Re-positioning practice, place and people through virtual teaching of socially engaged art

The research considers how virtual education for socially engaged artists opens new spaces for understanding art making, place and space through comparative case studies of well-established practices within communities who have affinities with the Highlands and Islands, culturally, economically and geographically. These include universities who have well-established practices teaching socially engaged art and who use virtual tools within communities who have affinities with the Highlands and Islands culturally, economically and geographically, including Sherkin Island off the west coast of Ireland, Finnish Lapland and British Columbia, Canada (Emily Carr School of Art), where the insea2019 conference takes place and the researcher is giving a presentation. The project seeks to find out: 1) Whether, and if so, how is the use of virtual tools contributing to changing practices in the field of social art practice? 2) How are these programmes navigating material and immaterial approaches, global movements of ideas, and perceptual shifts in the field? 3) How do socially engaged artists navigate shared or hybrid identities, experimental ideas and place-based consciousness as we progress further into the 21st century?