Arts&Heritage is pleased to share an update of the progress of Common Lands – a new approach for the organisation driven through a themed national programme.

Emerging from this time of consolidation and planning is an exciting new approach; our first thematically driven national programme: Common Lands. Retaining the best of our collaborative learning approach and continuing to forge new partnerships between communities, heritage organisations and artists, Common Lands uses as its inspiration the stories of people, place and collective action, inspired by histories of access to land, land ownership and the duty of care for nature.

We have expanded our definition of heritage to include organisations that hold intangible cultural heritage or have responsibility for the safeguarding of environmental heritage. Common Lands focuses on these aspects of our heritage and crucially pivots to create projects that are driven by a broad range of communities, that increase opportunities for sharing knowledge and perspectives and promote the learning of new skills, embedding care and foreground co-created projects nationally that create small positive tangible incremental change.

The starting point for projects comes from the communities we partner with, artistic and academic research. Large and small scale activism and partnerships which value and support environmental quality, inclusivity, community well-being, and biodiversity will be at its heart. While always acknowledging and highlighting voices traditionally excluded from narratives of land access and ownership, we want to bring to light progressive historic environmental movements that give voice and value to radicals from the past, informing the present and inspiring the future.

The programme began with research & development, with input from a steering group of artists, leading experts and academics, who refined our national programme from the perspective of the ‘non-human voice’, since becoming a critical partner in the development of the programme.

A&H led a dynamic approach to R&D, which included; community consultation, artist led walks, digital engagement and virtual symposiums to ascertain levels of engagement and opportunities for lasting change through cultivating powerful and passionate partnerships to realise the needs of community groups and ‘green’ heritage sites through artist interventions. 

We are pleased to share that Rebecca Beinart has been selected as the first artist to work with Arts&Heritage, Herefordshire Wildlife Trust (HWT) and local communities to develop artwork for Bartonsham Meadows. The commission responds to an ambitious ecological programme through which HWT plans to restore part of the site, which is regularly inundated by the River Wye, to be species-rich floodplain meadows. The commission will respond to the history of Bartonsham Meadows and is inspired by the multi-decade vision for the regeneration of the site. Rebecca will work with community groups to collectively learn from and respond to the Meadows rich history and changing ecology, and the process of regeneration. Full project details can be found here.

A&H led a digital commissioning opportunity, inviting artists to submit existing film works that highlight stories of people, place and collective action, inspired by histories of access to land, ownership and duty of care for nature, as contributions to our digital screening room exhibition space. Seven films were selected through the open call, with works featuring on A&H’s Screening Room from November 2024 – February 2025, beginning with ‘Gathering: Women of Colour and Nature’ by Durre Shahwar. 

As other projects in the national programme continue to develop with Common Lands, we will continue to share.

We invite you to contribute to the conversation by  sharing our initial thoughts and reading list, which can be found here.

Meeting Point is Arts&Heritage’s artist-led research programme that explores tangible and intangible heritage of museums and collections through collaboration: between artists, participants and heritage partners.

Meeting Point is designed to support small and medium scale museums to develop their skills and commission artists, who will create a piece of work in response to their site or collection. 

The programme addresses the fundamental question of why museums and the contemporary arts should work together. Meeting Point brings new opportunities for artists and new experiences for visitors to participating museums, positioning heritage sites as exciting places to see contemporary art.

There has been six rounds of the Meeting Point programme; each funded by Arts Council England.

Please contact info@artsandheritage.org.uk for further information.

Meeting Point 6

List of participating organisations and artists

• Vanley Burke and collaborator Gary Stewart with Museum X
• Liz Gre with The RSC, Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire
• Luke Fowler with the National Trust and YHA, Ilam Park, Peak District

Read more about the programme here and watch the overview film by Pascal Vossen below:

Meeting Point 5

List of participating organisations and artists

• Jordan Baseman at the National Paralympic Heritage Centre, Aylesbury
• Chisato Minamimura at Ure Museum of Greek Archaeology, Reading
• Enam Gbewonyo at God’s House Tower, Southampton
• Emma Smith at The Brickworks Museum, Southampton
• Savinder Bual at Didcot Railway Centre, Oxford
• Anna Cady at Furzey Gardens, Minstead

• Hetain Patel at Cromford Mills, Derbyshire
• Lady Kitt at Warwickshire County Records Office, Warwickshire
• Nuala Clooney at Middleport Pottery, Stoke-on-Trent
• Dan Scott and Tom Adams at The Naseby Battlefield Project, Northamptonshire

• Kelham Island Museum, Sheffield – Mel Brimfield with Gwyneth Herbert
• Colne Valley Museum, Golcar – Ed Kluz
• Washington Old Hall, Washington – Lindsey Mendick and Dominic Watson
• Grace Darling Museum, Bamburgh – Sophie Dixon
• Port Sunlight Village Trust, Merseyside – Tod Hanson
• Warrington Museum & Art Gallery, Warrington – Susan Stockwell

• Brontë Parsonage Museum, Howarth – Lynn Setterington
• Chetham’s Library, Manchester – Brass Art
• Experience Barnsley Museum and Discovery Centre, Barnsley – Jacob Cartwright and Nick Jordan
• Gawthorpe Textiles Collection, – Serena Partridge
• Hexham Old Gaol – Matt Stokes in collaboration with Richard Dawson
• Lion Salt Works, Cheshire – Martin Hylton
• Norton Priory Museum and Garden – David Appleyard
• Portland Basin Museum, Ashton-under-Lyne – Magnus Quaife
• Prescot Museum, Knowsley – Owl Project
• Preston Park Museum – Stephen Dixon and Alison Welsh

Meeting Point 2016

• Morpeth Chantry Bagpipe Museum, Northumberland – Ziad Jabero working with the Bagdhaddies
• Dales Countryside Museum, Yorkshire – David Murphy
• Durham Castle – Jo Coupe
• Head Of Steam, Darlington – Cath Campbell
• Kirkleatham Museum, Redcar – Grennan and Sperandio
• Pannett Art Gallery, Whitby – Pippa Hale
• The Workhouse Museum, Ripon – Catherine Bertola
• Shandy Hall, Yorkshire – Anne Vibeke Mou
• Thackray Medical Museum, Leeds – Irene Brown

Mapping Contemporary Art in the Heritage Experience

Arts&Heritage is a core partner in this three-year interdisciplinary research project (2017-19) funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).  

Mapping Contemporary Art in the Heritage Experience is an interdisciplinary research project that critically examines the role and practice of temporary visual art commissioning within heritage properties in Britain today, mapping the current landscape and exploring the impact of this activity on its producers and audiences. It approaches this subject from multiple perspectives, bringing together the knowledge and experience of scholars, artists, heritage professionals, volunteers and visitors.

This is a three-year research project (2017-19) funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). The project is delivered in collaboration with UK heritage partners The National Trust, The Churches Conservation Trust and English Heritage.

Public outputs from this research project included the production of five new commissioned artworks at heritage property sites in North East England throughout 2018, a major international conference on contemporary art in heritage practice and an exhibition at The Hatton Gallery in Newcastle in 2019.

For further information please visit the MCAHE website.