reflects the resilience, care and creativity of artists working with communities.

SOAL now serves as a vital resource for artists, educators and curators seeking to understand the methodologies of social practice, and as a living record of how artists responded to a moment of global disruption.

Credits

Funded by: Art Fund
Lead Partner: Axis
In Partnership With: Social Art Network
Lead Artist: R.M. Sánchez-Camus
Social Art Librarian: Lucy Wright
Evaluator: Lawrence Bradby
Workshop Lead: Debs Newbold