Inclusive Art for Wicked Problems: Innovating Creative Methods for Systems Change with Learning Disabled Artists and Their Facilitators

Value

£1927011.35 (FEC)

Partners and collaborators

Pyramid; Dr Viviane Sarraf; São Paulo Museum of Modern Art, Brazil; ActionSpace; Blue Room; Project Art Works

Description

This Fellowship builds on the Dr Jade French’s extensive work in inclusive arts, a collaborative practice where learning disabled and/or autistic artists create with professional support. This project aims to develop a new method of Systemic Action Research (SAR) enriched by inclusive arts, facilitating learning disabled and/or autistic artists to address systemic social, health, and economic inequalities, referred to as "wicked problems."

Key activities include:

• Collaborating with Pyramid, a Leeds-based inclusive arts studio, to support learning disabled and/ or autistic artists in conducting their own research.
• Establishing an inclusive arts studio in partnership with the São Paulo Museum of Modern Art, enhancing global exchange in arts-based activism and pedagogy.
• Connecting research findings to UK policy debates and decision-making to drive structural change.

Key contributions:

1. Methodological Innovation – Integrating inclusive arts into SAR to make research accessible and led by learning disabled and/or autistic artists.
2. Empirical Insight – Generating transformative knowledge through participatory inquiry into what helps learning disabled and/or autistic artists thrive.

The Fellowship supports international collaboration, slow scholarship, and leadership grounded in equity and inclusive knowledge systems. It ultimately asks whether inclusive art can help reimagine systems and address complex societal challenges.

Impact

This project addresses the deep-rooted exclusion, discrimination, and stigma faced by learning disabled and autistic people. By positioning learning disabled and autistic people not merely as subjects but as producers of knowledge, the project challenges entrenched systemic barriers and promotes inclusive, participatory research.

Aligned with national priorities, including the NHS Long Term Plan (2019) and legislative reforms such as the Draft Mental Health Bill, ongoing effects of COVID-19, access to higher education, the project contributes to policy efforts aimed at ending discriminatory practice. It resonates with the government’s 2022 Building the Right Support for people with a learning disability and autistic people action plan, which calls for long-term change through meaningful involvement of people with lived experience.

The project’s third phase will explicitly focus on collaborating with social care and policy practitioners to support systemic change, improving how services engage with and support learning disabled people. This work directly supports UKRI’s 2022–27 strategy principles of diversity, connectivity, resilience, and engagement by fostering international knowledge exchange, capacity building, and inclusive research practices.

Ultimately, the project aims to shift how research and policy are shaped, centering learning disabled and autistic people’s voices to develop more equitable systems. It contributes to the UKRI’s goal of “research by everyone, for everyone,” with an emphasis on structural and systemic transformation, both within academia and beyond.

Project website

Irregular Art School - Pyramid | Inclusive Arts Collective; Irregular Art Schools