Embracing the Messiness: A Creative Approach to Participatory Arts Evaluation

This article advocates for an approach to evaluation for participatory arts that privileges creative risk-taking into their design and considers some of the leaps of knowledge and discovery that can ensue when they are embraced and encouraged by the research team. By examining the methods used to research the London-based participatory project Unleashed (Barbican Centre, 2012), it considers how a creative, durational approach to research and evaluation methods might support the leaps in knowledge that result from moments of “failure” or “decomposition” (Hughes et al. 2011), and in turn, paint a clearer and more detailed picture of the modes of disruption that sit at the heart of the practice. This paper reflects on the narrative of social inclusion set forth by recent UK governments and cultural policy agendas in which critical reflection is often challenging.