Dispassions: Class Struggle in Arts & Culture

Variant magazine will host the launch of the latest magazine issue by Notes From Below, Dispassions: Class Struggle in Arts & Culture. The issue commissioned workers in Britain, France and Canada to write and reflect on their experiences of work and organising from across the arts & culture sector. It includes contributions from gallery assistants, stage actors, game designers and freelancers, capturing a snapshot of the current state of activity and organisation in the sector, with a particular focus on struggles around funding, outsourcing, and Palestine solidarity.

Placing the worker at the centre of analysis, the launch event at Broadside aims to foster discussion on the direction of rank-and-file activity within the arts and cultural sectors. Notes from below will explain their methodology, rooted in class composition analysis and workers’ inquiry, before discussing the magazine contributions in more detail. There will also be space to exchange testimonies and experiences across different cities and contexts, fostering the construction of new relations between cultural workers, sharpening understanding of workplace organising, and composing a more coordinated and militant workers’ movement in arts and culture.

Print copies of ‘Dispassions’ will be available on the night for £5.