FOREWORD 13
announcing ‘It is we, the artists, who will serve
you as avant-garde: the power of the arts is indeed
the most immediate and the fastest. We have
weapons of all kinds: when we want to spread new
ideas … for the force of the imagination is incalculable,
when it springs up in a direction of public
good.’ ⁶ Almost 200 years later we continue in this
tradition of challenging dominant conventions as
a call to social action.
Axisweb along with Social Art Network are leading
the way to connect the various voices of practitioners
across the country, offering platforms for
mutual discovery and appreciation. From Network
to Meshwork offers us a way in to understand the
complexity of the field and lays the groundwork
for how we can better create and collaborate in
the arts. Ravetz & Wright build upon their 2015
study of artists working outside the gallery system
to offer the wider sector a powerful testament to
social practice that is embedded with practitioners’
collective voices.
The words written here are not just for you,
or about you, but aim to be together with you.
6 Saint Simonian Olinde Rodrigues, ‘The Artist, the Scientist and
the Industrialist’ (last accessed 13th March 2020) http://www.
artandpopularculture.com/L%27artiste%2C_le_savant_et_l%27industriel