Golden Thread Gallery
Botanic Gardens, Belfast, BT1 6EA
19 September 2024
Convened by Mary Stevens
Exploring Equity, Diversity and Inclusion issues and creating a roadmap for organisational
change is essential to our work at Golden Thread Gallery (GTG). This seminar was designed to
be an open conversation with key individuals on how to properly diversify our programme,
our stories, and the people telling them. We invited four curators, artists and cultural
leaders to share their experiences and clarify the bias and structural challenges here with
an invited group of participants and representatives from Northern Irish arts
organisations.
We heard from Dr Azadeh Sobout, a research fellow at Queen’s University Belfast who is
developing an action research project on the role of storytelling and creative practices in
documenting urban change; Fatemeh Jeetun, a Parent Support Officer for Fane Street
Primary School in Belfast, who works with parents of school children to promote better
social cohesion, learning and support; Sinead O’Donnell, an artist who was diagnosed
as dyslexic in 2004 and has been researching identity within the disabled community as
an artist, educator and curator; and Consuelo Ortiz, an intercultural visual arts facilitator
from Colombia who works in Belfast.
Our speakers discussed issues around inclusion, racial barriers in NI and structural racist
behaviour, accessibility and the results of actions already taken by arts organisations in
NI. Participants then contributed to open discussion facilitated by GTG staff and our
invited speakers
