Story

University of the Arts London announces 5 postgraduates awarded British Council Venice Fellowships

Written byKatie Moss
Published date 11 April 2024

**Image: Outside the British Pavilion at Venice, 2022. © Cristiano Corte, British Council**

University of the Arts London is delighted to announce that five UAL postgraduate students have been selected to take part in the 2024 British Council Venice Fellowships Programme - through partnerships with Decolonising Arts Institute and London College of Communication.

The fellows will spend a month in Venice during the world’s most important art and architecture biennales, alongside 63 other creative students and professionals from 40 UK Higher Education Institutions. During this time, they will develop personal creative projects and engage audiences as ambassadors at the British Pavilion.

The British Council Venice Fellowships Programme is a scheme which activates and enriches world-renowned exhibitions at the Venice Biennale. The Fellowships Programme is a key part of the British Council’s presence in Venice, supporting the exhibition programme as well as being a platform for the development of new creative careers and future leaders.

The Fellowship offers a unique opportunity for emerging creatives to represent the UK on an international level whilst broadening their perspective, making connections and developing their creative practice.

Find out more about the Venice Fellowships Programme.

As a British Council Venice Fellowship Programme Partner, the Decolonising Arts Institute aims to support our Fellows’ personal and professional development through this incredible opportunity to see and embed themselves in a significant, high profile national and international artworld context, that might otherwise seem inaccessible. Freya and Caitlin will be able to network with communities of practice and other creatives at different stages and levels of career, while also developing their own research and practice. They will be mentored by two DeAI Associates, Dr Pratap Rughani (Professor in Documentary Film and Associate Dean of Research, LCC) and Erika Tan (artist and MA Fine Art Course Leader, CSM). We look forward to hosting a showcasing event next year to bring their insights and reflections back to the local, national and international creative communities of UAL.

— Dr susan pui san lok, Director UAL Decolonising Arts Institute

LCC’s International Office is thrilled to be able to support three Fellows from the College as they participate in the Venice Biennale with the British Council this summer. Ray, Hannah, and Crystal will be able to develop their creative practices through networking, as well as through their research projects that they have proposed for the duration of their Fellowship in Venice. This is an incredible opportunity for students to gain international experience, to explore their research themes from a new perspective, and to work with an international audience both within and outside of the scope of their practice. We look forward to following Ray, Hannah, and Crystal’s journeys as Venice Fellows.

— Tom Webb, Director of International Partnerships at London College of Communication

Meet the 5 Fellows

Hannah Kemp-Welch | London College of Communication

I'm a socially-engaged artist; I often work collaboratively with community groups through a relational practice. I enjoy collecting intriguing sounds through field recording and I have recently become obsessed with risoprinting zines. I'm currently a PhD student at University of the Arts London, working on a project titled 'Listening in Socially-Engaged Art: Artistic Strategies for Equitable Collaboration'.

Caitlin Shepherd | Decolonising Arts Institutes

I’m deeply interested in how money, work, our bodies, education and health shapes access to secure and equitable employment, and everything that is enabled (or not) through secure and fairly paid work. My PhD (2015 - 2023) examined how intersectional working-class experience is excluded from socially engaged art (and the creative industries at large) and studied how convivial listening practices might help to better understand and challenge such inequities and exclusions.

I’m interested in how we listen together, and how this might offer a form of giving attention, a form of listening to stories often erased, played down, or muted. I’m currently prototyping listening rituals, using a range of listening practices and processes. I’m interested in listening as a radical act of giving attention and platforming stories of disquiet, breakdown, refusal, and resistance; especially from precarious and revolting bodies - bodies no longer able to take compounded and complex pressures of systemic inequity.

Freya Shi | Decolonising Arts Institute

I am a graduate student at UAL Central Saint Martins studying the Master of Research program in Exhibition Studies, with a background in computer science, literary studies, film studies, and philosophy. My research institutes critical theory, media theory, cultural studies, and queer theory and I am interested in alternative ways to form knowledge, to tell history, to imagine the future, and to intervene with our present of the Anthropocene. I am also an astrologer, a mezzo-soprano, a percussionist, a string player, a tarot reader, and a yogi. I especially value the potential of sound, music, myths and games to heal, to assemble, and to subvert hegemonic modes of being and I hope to incorporate these practices within my academic projects.

Ray Sims | London College of Communication

I'm a filmmaker and writer, working with ideas about the body in translation, archive, and conjuring physical spaces through film and text. Film archiving exposed me to the materiality and physical nature of film; I'm interested in how film as a medium can convey tangibility and touch. I'm currently taking part in a choreography course at Siobhan Davies Studios and I hope to begin using dance and performance as part of my practice.

Crystal Zheng | London College of Communication

I am Crystal Lezhi Zhang, currently a PhD candidate at University of the Arts London. I am also a product designer, artist, lecturer, researcher, writer, workshop leader and third-country kid. My life's narrative has unfolded against the backdrop of "London-based, Guangzhou-born, and Vancouver-raised", weaving a rich tapestry of experiences that profoundly shape my value. Within the realm of interdisciplinary design, my research and creation extend to pedagogical methods, eco-social justice, circularity design, design for social innovation, and education for sustainability. Drawing inspiration from food, dialogue, form, shape, colours, sound, material, texture, multisensory experiences, and the intricate interplay between the human and non-human, my works seek to evoke connections with our surroundings.