Deep Thinking and Creative Practice: A Symposium

This symposium is made up of a film screening, a panel discussion and a participatory audience discussion that together explores how neurodivergent characteristics of thinking and feeling deeply impacts creative practice and looks forward at ways we find ourselves in the world. The panel is made up of practitioners Celia Burbush, Katie Elphinstone, Cate Ross and Patricia Paolozzi Cain.

We are artists whose work is shaped by the thinking deeply typical of neurodivergence. We engage in curious questioning as part of our creative process, often stepping outside our material processes. We are drawn into thinking about our thinking as we create. This thinking enlarges the context of our creativity, leading to questions like, “How does our individual expression find a place in our community?” and, “Can my community benefit from the thinking behind my art?”

The panel for this symposium is:

Celia Burbush – our host/curator – a community artist and doctoral researcher re-theorising aesthetics

Katy Elphinstone – Autistic advocate who writes about autism and raising neurodivergent children (How to Raise Happy Neurofabulous Children). She considers David Bohm’s Weavers and concluders: the process of weaving and the dynamic way things form: neurodivergent self-talk and how this is viewed/received.

Cate Ross – Artist, Autist and Creative Development Educator. She considers the art of painting in the dark and intuitive approaches to self-expression: Thought as the primary creative act: Defining art practice through acknowledgment of true self.

Patricia Paolozzi Cain – Visual artist, scholar and author (Drawing: The Enactive Evolution of the Practitioner). Considers the intersection of spirituality, cognition and art practice: The impact of giving oneself up as the ‘uncarved block: What place for the artist being themselves in this way and has left the room? – Implications for future/ thinking spaces.