About us...

The Nottingham Community Artist Network is an Artist-led creative organisation that aspires to socially, creatively, and educationally enrich our local community through artist-led research, community artist training, and arts delivery and events.

A Little About Our Mission...

Our mission is simple. We are an organisation dedicated to the exploration of how the arts can be best facilitated, modelled and delivered towards positively impacting our local communities.

Using the arts as focus we aspire to socially, creatively and educationally enrich local communities, supporting, nurturing and facilitate active community engagement between the local community and Artist.

We achieve this through two main focuses

The first being direct artist-led research, consultating and engaging within local communities with a social, political and environmental focus.
The second being the and the training, developing and support of aspiring and already practicing community artists.

By focusing on these two areas we cultivate a growth of well-informed community arts workshops, sessions and events, that have direct impact and explore wider community issues through the arts.

Our Focus...

This is the CANtra

# Community Artists For Community Action

Our mission within our Artist-Led Community Research is to facilitate active engagement and consultation between the local community and our Artists.

Learning from our local communities is essential to our mission, and by providing a platform from which issues can be voiced, this helps us better understand how best we can response effectively to these issues using our own Arts practice. This research is crucial in forming strong relationships and in identifying pressing social, political and environmental issues that our local communities are facing.

The Arts are a powerful tool for engagement, and the Community Artists is in the best position to facilitate conversation and consultation within the community, with the vision of responding quickly and affectively to the issues raised, making active changes that promote positive, inclusive, community values and environments.

Centralised by the Nottingham C.A.N Artist Network, the training, development and support of aspiring and already operating community arts practitioners is an important part of our work.

The Artist Network hosts monthly workshops, where collectively artists come together to explore local community issues and a whole range of areas of community arts delivery from session planning, to dealing with challenging behaviour, funding, exploring teaching methods and learning styles. As an organisation we are actively looking to find artists from all disciplines and equipped them with the support, funding and knowledge of safe working practice where their community arts delivery will flourish, focusing heavily on their practice and how best it can positively impact community issues.

Informed by our artist-led research and delivered by artists involved in the training and development programs from the Nottingham C.A.N artist network, all of our workshops, sessions and events are designed to impact social, political and environmental community issues, with the arts at the heart of things.

Within our local communities their are many complex needs and factors that result in many people feeling isolated and excluded. We believe that everyone in our community deserves the access to the arts, and to enriching their social and cultural capital, regardless of their geographical location, financial status, gender, sexuality, or race. We believe that the arts can create more unified, happy communities providing safe working creative spaces where members of the community are free to express themselves, socialise, access to the arts, collectively explores issues and topics and also individually develop creativity.

Our Directors

Trekkah Benjamin has a wealth of experience within the delivery and management of community arts projects. He has 10-years experience of community arts delivery and youth work, working in fulltime employment and freelance positions for leading community arts and youth organisations in Nottingham such as Nottinghamshire YMCA, Send Project, Confetti Studios, Circle of Light and the Arts Council. He is experienced at designing, managing, delivering and evaluating a vast portfolio of projects for nationally recognised funders such as the Heritage Lottery Fund, BBC Children in Need, National Foundation for Youth Music, Department of Education, The Arts Council, European Social Fund, Media box, Nottingham City and County Council.

Within his work he has engaged with a diverse spectrum of participants through a varied mixed of creative arts and digital medias. He has experience managing, delivering and providing training for aspiring community artists and within all his work displays a clear understanding, passion and vision of how best to creatively engage with hard to reach, socially excluded participants, using the Arts.

Nathaniel Wilson, founder of Nottingham creative-hub Mimm Stores and the architect behind award-winning venue Nottingham Street Food Club. Nathaniel combined the worlds of fashion, food, music and art, creating a unique, independent clothing brand, audio-visual events and a community radio station. Nathaniel was instrumental in introducing local artists such as Yazmin Lacey, Snowy, Medikul & Congi, to Gilles Peterson’s (BBC 6 Music) ‘Future Bubblers’ program, where all acts positively developed their careers. Throughout Nathaniel’s 10 years within the creative industry he has been passionate about the development and support of young black creatives within Nottingham and through the Mimm brand offers mentoring and support for up and coming artists. Recently the Mimm Store has upgraded all clothing materials to ethically sourced, sustainable fabrics made in fair wear factories. This change now aligns Mimm with their ethos, and the level of respect and care they feel for our global community.

Standing with the creatives, the artists and the musicians, with the belief they are all essential to a healthy community, we are delighted to have the guidance, support and partnership with Nathaniel on the Nottingham C.A.N Directors Board.

Georgina Brierley is the founder of leading Nottingham social media marketing brand ‘The Social Teacup’. As an intuitive social media and online business coach, she specialises in creating high-engagement content, that through her online coaching cultivates support local brands to grow their online community and reach their full potential.

Since ditching her 9-5 job and becoming fully freelance in 2018, she has coached 100+ business owners, elevating their brands and orchestrating a streamline plan for online success. With experience working in events management with the health and well-being industry, undertaking a degree in Psychology and travelling to India to complete her Yoga teaching qualification, we are delighted to have to Georgina on our Board of Directors, guiding and supporting our organisation and brand.

Advisory Board

Dr Frances Howard is a Senior Lecturer in Youth Studies at Nottingham Trent University. She had previously worked in local authorities, arts education and youth work. She undertakes evaluations for arts, youth and community projects and her research interests include youth arts programmes, community development and music-making and wellbeing.

Maddy is Production Manager at one of Nottingham’s most loved music venues, The Bodega and local Promoter for DHP Family. Here she oversees the running of the venue, organising of live events and bookings for festivals and Women in Music Notts. Maddy is also a musician, DJ, and co-run’s Phlexx Records, one of Nottingham’s biggest emerging independent record labels.

Andre helps disadvantaged young people who are not in education, employment or training to overcome barriers, find their motivation and progress into employment or education while using a combination of outreach and mentoring to affect positive change in young people’s lives.

Dominika is a founder and editor of the global magazine Rising Issue, a platform shining light on social and community issues. As an avid mental health advocate, Dominika uses her platforms to speak out about her values and beliefs. She also works as a graphic designer and a digital marketing consultant with experience in the fashion, beauty and lifestyle industries.

Co-founder and director of RISE Learning Zone CIC, a small educational social enterprise that works with vulnerable teenagers coping with the effects of infant and childhood trauma, usually through abuse, neglect, exploitation or bereavement. RISE was founded in 2015 and is the culmination of 20 years working in community arts, youth work, and education.

Our Amazing Partners

Nottingham CAN ethos is all about collaboration, checkout and support the amazing organisations that we partner with.
If you would like to get involved contact us