Eighteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

In this paper, I will draw on my ongoing doctoral research to propose an inductive arts-based research method called Community-Based Research-Creation, which welcomes members of the public to engage in guided artistic making to create their own works of research-creation. Many arts-based research practices engage the public to share in the creation of meaning through interviews, artistic intervention and collaborative making. However, these projects’ artistic outcomes are often realized by the artist-researcher alone. This method extends the logic, ethics and frameworks of oral history–which takes the interviewee as the expert in the research–to artist-researchers, who under the right conditions can welcome the public to create works of research-creation. I argue these conditions can be readily created in community art classrooms, where one can work with participants for prolonged periods to introduce the concepts of the research, build skills and help develop their own ideas and artistic projects responding to a given subject. Ideally, this research is less extractive, leaving participants with a fulfilling learning experience and a larger stake in the study. Using student examples in multiple mediums from my own teaching, I propose interpretive frameworks, ethics and how works might be used in a larger study, and how the manner of engagement requires an open mind on the part of the researcher to share in meaning-making. In my view, this method offers arts-based researchers a powerful option to engage communities and to diversify the perspectives and practices in the artistic component of the study.