Protest and Resistance map at Toxteth Library

In August 2012 we contributed to the Nerve Centre libraries tour a sound installation and world map on which visitors were invited to record protests, strikes, movements and acts of resistance that have occurred since 2008 in response to the capitalist crisis, from library closure protests to the Chilean student uprising.

MAMA / Migrant Artists Mutual Aid

Since December 2011, Penny has been working as part of Migrant Artists Mutual Aid (MaMa), a network of people who come together to produce community cultural events that aim to promote cohesion and intercultural understanding while raising money for migrants in crisis.

MaMa recently contributed to Cartographies of Justice , a creative investigation into citizenship, migration and belonging with an eye on social and ecological justice. For the event, which took place at Liverpool Hope University, MaMa organised a Migrant Story Slam, bringing together the lively world of slam poetry and the high stakes reality of storytelling that is part of the lives of migrants, from passport control through asylum hearings to the check outs at supermarkets.

Open Media

In December 2011 we spoke at the concluding panel discussion of the Open Media research seminar series at The Meter Room in Coventry. It was initiated by Janneke Adema from Coventry University and featured James Wallbank from Access Space in Sheffield and artist Elly Clarke. Open Media was a year-long series of research seminars on the theme of openness in media in all its forms, all of the sessions are available as podcasts.

Culture LAB: Protest and Propaganda

In February 2012 we were part of a group of artists, groups and organisations taking part in a week of activity at Metal that included a series of talks, discussion, and the development of new work around issues relating to the London 2012 Olympics. Our research focussed on:
- privatisation and the Olympic park land grabs,
- British 'soft power' imperialism and the appropriation of art and sport as mechanisms of nationalism,
- the bio-politics of militarised Olympic security,
- and the mass-exploitation of volunteers in the context of a £ multi-billion global spectacle.

Through this research we are currently developing a new project to be presented at Metal's Village Green festival in Southend On Sea in June 2012.

Liverpool Culture in capitalist crisis

Sadly in December 2012 Wolstenholme Creative Space (WCS), one of Liverpool's oldest studio and DIY gallery and music venues closed its doors for the final time having been taken over by receivers dealing with the administration of a subsidiary of Liverpool property owning giants Frenson Ltd. As two of WCS's thirty studio holders we gathered to say goodbye to the space with representatives from independent art and music venues MelloMello, the Kazimier and Static which are all faced with a similar situation having recently been handed over to the receiver company dealing with the property developer's debts.

Fred Lonidier, International Arts and Trade Union activist

Free lecture: 7.30pm, 12.12.11, Liverpool.
Fred Lonidier is one of the leading pioneers, from the late 1960s onwards, of the arts and trade union movement in the USA. His work continues to deal with the possibilities of photography applied to trade union campaigns for social justice, labour history, and social change. His work has recently focused on workers rights and cross-border labor struggles and solidarity between U.S. and Mexican workers. In Marxian terms, Lonidier considers his work to be "economistic" in that it is framed around worker/owner relations and struggles. This comes from a long interest in the issue of international working class solidarity which is what brings him to the UK on this occasion.

Coordinated by Daniel Simpkins in association Littoral Arts Trust and the Centre for Lifelong Learning, University of Liverpool.