Museums, Artists & Communities: Towards Empathetic Creative Practice Symposium

In a period marked by austerity, precarity and widening inequities, museums are increasingly required to articulate — and demonstrate — their role as civic learning institutions. As creative workers, audiences, and community partners navigate unstable economic and social conditions, museum learning and education teams are uniquely positioned to champion inclusive pedagogies, equitable access, and artist-led approaches to cultural participation.  

Empathy is a core element of creative and artistic practice: Artists engage empathetically with materials, histories, collaborators and audiences. Museum educators facilitate empathetic encounters between people, objects and ideas. Collections hold layered human stories — of making, labour, migration, power, care, innovation and resistance. By activating collections as sites of creativity rather than static archives, museums can foster practices of listening, dialogue and shared meaning-making.  

Rooted in museum learning practice, this two-day symposium brings together international practitioners to examine how museums can foster empathetic, ethical, and sustainable cultures of learning. Through artist testimonies, case studies, and dialogue-based sessions, we explore how museums can function as safe, generative spaces for creative risk-taking, curiosity, and informal learning — particularly for young people seeking alternative pathways into the creative industries.  

Please click ‘Download programme’ link to the right for the call for papers and more information.
Transportation and accommodation will be provided for invited speakers.