As International Partner of UNBOXED: Creativity in the UK , the British Council supported two international delegation visits the UK, as part of our shared ambition to build a global conversation about creativity. 24 delegates visited UNBOXED commissioned projects across the UK, with one visit focused on the future of festivals and their role in communities, places and nations, and the other focused on the role of socially engaged art in public spaces. We also supported some of the delegates to carry out their own collaborative R&D projects inspired by their visits, including new research in Brazil, and a new mapping tool to support festivals to align with the Sustainable Development Goals.
We supported a costume design residency in Pakistan, as part of our Pakistan/ UK New Perspectives Season, to design and create costumes for the PoliNations commission – a giant garden which was installed in the centre of Birmingham for 17 days.
The partnership also supported Northern Ireland’s commission Our Place in Space, which placed artists in residence in observatories in Vietnam and South Africa. Each resident artist worked with up to 200 young people in each country. The project then went on to be recreated in Hanoi, as part of the British Council’s UK/ Viet Nam Season 2023.
We supported an exchange project developing the legacy of the UNBOXED commission About Us and the Poetry Society in Malaysia, with the Young Poets Network and profiling new work at the George Town Literary Festival.