Episode 16 - Dissident artists

What is it like being a dissident artist in the UK right now? Two artists, Claudia Clare and Con-She, talk to artist Rachel Jordan about their art practices and what it is that makes them dissidents. Claudia Clare is a feminist artist who has exhibited widely within the UK and whose ceramics include works that challenge notions of gender, the sex trade, and religious fundamentalism. Con-She describes herself as a conscientious objector who makes artworks that push back against woke ideology in a wide array of forms, including video and text.In the episode, Claudia Clare who’s been a potter since the 1980s, describes some of her experiences over the past 14 years of having work withdrawn from exhibition, having invitations to exhibit revoked, seeing publicly funded opportunities disappear and essentially reaching the point of having to rethink her career.Con-She describes how finding herself caught in the game of art institutions’ identity politics drives her desire to make work that challenges it. Shunned both professionally and personally for her views on gender and disability, she has come out the other side fighting and makes art that directly confronts the ideologies that have been used to try and silence her.Claudia ClareView Claudia’s website and work here.Daily TelegraphCeramic artist Claudia Clare in cancel culture row after her arts college talk is axedDaily Mail Ceramic artist is CANCELLED over her 'gender-critical' viewsUnHerdCeramicist de-platformed for being a ‘SWERF’Con-She“Art must be free to be nuanced, complex, and un-didactic.” View Con-She's work here.The Wokely Round-up with Con-She - ‘A back-room broadcast covering news events from a sceptical viewpoint’.The Critic MagazineDisability is not an identity by Con-She Get full access to Arts First at artsfirst.substack.com/subscribe

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