Great Hall

Zoe Laughlin, Institute of Making

Performing Matter: Objecting Stuff

Zoe is the co-founder of the Institute of Making and the Materials Library project. She holds an MA from Central Saint Martins and a PhD in Materials within the Division of Engineering, Kings College London. 

Working at the interface of science, art, craft and design of materials, Zoe's work ranges from formal experiments with matter to large-scale public exhibitions. Her particular areas of interest are currently The Sound of Materials, The Taste of Materials, and the Performativity of Matter - with outputs ranging from theatrical demonstration lectures to the making of instruments. Zoe's work features on both radio and television, and has partnered with Tate Modern, the V&A, and the Wellcome Trust.

@Zoelaughlin

Great Hall

Lightning Talks on Creative Fuse North East: A Unique Cross-University Partnership

• Rebecca Prescott, Newcastle University
• Mark Bailey and Nick Spencer, Northumbria University
• Alistair Brown, Durham University
• Suzy O'Hara, University of Sunderland
• Sam Murray and Paul Stewart, Teesside University

Fireside Chat - Born Out of Rebellion: Fusing Performance and Innovation

Catherine Johns in conversation with Alan Welby

• Catherine Johns, Innovation and Business Growth Director, Business Durham & Southpaw Dance Company
• Alan Welby, Innovation Director, North East Local Enterprise Partnership

Turbinia Room

Creativity and Culture: Museums and their Partners in Civic Life and Civil Society

• Iain Watson, Director, Tyne & Wear Archives and Museums

Seeding a Culture of Collaboration

• Sarah Younas, Digital Programmes Officer, Tyne & Wear Archives and Museums

Maryport Camp Farm: AR and Digital Archiving - Fresh Approaches to Storytelling

• Megan Doherty, Cultural Heritage Programmes Officer, North of England Civic Trust

Playing at Reality: Digital Frames and Stages

• Rachel Briscoe, Director, FanSHEN
• Dan Barnard, Director, FanSHEN

Mauretania Room

The Workshop Game: Just When You Thought it was Safe to Run a Workshop

90 Minute Workshop: Advance Booking

• Ladan Cockshut, Research Associate, Durham University
• Alistair Brown, Research Associate, Durham University

In the ultimate meta event, this workshop will lead participants through The Workshop Game, a messy, hilarious, and hands-on game (which was created by Ladan Cockshut earlier this year) geared at encouraging conversation and reflection on the rewards, opportunities, and pitfalls that artists and craftspeople often encounter when they try to deliver a creative workshop to an often excited, typically earnest, and sometimes hapless public. We’ll first play the game in small teams and then the workshop leaders will lead the group through a discussion about the challenges and opportunities they face when running and attending workshops. If you like Play-Doh and have ever thought you might like to deliver a workshop some day, you won’t want to miss this! There’s even a prize for the winning team!

The goal of the workshop is to allow participants to discuss, share and reflect on the nature of workshop delivery in a fun and engaging environment. It is also to demonstrate the workshop leaders’ own approach to workshop delivery through bespoke play-based methods (a specific research interest of Ladan’s).

This workshop is aimed at any conference goer who is interested in delivering their own workshops, wants to learn tips about how to improve on their existing workshops, or is interested in how play-based methods can be used to improve learning among adults.

Play and Invent Space

Invent and Innovate: Enhancing your Professional Creativity with Little Inventors

90 Minute Workshop - Advance Booking

• Suzy O'Hara, Innovation Development Specialist, University of Sunderland
• Will Evans, Chief Strategist, Little Inventors

Creativity has recently been identified by top global companies as the most important characteristic/quality in their staff. It is the driver for innovation, the catalyst for competitive advantage, and the golden fleece for a thriving workforce. There is a clear and significant demand for training and professional development in creativity across all business.

Little Inventors' "Invent and Innovate! Enhancing your professional creativity with Little Inventors" workshop will be hosted in the unique context of our live ideation/prototyping exhibition entitled, “Little Inventors Great 2030 Challenge”, located in the Play & Invent space at Discovery Museum. This exhibition is proud to be part of the Great Exhibition of the North.

The workshop will capitalise upon; a non-replicable and globally sourced asset base of Little Inventors invention drawings and prototyped invention objects, a significant range of “invention thinking” methods and resources for problem/challenge identification and imaginative solution finding techniques, and a reputation for providing a completely new viewpoint and process for enhancing professional creativity. Participants will be provided with an opportunity to consider how creative ideation and inventive thinking through making can catalyse professionals innate sense of human creativity and explore the powerful impact that imaginative, inventive play can have on their current creative roles

Register for Invent & Innovate

Great Hall

Join us for drinks, canapes and a range of performances:

Symbiosis

Manoli Moriaty and Lucie Lee

Symbiosis is an interactive performance realised through collaboration between the expressive mediums of sound and physical movement. Exploiting a range of emerging and traditional technologies, performers improvise within a feedback loop where sound and motion are continuously influencing one another. 

The performance highlights the emergent properties of interdisciplinary interaction in reference to the biological phenomenon of symbiosis

Hi-Hack

Ian Horn

A digital presentation using poetry and images. The software interacts with the voice of the poet at a live reading, randomly selecting images on screen that correspond with the piece of work being presented.

The Often Herd

The Often Herd are a progressive bluegrass band based in Newcastle. Since the group's formation in August 2017 they have developed and refined a set which includes original material and contemporary interpretations of bluegrass/old time standards. In March they released their debut EP with a successful UK tour. 

Expect a showcase of intricately arranged material, spontaneous improvisation, deft instrumental skills and good fun!

Bridge (Turbinia Room)

Anthonia Carter

Artist and mathematician Anthonia Carter welcomes you to Bridge, a performance in creation. Enter the Creative Lab space, view existing pieces and help shape the formation of a new artwork.

Sign up for an informal dinner with other conference delegates at Simla, a modern Indian restaurant located on the Newcastle Quayside.

The dinner is a set menu, priced at £21.50 per person.

Places are limited and will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis.

Booking essential.

A series of presentations, case studies and a fireside chat on the challenges and benefits of working across sectors:

Academic Engagement with SMEs: Challenges for Fusion

• Lynne Hall, Professor of Computer Science, University of Sunderland

Innovation Pilot: Youseum and its Value to Wellbeing

• Andy Frith, Senior Lecturer in Advertising and Graphic Design, Northumbria University

Innovation Pilot: Augmented Reality ofr the Sight Impaired

• Dan Riley, Spearhead Interactive
• Peter Reid, Teesside University

Fireside Chat: In Conversation with Darren Henley

• Professor Eric Cross, Creative Fuse North East
• Darren Henley, Chief Executive, Arts Council England

Turbinia Room

Design is Science. Wait... What?

• Sara Weinand, UX Designer, Booking.com

Delivering Exceptional User Experiences: What we can Learn from the Worlds of Architecture and Design

• Helena Hill, Director, 49Digital and Helena Hill Consulting

The First Rule of Knight Lab

• Lee Hall, Head of School of Media and Communications, University of Sunderland
• Neil Macfarlane, Senior Lecturer in Online Journalism, University of Sunderland

Northumbria Room

Pricing, Costs and Business Plan: How Do I Finance my Creative Business?

90 Minute Workshop - Advance Booking

• Ellie Clewlow, Crafts Council

Looking for advice on how to structure a business plan? Looking for expertise on how to manage your cash flow finances, or how to price your work or ideas on how to raise money for a project?

Why should you attend?

• Find out about how to manage your finances for your creative practice
• Find out about funding options for your business whether you are a start-up or more established
• Find out the top tips from experienced makers on costing and pricing your work and how to manage sales and cash flows.

What is on offer?

• A better understanding of financial jargon, what you need to know that will support you now and in the future.
• Top tips on easy to manage financial administration tools
• What are cash flows? How to plan cash flow forecasts into your business plan

This session will be shaped around the needs of participants, who will be asked to complete a pre-session questionnaire about the key financial challenges they are currently facing. By the end of the session, participants will have identified their own personalised action points. The session facilitator will follow up on these action points after the workshop.

Booking essential: 

Great Hall

Panel: Making Culture Digital

• Annie Rigby, Director, Unfolding Theatre
• Matthew Read, Director, The Bowes Centre of Art, Craft and Design
• Sara Pepper, Director of Creative Economy, Cardiff University
• Sharon Paterson, Associate Director of Culture and Engagement, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (mima)
• Chair: Sam Murray, Research Associate, Teesside University

Panel: Culture is Digital? An Interactive Discussion

• Ladan Cockshut, Research Associate, Durham University
• Alistair Brown, Research Associate, Durham University
• Miki Rogers, Tees Valley Arts
• Claire O'Malley, Pro-Vice Chancellor (Global), Durham University

Turbinia Room

Adaptation and Mutual Exploitation in Interdisciplinary Collaborative Practice

• Manoli Moriaty, Doctoral Candidate and Associate Lecturer, University of Salford

Capturing the Blockchain Zeitgeist

• Andrew Fletcher, Research Associate, Durham University
• Vesa Kivinen, Independent Blockchain Artist

Nurturing Creativity: The Benefits of Collaboration Between Artist-Led Galleries and Universities

• Daniel Goodman, Director and Senior Curator, System Art Gallery

Participatory and Artistic Strategies Emerging from Creative Innovation Labs and Art Hacks

• Suzy O'Hara, Innovation Development Executive, University of Sunderland
• Dominic Smith, Artist, Curator and Researcher

Northumbria Room

90 Minute Workshop - Advance Booking

Going off Grid: Comics and the Communication of Information

• Lydia Wysocki, Research Assistant, Newcastle University/Founder of Applied Comics Etc.

A grid – as rows and columns of panels – is a typical but not inescapable feature of the comics medium. A four-panel structure is an established form, but the bits between the panels are equally important in giving space for the reader to read and think. A regular rhythm can be broken, and what might at first appear oppressive can offer unexpected possibilities.

Comics – as a medium of words and pictures in sequence – has come a long way from print to digital media. It can be easy to pick up and read, or make, a comic. Equally, it is easy to assume that comics making requires skills in planning, writing, drawing, and finishing techniques, and that comics reading demands an encyclopaedic knowledge of the Marvel universe. If you have these skills, great.

If not, great. You can get started with or without them.

This workshop looks at grid structures in comics, to support you to plan your own short comic.

• Introduction: infoblast of examples
• Discussion: explore examples of comics that respect or reject the ‘rules’ of grid structures
• Complication: what else is possible in a digital environment? How can the use of digital platforms reinforce, change, or escape a gridded layout. Is an Instagram grid, or a Twitter image preview, a comic?
• Provocation: using a selection of grid templates, plan and make your own comic to communicate something that matters to you. You can choose to start with paper or digital templates. Off-grid paper and pens are provided, and we encourage a ‘come as you are’ approach to digital media: use your own smartphone or other devices.

Register for Workshop

Mauretania Room

90 Minute Workshop - Advance Booking

What Does the Future Look Like? Introducing Design Methods to Think About the World

• Jisun Lee
• Leila Hogarth
• Cameron Marshall
• Anthonia Carter
• Chloe Maclellan
• (All Northumbria University Masters in Design Innovation Students)

As a group, the Masters in Design Innovation Students at Northumbria University work on live projects, using design thinking to complete a wide range of briefs, with a focus this semester on responsible innovation. The students are experienced in running small group workshops, such as Creative Fuse North East’s ‘Get Ready to Innovate’ programme, working with small businesses to explore their opportunities and realise how to achieve them.

This workshop will explore:

• Ideating around what the future might look like (based on stimulus/resources provided)
• Recognising the problems that these idealistic futures may accidentally create
• Creating a concept that would solve the issue and mapping it out through a series of service design methods.

Throughout the workshop the group will demonstrate their way of working, explaining how design thinking can be applied in day to day working. Participants will be helped to develop their own creative expression, as well as gaining awareness of how design methods could be used to solve problems they may experience. The tools and methods used in the workshop are designed to be easily replicable in your own business or creative practice.

Register:

Great Hall

Panel: Thinking Nationally - Learnings, Insights and Challenges in Innovation

• Prof Eric Cross, Creative Fuse North East (Chair)
• Caroline Norbury, Creative England
• Paul Lancaster, Plan Digital UK

Panel: Is the Business Community in the North East Truly Collaborative?

• Vicky Stone, Stone Collective (Chair)
• Catherine Coulter, BeaconHouse Events
• Charlotte Windebank, FIRST Face to Face
• Catherine Boland, Baltic Training
• Phil Jackman, Guerrilla Working

Turbinia Room

Making a Difference: Understanding the Long-Term Impact of Creative Organisations on a Craft Maker's Career and the Creative Economy

• Lauren Baker, PhD Researcher, University of Dundee

North East Craft: Who Cares?

• Helen Bramhall, MA Student and Creative Enterprise Specialist, CCT for Enterprise

Innovation Through Craft

• Julia Bennett, Head of Research and Policy, Crafts Council

Northumbria Room

90 Minute workshop - Advance Booking

The aim of this workshop is to explore how experiences emerge from the intersection of content, narratives, places and audiences. We are keen to understand how these elements can be combined to create participatory immersive experiences for public spaces that allow heritages to be experienced using immersive technologies. In so doing we are exploring how to enhance and invigorate these spaces. We want to understand what does, and what doesn’t work for certain kinds of heritage, narratives, places and audiences.

The facilitators have designed an ‘ideation game’ for groups based around different forms of heritages, places on and around Northumberland St, features of the built environment (e.g. lampposts, phone boxes, street corners) and different types of audiences exemplified through personas. Participants will be presented with a range of heritage items to stimulate their creativity and generate ideas. Participants from any background are welcome and we encourage people to think big.

Facilitators (all Northumbria University):

• Jon Swords, Senior Lecturer in Economic Geography
• James Charlton, Lecturer in Architecture
• Kay Rogage, Vice-Chancellor's Research Fellow in Digital Living
• Richard Watson, Senior Research Fellow
• Claire Nally, Senior Lecturer in Twentieth Century English Literature
• David Kirk, Professor of Digital Living

Great Hall

Jo Lansdown, Watershed

Jo is the Creative Programme Manager at Watershed, a leading film, culture and digital media centre in the South West. Jo joined Watershed as a Producer of REACT, a four year project which connected creative companies and academic researchers.

Jo led the design and delivery of Sandbox, and R&D programme that supports people to experiment and produce new prototypes. She leads many of Watershed's partnership projects, currently working on Creative Producers International, Network for Creative Enterprise, and the South West Creative Technology Network

@JoannaLasdowne

Northumbria University (Group Walk from Conference Venue)

Advance Booking

Creative Fuse North East have arranged special after-hours access to 1up North for conference delegates. We'll have access to the 1up North showcase between 18:00 and 19:30.

Part of Great Exhibition of the North, 1up North is a showcase of the best gaming from across the North.

Join us as we celebrate the greatest games created in the North of England, learn about the industry, meet developers and play the games.

Experience everything from retro classics to cutting-edge virtual reality titles. 1up North will showcase major game publishers and independent developers working in the north.