Last month, Kids’ Own presented at the Arts in Society conference, which was held in Lisbon. Acting Creative Director, Alice Lyons, and Researcher Bryonie Reid, presented on our long-term, virtual artist-in-residency project, Virtually There, which has been running since 2007. At present, eight schools across Northern Ireland are working with eight artists from North and South and further afield. The project supports artists to connect from their studios with teachers and children in the classroom, engaging in contemporary art practice that stems from the artists’ own studio practice.

Bryonie has been carrying out longitudinal action research on Virtually There, which will be published and disseminated in Spring 2020. The Arts in Society conference was an important opportunity to present some of this research, and there was a great deal of interest in the project and research.

To read more about the Virtually There project, please see the Virtually There website.