Biografia

Abi is a Senior Lecturer in Arts Management and Cultural Policy based at the Institute for Cultural Practices, University of Manchester. Her research concerns local cultural policies, cultural institutions and their impact on and contingent relationship with place.  She has a background in research management, impact assessment and research commissioning for evidence-based policy, and a Phd in Popular Culture and Society which looked at the role of local music industries and communities in urban cultural development.  Recent research on the project Arts Humanities Research Council (AHRC) ‘Understanding everyday participation – articulating cultural values’ explores everyday participation in public parks, their role as civic institutions and their contribution to historic and contemporary cultural governance. Abi is also a co-investigator at the AHRC Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre (www.pec.ac.uk), focusing informal creative education and creative industries policies relating to city-regional devolution. She is currently on research sabbatical.

Projecte

At Faber I will be thinking about how cultural institutions foster participation and cultural democracy, with a focus on museums located in public parks. Museums and parks are common components of urban fabric, with intertwined histories as civic institutions which serve cultural policy functions as sites of participation and managed assembly. My research explores the synergies and tensions between these two public spaces, which can enhance public value and democratic potential. I hope to refine forthcoming fieldwork plans, to write a book proposal, and to engage in many rich conversations about cultural institutions, their pasts and futures with other residents.