In episode 50 of “A Culture of Possibility,” Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso talk about a remarkable book, Engineers of the Imagination: The Welfare State Handbook. First published in 1983, it’s both an account of a novel and exciting approach to community performance and a how-to manual for anyone who wants to use or adapt its tools and methods. The book conveys the spirit and generosity of the British community arts movement during those years, and gives François and Arlene a good excuse to reminisce about the impact of this innovative and influential work in Europe and the U.S.s for the future. You are invited to respond with comments and suggestions. What do you need from the podcast?

Hector MacInnes works in socially engaged art, sound and research. His practice includes spoken word, sonic fiction, installation, text, tech, music, radio, speculative design and organising things, often in collaboration with other artists and a diverse range of communities. Hector was born and grew up on the Isle of Skye, and his projects are deeply rooted in an ongoing interrogation of belonging, identity, legitimacy and lived experience of the more-than-urban, themes he’s brought to his practice-based doctoral research into the concept of the field, anthropocene rurality, and the ‘New Weird’. In this episode, Hannah Kemp-Welch talks in depth about a project Hector has been working on in a prison (HMP Inverness), and the particular sonic environment in which this work is situated.

Youth Landscapers Collective is a youth arts organisation based in the National Forest area of England. We’re a collective of young people, artists and technicians who collaborate with our local community to explore this landscape’s industrial past and forest future.In this episode we want to give you a sense of how we work together. YLC member Kris Kirkwood has built a sound narrative of our 2024 song-making project, using audio recordings from our sessions - from the seeds of our ideas through to performance. Here’s a bit of context about the project, to help set the scene:In 2023, YLC created The Stage of Possibility – a vibrant, democratic space designed, built and curated by YLC to showcase stories and voices from the National Forest at Timber Festival. The project connected us back to the creative and resourceful communities that grew from the former coalpits and pipe works of this area. In 2024 we wanted to strengthen that connection and also perform together on the stage too! We created a set of locally inspired songs, in a project we called: WAYANNAEYINANYONNIT (A Big Story).Working with artists Rebecca Lee and Jessica Harby and our community we sought out the hidden stories of our local area, finding them in discussions with former mining engineer, pipe worker, and co-founder of Moira Replan Graham Knight, research visits to Moira Furnace Museum and The Magic Attic Community Archive, and sharing our own personal experiences. From Graham we learned stories of injustices small and large in the mine - the disappearance of cakes sent down for overtime workers and the tragic death of a young co-worker in an accident. From Clyde at Magic Attic we learnt local dialect and the definition and pronunciation of our title: WAYANNAEYINANYONNIT. More than anything we responded with heart to what it must have felt like to take part in each of these stories and what it's like to be living here today, many of our houses built over the unfilled mining tunnels.The songs we made and performed share our experience of the National Forest, as the past, present and future overlap, canaries sing, children climb on the lime kilns, new words are shouted, and we make sure we're all alright.

This episode addresses two questions. How can we ensure more access and equality in the development of public spaces? How can we make certain that the voices of young people become embedded in planning processes?Sophie Hope and Hannah Kemp-Welch discuss with Ben Bordwick and Leo Valls who both made presentations at Social Making in October 2024.Note:Social Making iteration 5 took place on October 10 and 11, 2024, with support from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.

On Episode 49 of A Culture of Possibility, François Matarasso returns from medical leave to join Arlene Goldbard in considering the podcast as its fifth year begins. They explore the intentions that have guided them so far, and talk about key questions for the future. You are invited to respond with comments and suggestions. What do you need from the podcast?

Joanne Coates practises as a socially engaged artist, using photography to ask questions about rurality and wealth inequality.Her work explores gender, class and disability, drawing on her lived experience. Projects often involve participation and varying levels of collaboration with communities. In this episode, we speak about Jo’s recent work with young women in the Yorkshire Dales and Orkney, Scotland.Alongside and intersecting with her practice, Jo works as a part-time farm labourer and runs a project called Roova, bringing together artists and communities to forge connections in rural landscapes.

Youth Landscapers Collective (YLC) is a youth arts organisation based in the National Forest area of England. We’re a collective of young people, artists and technicians who collaborate with our local community to explore this landscape’s industrial past and forest future. Together we make ambitious, creative projects to share at a variety of festivals, events, and online.
In the past nine years we’ve worked with over 50 groups and individuals, including a beekeeper, ex-miners, scouts, Derbyshire’s official fungi recorder, potters, photographers, a mushroom grower, narrowboat restorers, museum curators, community archivists, forestry workers, amateur radio enthusiasts, musicians, kiln workers, historians, wildlife recorders, filmmakers, charcoal makers, bird watchers and folk singers.
Over that time our youth members have grown in confidence and skills, developing experience and commitment to shape and direct where Youth Landscapers Collective goes next.
In this episode we introduce you to who we are and what we do via an online conversation between artist Jo Wheeler, who helped initiate YLC in 2016, and three of our Youth Council members, Alfie Ropson, Isaac Munslow and Kris Kirkwood. Alfie, Isaac and Kris have all been involved with YLC since the early days and now contribute as paid project assistants, artists, technicians and board members.

Most months have four Fridays, and we know what to do with them. We put out a podcast: a different but related one for each Friday in the month.
Sometimes, however, a month has five Fridays, and then we do something different - usually celebrating sound in one way or another.
This month we have the first Friday Number Five of 2025 and we start another irregular series of Radio Miaaw: podcasts of music issued under Creative Commons licences which we last did four years ago.
We will pick a theme for each edition. In this episode we showcase a range of music available on Tribe of Noise, based in Amsterdam and one of the longest running independent platforms for Creative Commons licensed musics.
You can find full episode notes with links to all the music at miaaw.net.