Artist residency 2023

The Regen Art Lab’s artist residencies are interdisciplinary collaborations between our clean energy experts and UK-based, early career artists.

This artist residency ran from November 2022 till April 2023.

Get in contact with the project manager, Sophie, at swhinney@regen.co.uk with any questions.

This year’s themes:

Energy democracy, community energy, and the power grid

The energy transition away from fossil fuels, to a net zero and just energy system, is a societal paradigm shift – undoubtedly a powerful discussion topic in which there are infinitely many exciting, multifaceted, topics to explore. This year we are focusing on theme of “energy democracy, community energy, and the power grid”:

As part of our mission to transform the energy system, we believe we can only decarbonise at the speed and scale necessary if we bring people with us.
Some communities have taken collective action to address climate change through delivery of community-led renewable energy, and other sustainbility and fuel poverty alleviation projects. These organisations have consistently acted as the social conscience of the energy system, holding the wider sector to account and help ensure a just transition where no one is left behind.
Our power grid – the wires that deliver electricity to our door every day – have a critical role to play to get us to a zero carbon future whilst keeping costs down for people and enabling thriving communities and places in the UK.

What is Regen’s expertise on this theme? In response to these challenges, since 2015, we pioneered the Distributed Future Energy Scenarios (DFES) approach, an analysis based methodology that directly supports electricity and gas networks with long term strategy and network planning processes, at a localised level. We’ve supported and developed a network of community energy organisations across the UK for over 10 years, working on policy, innovation and direct support. Our 2019 paper Energy Networks for the Future, highlighted the need for a new partnership between the public and private sector to deliver the energy infrastructure needed to achieve net zero decarbonisation.

What was the brief? The residency brought together energy industry experts with an artist to work collaboratively on this topical theme. However, was not the aim of the residency that the final works are a mouthpiece for Regen’s views, nor the artists. We set a constraint on the artistic process to explicitly use of reference materials to create the artworks, to be collected during the residency via interviews and archives from a range of voices. The aim is that the final works offer a balanced view of this complex, nuanced topic – holding a mirror to society, and inviting the viewer to make their own opinions.

What were the outcomes of the residency?

SOUNDING CONNECTIONS: An audio collage of energy and democracy dialogues

Listen to the online, interactive soundpiece

Art launch and Q&A

To listen to the works live together, for the first time, we came together via zoom.

Blog: Behind the scenes of SOUNDING CONNECTIONS

An interview with the collaborators on what they learned from the experience, what it means for the future of interdisciplinary collaborations, and how to connect the dots on the medium of sound and the topic of energy.

Meet the artist, Cameron Naylor

Cameron is a sound and digital media artist working with sound and technology. His works combine field recording, interview material, and archival audio with emerging technologies. For example, dataset to sound sonification, machine listening, and fluid corpus manipulation.

Cameron uses the sound art to tell stories, and express data in a novel and accessible way. His audio works have spanned a range of topics, such as religious viewpoints, technologies both old and new, climate disasters, as well as spoken word, and sound for theatre.

Read Cameron's introductory blog

How is the residency structured?

We will be looking to extend this residency by applying for additional funding. We are open to working with more partners on this, so please get in touch if you are interested.

The first 5 weeks of the residency is focused on research and gathering reference material. Guided by experts, the artist conducts research on the theme and collects relevant reference material. By the end of the 5 weeks, a final art concept is selected.
The second 5 weeks of the residency is focused on the collaborative exchange between the energy experts and the artist as they develop the artworks.

The residency is rounded up with an reception event exhibiting the final works with a Q&A session showcasing the collaborative experience.