'Thorn Roberts is an artist and a country express train'. Commentary on 'Community participation as identity and belonging: a case study of Arts Project Australia. 'I am an artist'' (Anderson Bigby, 2021)

摘要

The community artist and scholar Francois Matarasso (1997) offered one of the first systematic accounts of the social impact of participation in the arts. Through detailed case studies of some 60 projects, including interviews, discussion groups, and questionnaires with over 1000 participants, he found that arts programs had the potential to enrich social lives, bring people together, empower communities, strengthen a sense of place, and improve health and wellbeing. While all these outcomes can be achieved by other kinds of social programs and policies, he acknowledged the special power of the arts to "help people think critically about and question their experiences and those of others ... with all the excitement, danger, magic, colour, symbolism, feeling, metaphor and creativity that the arts offer." He continued, "it is in the act of creativity that empowerment lies, and through sharing creativity that understanding and social inclu-siveness are promoted" (Matarasso, 1997, p. 90).