DASH

Join us tomorrow for our ‘In Conversation Creative Practice in the Home’ event with artist Grace Currie, DASH Creative Producer Lucy Mounfield and Curator Ila Colley. ✨ This is a fantastic opportunity to get to know the artist Grace Currie whose short film is featured in our exhibition: ⚡Troublemakers and Prophets, Elizabeth Allen and Other Visionary Artists Together, we’ll discuss the exhibited artwork, creative practice within the home and how we can embrace art and creativity as a form of self expression. 💛 This event is FREE to attend online and in-person if you are a member or with a valid admission. When? 🗓️ Tomorrow ⏰ 2-3:30pm 🤝 In collaboration with @dashdisabilityarts 💡For more info and to book your tickets click the link in bio

EVENT This weekend ... Creative Practice in the Home Event Where: @comptonverney Event Date: Saturday 9 May 2026 Time: 2pm – 3.30pm This is a hybrid event; attend in person at Compton Verney, and join in remotely via Zoom. Join the artist Grace Currie, Creative Producer at DASH, Lucy Mounfield and the curator of Troublemakers and Prophets, Ila Colley to discuss the exhibited artwork and Grace’s experiences of a creative practice within the home, and how this relates to Elizabeth Allen. This event is part of DASH’s Home Based Situated Practice programme (HBSP) that provides opportunities and support for visual artists who encounter access barriers to bricks-and-mortar galleries. See @comptonverney or the DASH bio for more details and how to book. *Please note that reimbursement of bursary tickets will now take place early next week. #HomeBasedPractice #DisabilityArts #DASH #ArtsPractice #DisabledArtists Image Credit: © Compton Verney and Jamie Woodley Image description: A dark gallery space, a film is projected onto a wall to the right. Appearing on the film is artist Grace. She is seated in her studio and sips a cup of tea. Her blue work clothes are splattered wih paint.

OPEN CALL! @johnhansardgallery are seeking Expressions of Interest from disabled artists living and working within a 40-mile distance to John Hansard Gallery who are interested in collaborating with Occupational Therapy and Engineering students from @uni_southampton . This is an opportunity for one artist to make or adapt tools to support their artistic practice. The creations will be displayed in an exhibition with John Hansard Gallery, curated by Jess Starns as part of the Future Curators Programme. Future Curators is a residency programme for Disabled curators working within mainstream visual arts institutions. Grounded in disability justice, the programme was founded by @dashdisabilityarts . Artist fee: £2,000 (including up to four meetings with students), plus travel expenses, access costs and materials budget to be defined. Artists are invited to attend an Information Session on Monday 11 May in person or online to find out more about the opportunity before applying. Booking links in the @johnhansardgallery bio, or call 023 8059 2158. Deadline for applications: Monday 25 May 2026 For more information see the John Hansard Gallery website or view the bio @johnhansardgallery #ArtsOpps #OpenCall #Southampton @uos_engagement @outsidein_uk @disabilityarts #FutureCuratorsProgramme #FCP Image: Outlandish, installation view, John Hansard Gallery, 2025. Photo: Reece Straw Alt-text: An image of two people holding a sign saying 'Shhh...! We are not really disabled', mounted on a piece of plywood.

↪️ We are excited to announce that our "ND Inclusion Guide - How should organisations support freelance neurodivergent artists?" is now live on the @dashdisabilityarts website. 🔗 You can download the guide for free via the link in DASH’s bio and get in touch with us to request an Easy Read or other format. ♾️ The guide was co-created with neurodivergent creatives and offers clear, practical advice for organisations working with freelance neurodivergent artists. Grounded in lived experience, it shares simple, realistic ways to make recruitment, planning and day to day working processes more inclusive. 🙌 A heartfelt thank you to Carol Reid, Grace O'Malley, Isaac Boothman, Jennifer Gilbert, Josephine Reichert, Kate DeRight, Katerina Pushkin, Liz Leck, Rachael Lines, Richard Hayhow, Robin Jax and Tyriq Baker, who gave their time, energy and expertise to make this guide a reality. @open_theatre_co @bits.of.pieces @j_lgallery @spectraartscompany @cuckoosia @ty_yo_lace_ @kpmusictheatre @frontlinedance1 @robinplayschords Image Credit: Mehvish Rehman @thetravellersyndrome Image Alt text: Two people stand side by side in an art gallery, facing a wall of colourful, abstract paintings in wooden frames. They appear to be discussing or reflecting on the artworks together.

We're welcoming several new faces to the DASH family this month. Find out who's who in the May DASH newsletter - link in bio. Images: A carousel of images featuring artworks by disabled and Neurodivergent artists and photo portraits of new DASH colleagues and associates. #ArtsNews #DisabilityArtsNews

DASH are pleased to welcome Lou Mensah to our Board of Trustees. Lou is a photographer and writer whose practice spans criticism, audio, and education. As a lecturer at Central Saint Martins, she has worked to centre access within arts education, bringing disabled and Global Majority perspectives into spaces that have historically excluded them. Lou is committed to education and advocacy as foundations of a fairer arts sector. She brings to the DASH board grounded institutional knowledge, a track record in communications and partnership-building, and the lived experience of navigating the barriers DASH works to remove. "DASH's work speaks directly to everything I care about in the arts: access, equity, and disabled artists having the conditions to build sustainable careers. I have spent three decades navigating the sector without the right conditions or infrastructure. I know what that costs, and what a difference it makes when the sector gets it right. I bring experience from working with organisations across the arts — from charitable foundations and education spaces to major institutions and arts organisations, including Tate, the British Council, Hauser & Wirth, Frieze, and ActionSpace — alongside the ability to broker partnerships, build audiences, and make complex ideas accessible. I want to bring those skills to a board whose mission I believe in deeply, and to advocate for the artists who deserve the conditions and inspiration DASH works to create. " Lou Mensah Take a look at the DASH blog (link in bio) to find out more. Photo: Courtesy of the sitter Image: A head and shoulders photographic portrait of Lou Mensah. Her skin tone is light brown, and she has dark brown eyes. Her short, curly dark brown hair has subtle highlights and a fringe. She wears a navy blue, long-sleeved top. Her chin rests on her overlapping hands. Her head is facing slightly to her left and her eyes look in this direction too. She has a relaxed, happy, and engaged expression. #ArtsTrustee #DisabilityArts #ArtsEducation

Great news from previous DASH FCP Curator @aidanmoesby ! Over the next year thanks to the support of @thearthouseuk providing residency studio space and accommodation, plus access to their workshops - Print, Photography and Ceramics - and other general in kind support about career development, I am able to think about my new body of work exploring Air, Wind and Atmosphere through a neurodivergent lens. Thank you to @damonjacksonwaldock and @ameliabaron_art for their incredible support along the way. Other organisations who I am grateful to are @dashdisabilityarts @disabilityarts , @aceagrams and @shapearts for their current and future support in this process. Thanks also to @hannah_redlerhawes for agreeing to mentor me. I am once again looking forward to working with @kerryharker whose support over the years has been incredibly important both personally and professionally.

Following an open call for applicants, DASH x Wysing Arts Centre are pleased to announce Mariana Lemos @marianaamlemos as their Home-Based Future Curator, who will be joining their teams for the next 12 months. Mariana will co-develop and curate shared ways of working in digital/online spaces for DASH and Wysing Arts Centre, shaping it as a collaborative, accessible environment for artistic experimentation, storytelling, and international exchange. Mariana is a curator based in London, working across performance art, affect, and crip phenomenologies. Her curatorial approach is grounded in disability access and feminist methodologies. Mariana says: “I’m really pleased to be joining DASH and Wysing Arts Centre […] I’ve long admired the care, rigour and commitment both organisations bring to disability justice and experimental practice. I’m especially excited to develop transnational crip conversations across the UK and Europe, and to explore home-based and digital curating as spaces for collective thinking, speculation and solidarity.” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Future Curators Programme is designed and managed by DASH. It brings together seven partners from across the UK, to deliver opportunities in different regions for emerging disabled curators to work within visual arts organisations. The programme is generously funded by Arts Council England, Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, and the Art Fund. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Image: A head and shoulders, colour photographic portrait of Mariana Lemos. Mariana has shoulder length brown hair, dark brown eyebrows and brown eyes. She has tanned skin. She wears gold hooped earrings, a gold cross pendant on a chain around her neck, and a black and white horizontally striped scoop-necked top. #FCP #FutureCuratorsProgramme #DisabilityArts #Curators #HomeBasedPractice

Deadline tomorrow! @mimauseful is seeking an emerging disabled Future Curator to join its Programme Team. Application Deadline: 22 April 2026 Location: Middlesbrough/hybrid (remote and on-site at MIMA, Teesside University) Contract: Fixed-term, 12 months This role is part of the Future Curators Programme (FCP) led by DASH and is for a Disabled, Deaf or Neurodivergent curator. This is an exciting opportunity for a passionate individual with some experience of working in museums and galleries to join MIMA’s Programme Team. The curator will contribute to MIMA’s exhibitions, collections and public programme, developing curatorial research, supporting artists and projects and helping shape inclusive and engaging experiences for audiences. There will also be opportunities to explore and develop their own curatorial interests within MIMA’s programme. The role supports disability-led practice and aims to embed Disability Justice, access and anti-ableism within MIMA’s work and the wider arts sector. The Recruitment Pack is Screen Reader/Read Aloud enabled, with BSL interpretation embedded, alongside an Easier to Read version. Find the link in the @mimauseful bio. The Future Curators Programme is founded and led by @dashdisabilityarts in partnership with organisations across the UK, supporting Disabled curators to develop their practice within leading visual arts institutions. The programme is funded by Arts Council England, Esmée Fairbairn Foundation and the Art Fund. @aceagrams @esmeefairbairn @artfund #FutureCurators #CuratorJobs #ArtsJobs #DisabilityArts #InclusiveArts #MuseumJobs #MIMA #DASH #CreativeCareers

It’s been amazing collaborating with @dashdisabilityarts as part of our exhibition: Troublemakers and Prophets Elizabeth Allen and Other Visionary Artists. 💚 As part of our collaboration we commissioned talented home-based artist @gracecurrieart to produce a piece of work responding to our exhibition. Not only can you see the wonderful short film when visiting Troublemakers and Prophets but you can also meet the artist in our upcoming event: 🤝 In Conversation: Creative Practise in the Home Grace Currie along with DASH Creative Producer, Lucy Mounfield and our Curator Ila Colley will discuss the exhibited artwork and Grace’s experiences of her creative practise within the home. Join us: 🗓️ Sat 9 May, 2-3:30pm 🎟️ This is a hybrid event. You can attend online or in person at Compton Verney for free (with a valid day ticket or membership) 🔗 Click the link in bio for more info or search: ptonverney.org.uk 📸 Jamie Woodley

Introducing DASH’s Young Disabled Artists (YDA) Programme with Wysing Arts Centre and artist Louise Ashcroft 🎉 Louise Ashcroft is Wysing’s Young People’s Artist in Residence delivered in partnership with DASH as part of the Future Curators Programme (FCP). Wysing Arts Centre is a member of the FCP network. Louise will design and facilitate a series of workshops with young people at Wysing Arts Centre to take place every Thursday from 21 May for 5 consecutive weeks. The workshops will culminate in a multi-sensory sculpture trail of ‘hoax’ apparitions, activated on the evening of Thursday 25 June 6-8pm for friends and family of the young people involved. More about Louise Ashcroft: Louise Ashcroft (they/them) is an artist who uses fiction to ask difficult questions about society in playful ways; questions about how we live, who is in charge, and what we want to change. For more info, and for an audio description of the workshops, head to dasharts.org.uk or wysing.art 🔗 📸: Photo by Christa Holka Image 1:A portrait of a white person with long brown hair (just below the shoulder) looking at the camera and smiling slightly. They are wearing black trousers a white sports jacket with a neon red, purple and orange flecks of colour, and they are holding the zip pf the jacket with both hands. They stand in front of a grey photography studio backdrop in studio lighting. Image 2: A photo of Louise’s hand holding a small Apple. Their palm is facing up and a hole has been carved through the apple. Their index finger pokes through the hole and their other fingers point towards the sky. They’re outside in bright natural light. #dashdisabilityarts #youngdisabledartists #FutureCurators #FCP #DisabilityArt

We are excited to announce that Anne Forgan has joined DASH, working within the @cvanwestmidlands team as Project Manager for Creative Workspaces: A Research Project & Action-led Report for Birmingham. @anneforganart is a producer, project manager and artist based in Coventry. She has over thirty years experience of devising and producing collaborative projects and events across arts, craft, heritage and technology sectors. Anne’s work has had a consistent commitment to place and has frequently involved working with artists and communities to explore and celebrate aspects of a location. She has worked in sites as varied as a former slaughterhouse, an Ikea showroom, a cemetery and a medieval weavers house. She has been involved in organising a mass tree climbing event, a banquet in a disused industrial unit, an exhibition in a train station and a performance on canoes on Coventry canal. Working in unconventional spaces has given Anne a gritty determination to find ways to make good things happen and the ability to negotiate and make friends with unconvinced officials. Creative Workspaces: A Research Project & Action-led Report for Birmingham is an 18-month research project responding to a growing and urgent challenge across the city: the shortage and increasing fragility of affordable, accessible creative workspace for visual artists and makers. The project is supported by Arts Council England using public funding from the National Lottery, with additional support from Birmingham City Council and the West Midlands Combined Authority. To find out more follow @cvanwestmidlands or visit the website: cvanwestmidlands.co.uk #CreativeWorkspaces #WestMidlandsArtists #CVANWestmidlands