Playing for Time: Making Art as If the World Mattered - Paperback

by Lucy Neal (Author)

Now back in print... This groundbreaking handbook (first published in 2015 by Oberon and now needed more than ever in the face of multiple unfolding crises) is a resource for artists, community activists and anyone wishing to harness their creativity to make change in the world. Playing for Time explores the pivotal role artists play in re-thinking the future; re-inventing and re-imagining our world at a time of systemic change and uncertainty. Playing for Time identifies collaborative arts practices emerging in response to planetary challenges, reclaiming a traditional role for artists in the community as truth-tellers and agents of change. Fifty experienced artists and activists give voice to a new narrative - shifting society's rules and values away from consumerism and commodity towards community and collaboration with imagination, humour, ingenuity, empathy and skill. Inspired by the grass-roots Transition movement, modelling change in communities worldwide, Playing for Time joins the dots between key drivers of change - in energy, finance, climate change, food and community resilience - and 'recipes for action' for readers to take and try.

Author Biography

Lucy Neal is a theatre maker and writer exploring celebratory events that act as a catalyst for change. Co-founder Director of the influential London International Festival of Theatre (1981-2005), she has been active in the grassroots Transition movement in Tooting, SW London since 2008. Lucy tutors on The Arvon Writing Course Fierce Words and is a Trustee of the Aluna Foundation. She is author of The Great Imagining - how the arts spark cultural change in Zero Carbon Britain's Making It Happen and a founder 'declarer' of Culture Declares.