Like many people I heard yesterday about jackdrawsanything.com, a fundraising site set up by a six year old boy (with help from his family) to raise money for the Sick Kids Hospital in Edinburgh. He is a boy who loves to draw and decided to use his passion and talent for drawing to raise money for the hospital where his little brother has spent a lot of time. If you donate to the hospital and make a request, he will draw ANYTHING for you.

There are so many things I love about this story

• The idea - what a way to raise money and how wonderful that the concept came from a six year old
• The love and care of a child who wants to do something positive for other children
• The support he has had from his family who have responded creatively and with equal love to their child's idea
• The way digital social media has helped to reach so many people - actually I mean how the people who use digital social media have engaged so positively with the idea and shared the links and, I suppose, the positive energy started by a six year old
• That Jack's initial estimate of raising £1,000,000 may still be a long, long way off, but they have repeatedly had to revise their targets having broken through each one this week. Currently they are at about £5,000 with a target of £10,000

I was going to ask Jack to draw a picture of our cat Ginge, sitting in the sunshine in a lovely garden, but remembered how difficult it can be when I have lots of drawings I have to do for other people. I love drawing and the fact that people are interested in my drawings, but somehow the pressure can become too much and I get stuck. Instead I decided to do a drawing for Jack of him and his imagination as he drew our cat, in the sunshine in a lovely garden. I'll still send them some money and it will be worth every penny. I had no intention of drawing yesterday, and had it not been for Jack I would have sat in front of the telly. Instead I had great fun drawing Jackdrawsanything and had a bit of a spring in my step after I had sent it to him yesterday. Thanks Jack!

The response he has had is huge and he is going to struggle to keep up with his orders, but his family are looking after him and have extended the estimated time from order to delivery to make sure he keeps happy, well and gets all the sleep he needs. Maybe he needs to set up a team of people to help him with his orders. I'm in. We artists have to stick together.

I have spent so much time updating the blog from the Curious Minds Training I did last week I had entirely forgotten to update my own blog!

All I want to say is I LOVED IT! For someone who spent years as a participatory arts facilitator I have facilitated very few workshops in recent years (far too much time form filling and organising other people to do the stuff) and it reminded me just how much I love it. I felt alive. Part of that was with fear initially, but very quickly I got into the zone and was back to my old self. (Sorry!)

Wahoooooooooo!

Mailout  has just published its final paper edition of the magazine after 20 years and is about to go digital! I was seriously chuffed when they asked me to write a piece about my journey into social media (below) and I hope you will follow them on twitter @mailout, read their blog http://www.mailout.posterous.com and subscribe to the new online mailout which will go live in January 2011.

'I thought I was relatively new to social media, I didn’t have a facebook profile until a little over a year ago and twitter came even later. I could never quite see the point of them. But after listening to inspiring speakers at Art of Digital last year, I recognised that so much of what we do in participatory arts is about social media, about creatively using and adapting available tools to facilitate dialogue and connections, community voice and campaigns. We have been working with social media for years, we just call it banners and books, workshops, festivals, video, conversations …

When I realised that digital social media was just another set of new tools it began to make sense to me and I engaged more enthusiastically both in my own work and in my work with other people.

During Something Beautiful, one of my last projects at Action Factory Community Arts, we set up a face book group to help extend the reach of the project, involve more people and profile the work. In the first weekend the group was established we had nearly 80 members from all over the world, sharing their ideas of what beauty means to them through words, photographs and memories. The group added an additional layer to the conversations that were happening on the streets of Blackburn and Darwen and the workshops taking place in the Salvation Army Hostel and with the Refugees and Asylum Seekers at Wesley Hall. Young people who had been photographed on the street started to tag themselves in photos on facebook, using their photos for their profile and engaging in conversation online. Most of the people who joined the group during that first weekend had found us via twitter: followers of Action Factory had retweeted our request for contributions and within minutes our project had gone far and wide.

Twitter and facebook weren’t the reason the project was successful, they didn’t make a good project from a bad project, what they did provide was another platform. Like all tools, digital social media can be used well or badly but if we use it as we do other tools, underpinned by the values which characterise our work in participatory arts then it becomes another means of achieving goals.

I have recently become freelance, and digital social media has helped me to make that transition far more effectively. I was concerned that I might feel isolated in my attic and that the cat might not prove to be the most inspiring conversationalist. What I found is that digital social media enabled me to make contact with people who I normally wouldn’t even have the opportunity to speak to. I was astounded by the organisations and individuals out there who are passionate about sharing ideas and collaborating and by the way they are using social media as a way of opening up their processes to other people and I have been inspired to take a similar approach in my own work. I have started drawing again and have been blogging about the process and my learning. It was terrifying and I kind of hoped it would go un-noticed, but then people began to share the blog and make comment and my experience is that the benefits to my own practice and consequently the quality of my work with other people has been worth one hundred times the effort and of putting myself out there.

Digital Social Media is also playing a significant role in bringing people together to campaign for funding for the arts. The hashtag (a way of searching for things on twitter) #artsfunding is being used to aggregate twitter feed about funding and Marcus Romer of Pilot Theatre has established a ning group which has become a central point for discussion and archiving news coverage.

Of course, there are still challenges with digital social media – we need to consider online safety and the challenges of the unedited messages which are out there and the inequalities in access to the internet, but digital social media is not going away and if we continue to work with people to explore identity, strengthen communities, celebrate diversity and support creative dialogue then we are helping people to use social media in a more positive and informed way.'

I am @cath_ford on twitter
Blog http://cathintheattic.posterous.com/
www.cathintheattic.com

I have bought me a moleskine sketchbook. Until now I have been buying cheap and cheerful so this is a significant move for me. I hope my purchase means that I am valuing my drawing, that I want to have a sketchbook to carry with me and keep to look back on in the future. I hope it doesn't mean I get precious about my drawing and lose the fun.

Hence the 'First page nerves' - What if I do it wrong? What if I do a rubbish drawing and then have to look at it every time I open the book? What if my drawing keeps reminding me I am not an artistic genius?........... And so it goes.

Solutions

1. Get a grip
2. Start in the middle
3. Share the first drawing, whatever quality, on my blog.

 

I was a bit frustrated not to be able to blog about shift happens straight away; my computer had a minor breakdown and I am no good at typing on my phone yet, however lots of things have been whirring around my head in the past two weeks, so I am actually quite glad that I have had time to ponder (technical term).

Shift Happens was amazing. What an inspiring experience to be in a room with so many top (another technical term) people.

What I really loved was that, over the two days many of the presentations and conversations were about higher order ambitions - about democracy, identity, connection, learning and generally making the world a better place and the role of technology as a tool to help us achieve those ambitions. I was so pleased that there was no sense of 'bring and brag' there: no-one seemed to come with an answer but brought with them a collection of experiences, ideas, ambitions and 'what ifs?' Some previous arts conferences I have attended have had an underlying tone of arrogant confidence 'We have the answer and you will learn from us,' whereas Shift Happens had a tone of collaborative exploration and sharing.

I wondered whether there was a link between those attitudes and technology? Was there an openness, curiosity and willingness to learn because it was an arts and technology gathering (because technology is developing at such a fast pace you have to approach it with those attitudes), or do arts and technology attract people who are naturally experimental and open to collaboration?

I won't talk about the different speakers, many people have done that very eloquently already, but if you are on twitter search #shifthappens and you will find all sorts of interesting responses and links. Also check out Marcus Romer's article for the stage magazine http://www.thestage.co.uk/features/feature.php/28925/a-meeting-of-minds.>

One of my favourite aspects of the gathering was the opportunity to meet people I have been communicating with or following on twitter but have never actually met. I am quite shy, so wandering up to people and saying hello isn't in my nature, but I did feel confident to turn to someone next to me in the loos and open with the line 'are you creative?' and in fact it was @iamcreative. Very surreal, and we never did have the conversation we intended to and have returned to conversing in 140 characters, but it was a happy and amusing moment at a wash basin which added to the joy of the event.

I have also developed a liking for Pimms and lemonade.

 

 

Just got a copy of the Curious Minds Newsletter today and came over all unnecessary when I read what they had written about me.

'It has been wonderful to be reminded recently how our Creative Agents lead highly imaginative and creative lives beyond their involvement in Creative Partnerships. One of our long-established agents Cath Ford is undergoing something of a personal creative renaissance, having just launched her freelance 'solo career' after many years of employment with Action Factory Community Arts. The results of this can be viewed at Cath's website and at her blog. You'll find a rich mix of experiments in drawing combined with thoughtful reflections on the role of the Creative Agent. It's a real insight into how a creative life manifests itself and an example to us all about the power of social networking as a means of supporting your own development as well as sharing ideas with others.'

That's me they are talking about - how lovely is that?

 Working with Curious Minds has definitely played a significant role in my development both as a creative producer and as an artist over the past five years and it has been great to collaborate with them, other creative professionals, children and teachers to explore creative approaches to improving the lives and opportunities of children and young people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Curious Minds website has some great examples of their work, blogs and news about creativity and young people and is worth a visit http://www.curiousminds.org.uk/

On Twitter last night Mandy Precious @aprecious asked me what would happen at the end of the 100 hour challenge. I joked and said 'I dunno, no-one told me. I'll probably go back to slobbing in front of the telly and complaining I have no time to be creative', but nothing could be further from the truth. I started on the hundred hour challenge hoping to improve my drawing skills by concentrating my efforts on something I love but haven't prioritised. No-one said it was going to change my life! I feel re-invigorated and inspired, I look forward to my hour (it usually becomes 3 hours!) and I am looking at my future with fresh eyes.

Part of the success of the process has been the sharing through blogging, twitter and facebook - a part of the challenge I wasn't even aware of until today and it's just a coincidence that I am blogging (but don't tell anyone). Anyway, the sharing bit is motivating me to produce. I have shocked myself by my willingness to put my work out there and seek feedback. Maybe it's the distance that's giving me the confidence, but I think it's more likely that it's because the online arts community seems to be one which is collaborative, questioning, creative and respectful.

Based on my experience of the past 21 days I would encourage anyone to make time to do something they love and experience the joy of learning, and I would also encourage talking to people about it. Share your stories, the challenges and the successes, be open and invite the world into your learning. My experience is that the feedback you get and the impact that has is worth a hundred hundred times what you put in to the process.