Arts Council Toowoomba seeks wider vision through weekend workshop

After a decade responding to drought with Avant Garden and the 2011 floods with ACT Waterways, Arts Council Toowoomba (ACT) is inviting artists from the wider Toowoomba region (including smaller townships) and members of other Local Arts Councils to explore our identity as individuals and members of changing communities.

ACT volunteers, proudly supported by Toowoomba Regional Council, have developed a weekend workshop, Creating Our Futures, on 6 and 7 August, where representatives of Local Arts Councils and artists can forge closer relationships by developing their stories in visual forms.

Participants can take time to reflect on their past and consider the future of arts and cultural development in our region, guided initially by Stephen Clark, via an online survey before the workshop.

‘Stephen is a highly experienced consultant and advisor working extensively around the State in arts and cultural development, tourism and special event planning and management,’ explained ACT President, Jennifer Wright (Summers).

‘He will gather the ideas identified in the online survey and re-present those to the workshop group for initial creative response and further expansion.’

‘Then, over the weekend of 6-7 August, Therese Flynn-Clark will assist participants to Tell their own stories in visual forms that express identities and visions for the future.’

Therese Flynn-Clarke is a Flying Arts tutor who uses mediums that reflect deep connection to place. This earned her a position in the 2012 Double Vision Artist Exchange programme between Logan City Council, Qld and Onkaparinga Council, S.A. She creates work using recycled materials as well as plant fibres and won first prize for her large installation of ‘Moths of the Caldera’. Therese is a prolific and committed artist as well as a tutor and teacher, and a respected member of many community arts groups and events. www.thereseflynnclarke.com

‘Arts Council Toowoomba hopes that one of the outcomes of the weekend will be a series of touring and/or concurrent Symbolic Self exhibitions,’ Jennifer added.

These exhibitions would be held in 2017 and would be a collaboration among several galleries in the region. They would showcase the diversity and similarities of individual creative artists and LACs in the broader Toowoomba area.   

Registrations for the weekend workshop close on 26 July and enrolment forms can be obtained by contacting  Arts Council Toowoomba by email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.  or phone 0415 883 345.