UPDATE
With the COVID-19 pandemic, activities have been suspended or moved online. Follow my tweets here + here for updates. See here for news around my art-psychiatry commission #MagicCarpet, and here for archives of the RUN! RUN! RUN! Biennale, of which the 2020 edition was scheduled to run this year. The #MagicCarpet exhibition at the Manchester Craft and Design Centre has been shut ahead of its 4th April date, and the panel discussion cancelled. The Centre has however honoured the commission – so I will work with colleagues of Neurodiversity In/And Creative Research Network to redirect some of this funding for self-employed/early-career colleagues, in the form of a celebratory call for ideas/acts, Craftiness Against COVID-19. Look here for my other responses to and readings of the pandemic. Contact me if keen to chat/share., or if I can help in any way. Let us use the crisis as a catalyst for change for the better. Take care every body. With best wishes, Kai
2020
15 JANUARY 2020: Performance-Lecture. Manchester: Exceptional talent, the state of fun & islands of after death: On a body and mind in motion as a process of interrogation and intervention a world in motion (and commotion) – A performance-lecture. GO1, Sandra Burslem, All Saints Campus, Manchester M15 6BS. Kai can’t stay still – she has run, walked, swum, rolled, jumped, hopped and drowned. Here, she runs through how she has mobilised her hyperactive body (and mind) as a sight/site of expression, learning, protest and intervention, amid a volatile world. This talk is an invitation to contemplate the place of art and the artist, and the role of socially-engaged art in a world of closing borders and minds. An earlier edition was shared as a keynote lecture, Peter Scott Gallery 2018.
17 JANUARY: Film Screening & Discussion. Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience. London* ADHD, creativity and affective disorders: A discussion around myths, research and lived experience. This is a presentation for the MSc module Causes and Correlates of Affective Disorders. I will share 3 films, including Of Wanderings and Meanderings, which was in the Official Selection of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Research in Film Award. Invitation by Dr Patricia Zunszain. *This is not open to public. Email me if you wish to attend.
27 JANUARY: UCL London: Launch of book Colour & Poetry 18:00, Haldane Room. The book draws on The Nomenclature of Colours exhibition and making Colour & Poetry: A Symposium which I took part in by the invitation of Slade School of Fine Art Senior Lecturer Jo Volley.
30 JANUARY: Exhibition + publication launch. 5 MARCH: Discussion (with guests). Manchester: #MagicCarpet: Of wandering and weaving, of digits and the digital, of craft and craftiness. A tapestry by Kai Syng Tan. Public View: 30 January 18:00-20:00 Seminar: 5 March 18:00-20:00 Exhibition start date/end date: 30/01/20 – 04/04/20: Exhibition: 10am – 17.30 Monday – Saturday. Location: Manchester Craft and Design Centre, 17 Oak St Manchester M4 5JD. You’re invited to the award-winning art-science commission #MagicCarpet’s first solo exhibition in Manchester. Through a tapestry, film, badges and publication, this explores the notions of wandering (of the hyperactive mind and the restless body), weaving (of a tapestry; of ideas that clash and create new insights), digits (of the fingers that caress the tapestry), the digital (of iPad drawings; of Ada Lovelace’s computer programming; of the digital Jacquard loom), craft (on skills, on labour) and craftiness (of the place of the arts today). The panel discussion on 5/03 will be chaired by Kate Day with guest speakers. We will also launch a new publication, On Art, Neurodivesity & Giant Octopussies: Reflections on #MagicCarpet. This booklet documents my reflections of #MagicCarpet. It is my invitation for feedback, and participation for #MagicCarpet’s next adventures. With additional support by MMU’s Research in Arts & Humanities.
03 FEBRUARY: Presentation, Discussion & Launch. Reading: Launch of the Neurodiversity in HE research Network (title TBA). University of Reading. Invitation by Lecturer in Pharmacy Practice Dr Ranjita Dhital.
17-19 MARCH, Lecture and Masterclass, University Hospital Frankfurt, Germany: Invitation by Comorbid Conditions of ADHD (Coca), an EU Horizon 2020 funded project to study how ADHD relates to other conditions. Drawing on a recent project Sisterhood? (NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore 2019), I will explore with the neuroscientists, psychiatrists and psychologists around #ADHDwomen, and #ADHDart.
23 MARCH: Lecture and workshop, St Georges. London: Invitation by leading arts in health artist Dr Deborah Padfield. This workshop, around running as an artistic intervention, was first commissioned for a street festival in Grenoble, France 2016.
27 MARCH: Lecture and Masterclass, Edinburgh, Scotland: Invitation by Dr Linda O Keefe, Edinburgh College of Art. This new talk, entitled Ill-Disciplined: Creative, Neurodivergent Intervention and Leadership in Higher Education – A Manifesto, draws on my new book chapter (2019) in Beyond Borders? Articulations, provocations and performativities in Arts & Humanities research. Edited by Jacqueline Taylor et al (Birmingham City University, 2020/2021).
29 MARCH: Panel discussion, Berlin, Germany: Invitation and chaired by Professor of Psychiatry Philip Asherson. More details soon.
ALSO: book chapter “Run Riot in 8.5 Steps: Running as a Creative Mobile Toolkit for People of All Walks Today.” In Handbook on Methods and Applications for Mobilities Research, edited by Malene Freudendal-Pedersen, Monika Büscher, and Sven Kesselring. Edward Elgar Publishing.
APRIL 2021: Invited keynote lecture speaker, Health Service Research and Pharmacy Practice (HSRPP) conference, Reading University.
2019 AUTUMN ONWARDS
- 2019 December: New 55-page publication On Art, Neurodivesity & Giant Octopussies: Reflections on art-science commission #MagicCarpet, to be launched at the public view of Kai’s solo exhibition at the Craft and Design Centre on 30/1/2020 (until 4/4/2020), is available for download now as a PDF or viewable as a slideshow here. Publisher: King’s College London ISBN NUMBER 978-1-908951-28-1. It is her invitation for feedback, and participation for #MagicCarpet’s next adventures.
- 2019 October : 2019. ‘Running (in) Your City’. In Mobilities, Literature, Culture, edited by Marian Aguiar, Charlotte Mathieson, and Lynne Pearce, 1st ed. 2019 edition, 163–86. S.l.: Palgrave Macmillan.
- September: Wanderings and Meanderings
of the Mind and Body, a #MagicCarpet film poem, is an AHRC Research in Film Award finalist. Results announced in November at the British Film Institute, UK. The project has also been nominated for Sovereign Asian Art Award 2019, the largest and most established art prize in Asia Pacific. - September: Drawing from #MagicCarpet graces the cover of British Journal of Psychiatry (BJPSych). Published by Cambridge University Press since 1853 on behalf of The Royal College of Psychiatrists, it is one of the world’s leading psychiatric journals and read by all registered psychiatrists in the UK. Take a look at ‘Psychiageographies [Détournement] [Exquisite Corpse] [Parentheses]’ here.
- September 13: Film Brisk/Risks screened at 10 Years in UK Adult ADHD Network (UKAAN) Conference, which also featured the controversial truth-speaking Professor David Nutt, at the Mermaid Conference Centre, London UK
- September 14-30: Part II of Kai’s artist-in-residency in Singapore, at the NTU Centre for Contemporary Art. There were 2 public events: 20/9: Art After Dark open studio, and 26/9 talk. The talk was part of Residencies Insights and is entitled Sisterhood? How do we imagine a better way forward? Insights and provocations on gender and social change in the arts in Singapore and beyond, and co-creating a vision for tomorrow.Kai was joined by seminal Singapore feminist artist Amanda Heng and Singapore-based French artist-curator Veronique Sapin. Respondents: Professor CJ Wan-Ling Wee and Dr Fang Tze Hsu. Introduction by Dr Anna Lovecchio.
- September: RUN! RUN! RUN! Biennale cited in Dean of Leeds School of Art Professor Lisa Stansbie’s article ‘Fields of Vision: Arts and Sport Communities and Methods of Practice’. Athens Journal of Sports by Athen Institute for Education & Research (A World Association of Academics and Researchers) X (Y).
- September: Kai joins Manchester School of Art as Senior Lecturer. Founded in 1838, the school is part of Manchester Metropolitan University. Kai will lead and set up a new MA in Executive Arts Leadership and help out in an MSc Creative and Cultural Industry Leadership programme with the Business School. Contact Kai if you wish to do a PhD with her, or join one of these courses.
- August: Kai becomes trustee member ofMusic In Detention (MID). MID is a charity set up in 2005 that works with immigration detainees, bringing them together with professional musicians and local communities to share, create and enjoy music, enabling often-ignored voices to be heard in new ways. MID believes that working through music can give immigration detainees a powerful way to voice their feelings, concerns and hopes. It also believes that music can help break down barriers of prejudice about immigration and asylum, so it work with communities local to detention centres to create music in response to detainees and their stories. Each year it involves around 2,500 detainees and 200 community participants, in over 200 workshops and produce up to eight CDs of new music. Its work includes Bedford / Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre (IRC), Dover / Dover IRC, Gosport / Haslar IRC, Hillingdon/ Colnbrook IRC, Hillingdon / Harmondsworth IRC, Oxford / Campsfield House IRC and Portland / The Verne IRC.
- August: Kai becomes Creative and Cultural Consultant for UK Adult ADHD Network, a professional network for researchers and practitioners in ADHD and mental health founded in 2009 by Professor Philip Asherson. Kai advising on its arts and cultural activities as part of effort to extend and enrich understanding of ADHD, neurodiversity and mental health. She helped to define UKAAN’s artistic, creative and cultural profile and remit, and helps to curates its online contents in these areas.
- 2020 January-March: #MagicCarpet: Of wandering and weaving, of digits and the digital, of craft and craftiness. A tapestry by Kai Syng Tan 2-month solo exhibition of #MagicCarpet at Manchester Craft & Design Centre (more details soon).
- 2020 February 12: Artist’s talk, Department of Art & Performance, Manchester School of Art, UK.
- 2020 March 17: Lecture and Masterclass for EU-funded consortium of neuroscientists, psychiatrists and psychologists at Comorbid Conditions of ADHD (Coca), Goethe University, Frankfurt, Germany.
- 2020 March 27: Edinburgh College of Art Lecture and Masterclass, entitled ‘Ill-Disciplined: Creative, Neurodivergent Intervention and Leadership in Higher Education – A Manifesto’ which is based on my book chapter in Beyond Borders? Articulations, provocations and performativities in Arts & Humanities research, which explores the spaces, places and territories that exist above and below, amidst and with/out borders in Arts & Humanities research. Edited by Jacqueline Taylor et al (Birmingham City University, 2020).
- 2021 April: Invited keynote lecture speaker, Health Service Research and Pharmacy Practice (HSRPP) conference, Reading University.
- Publication: Chapter in Beyond Borders? Articulations, provocations and performativities in Arts & Humanities research, which explores the spaces, places and territories that exist above and below, amidst and with/out borders in Arts & Humanities research. Edited by Jacqueline Taylor et al (Birmingham City University).
![‘Psychiageographies [Détournement] [Exquisite Corpse] [Parentheses]’ here](https://static.cambridge.org/covers/BJP_0_215_3/cover.jpg?send-default-cover=false&send-full-size-image=true){kind=link}
2019 SUMMER & SPRING
- 2018 December-March 2019: Artist-in-Residency award. Centre for Contemporary Art, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Nominated by pioneer Feminist artist Amanda Heng. Participated in Art After Dark event with performance using EEG devices on what happiness could mean in the contexts of the tumultuous world today and the paradisal island of Singapore, with Philip Tan and Singapore artists, as well as colleagues from Nanyang Technological University’s School of Computer Science and Engineering.
- February 2019: Invited Speaker, Hai Sing Catholic School, Singapore. On Art-science collaborations and conversations.
- February: A-N blog post Towards cultural change: re-imagining mental health through ‘lofty’ art
- March: Selection panel member for Unlimited 2019 commissions. Unlimited is an arts commissioning programme that enables new work by disabled artists to reach UK and international audiences.
- 14 March: Invited speaker at Reading University School of Pharmacy. At the invitation of Professor of Social Pharmacy Kath Ryan.
- 20 March: Invited artist. The Nomenclature of Colours exhibition curated by Jo Volley. Slade Research Centre. London UK.
- 28 March Thursday 17:00-19:00: Curator, chair of chat on making and thinking across disciplines with psychotherapist-artist Dr Patricia Townsend at the launch of her new book and art exhibition.
- 28 March: Image and artist statement in Representing the Medical Body. Science Museum. London.
- January-March: #MagicCarpet in new films: Arts in Mind, Understanding Neurodiversity in H.E et al published.
- April: Blog post on #ADHDwomen making #ADHDart on PsychART.
- April: Blog post on collaborations across art and academia drawing on #MagicCarpet by #MagicCarpet producer Alessandra Cianetti.
- 04-06 April: Invited artist 4th National Conference SOS Dyslexia in San Marino. Invitation by Professor Antonella Gagliano of Messina University and Professor Giacomo Stella, Director of Scientific Committee of the Conference.
- 24 April: Invited respondent, launch of new book on madness and the quest for recognition by Dr Mohammed Abouelleil Rashed. Institute of Advanced Studies, University College London. Book free tickets here!
- May 9, July: Invited curator, Mental Health Activism and Clinical Practice Workshops. Co-curator: Wellcome ISSF Research Fellow in philosophy and psychiatry Dr Mohammed Abouelleil Rashed. Birkbeck, University of London. Guests include Reader in Forensic Psychiatry, University of London, Professor Annie Bartlett, and artist /mad activist Dolly Sen and Dr Norman Poole, Consultant Neuropsychiatrist & Editor of BJPsych Bulletin.
- May 20-25: #MagicCarpet at Birkbeck Arts Festival. With literary scholar Dr Sophie Jones and curator Alessandra Cianetti. Week-long exhibition plus May 21 discussion Too Much / Not Enough: Neurodiversity and Cultural production. Book free tickets here!
- June: Drawing from #MagicCarpet on cover of BJPsych. Published by Cambridge University Press since 1853 on behalf of The Royal College of Psychiatrists, it is one of the world’s leading psychiatric journals and read by all registered psychiatrists in the UK.
- June 22: Invited artist as part of ‘Curating Borderless Spaces’: a half day of conversations at the Live Art Development Agency curated by Alessandra Cianetti and Xavier de Sousa.
- June 25: Invited artist to Plymouth College of Art to give new talk and run 1-day workshop for academic and non-academic staff on neurodiversity.
- September-November: #MagicCarpet in Manchester (more details soon).
- September: Art after Dark part II Singapore at Centre for Contemporary Art, Singapore. More explorations using EEG devices on what happiness could mean in the contexts of the tumultuous world today and the paradisal island of Singapore, with colleagues from Nanyang Technological University’s School of Computer Science and Engineering.
- Publication: Chapter in Beyond Borders? Articulations, provocations and performativities in Arts & Humanities research, which explores the spaces, places and territories that exist above and below, amidst and with/out borders in Arts & Humanities research. Edited by Jacqueline Taylor et al (Birmingham City University).
- Publication: “Run Riot in 8.5 Steps: Running as a Creative Mobile Toolkit for People of All Walks Today.” In Handbook on Methods and Applications for Mobilities Research, edited by Malene Freudendal-Pedersen, Monika Büscher, and Sven Kesselring. Edward Elgar Publishing.
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- 2018 November 8: RUN! RUN! RUN! Biennale #r3fest: In Exile / Dangerous Movements. Co-curator: Dr Vybarr Cregan Reid, author and Reader in English and Environmental Humanities at the University of Kent. Hosted by University of Kent’s Paris School of Arts and Culture (PSAC). See here for details.
- 2018 September 5-9: Unlimited Festival, Southbank Centre. With talk and new performance-lecture with Professor Philip Asherson on 6 September. More details soon.
- 2018 September 23-26: 24th September: Chair of Art programme; 25th September: roundtable discussion. 5th EUNETHYDIS International European Network for Hyperkinetic Disorders Conference. Edinburgh.
- 2018 October – 2019 December: King’s Artists Group Exhibition, Bush House, King’s College London.
- 2018 October 3 evening – 2019 March: #MagicCarpet Solo Exhibition. Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre, KCL.
- July: Sharing of the tapestry at Centre for Mobilities Research (CEMORE), Lancaster University by Kai as a 2017-2018 CEMORE Visiting Fellow (by invitation only). This took place at the Peter Scott Gallery, and it was the launch of the new Art & Mobilities Network which Kai co-founded with Professor Monika Büscher, Dr Jen Southern, Professor Emma Rose and Dr Linda O Keefe. Kai gave a keynote lecture which you can read about here.
- June: Performance with Lois Bentley. MA Art and Science seminar, Central Saint Martins.
- June: Exhibition. Birkbeck Institute Annual conference ‘Distraction’.
- June 4-10: Exhibition and activities as part of the Arts In Mind (curated by Ruth Garde) in June, including at South London Gallery. Coverage on South London press and Resonance FM.
- June: KUMEC 2018: Invited artist for King’s Undergraduate Medical Education in the Community Teacher Development conference. KCL. Ran Hand-in-Hand workshop.
- May: 2018: Lecture. Guy’s Hospital Nursing BSc. King’s College London.
- May 2: Tapestry installation at NESTA and Power to Change event The Future of People Powered Health at The Brewery in East London, with curator Alessandra Cianetti and mental health nurse Peter Reid;
- April 24: Launch of the #MagicCarpet tapestry at the iconic Art Workers Guild
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- Mental Health Awareness: Sarah Hughes interviewed by Dr Kai Syng Tan on Let’s Talk Mental Health. 2018. Directed by L. Arseneault. Economic and Social Research Council. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gY9kETgasJU
- Interviewee in short film, pan-European training network MiND (mastering skills in the training Network for attention deficit hyperactivity and autism spectrum Disorders) mind-project.eu. Filmed by 4QUARTER FILMS
- The #MagicCarpet film by Philip Tan, Michael Tebinka and Kai Syng Tan. Launched at the South London Gallery, this has also been shown at Birkbeck and University College London thus far.
- Diagram (named artist) in: Bozhilova, N., Michelini, G., Kuntsi, J. and Asherson, P., 2018. Mind wandering perspective on ADHD. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 92, pp.464–476.
- 2018: ‘An exploration of running as metaphor, methodology, material through the RUN! RUN! RUN! Biennale #r3fest 2016’. In Sport in Society: Cultures, Commerce, Media, Politics. February, 1–17. Routledge Taylor and Francis. ISSN 1743-0437.
- Tan, Kai Syng, and Andrew Stahl. 2017. “A Reflection on Monologue Dialogue 4: Mysticism and Insecurity. Art In An Insecure Age.” London. Slade School of Fine Art website. Slade School of Fine Art.
- Tan, K.S., 2018. What else could ‘neurodiversity’ look like? Disability Arts Online. February 19, 2018.
- ‘Mind Wandering: Best Friend or Worst Enemy? An art-science inquiry’. A-N Blogs (blog). February 6, 2018.
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- Clear Spot: Arts In Mind, 2018. Mixcloud. 4 Jun.
- Four Communications, 2018. Arts in Mind.
- Marlow, S., 2018. Arts in Mind. The Psychologist (The British Psychological Society), 31, pp.68–69.
- Smith, H., 2018. Arts In Mind Festival – I don’t mind if you don’t mind, do you mind..? – South London News. South London Press and Mercury. 4 Jun.
- Verrent, J., 2018. Why don’t we just… treat disabled artists equally? Big Issue North. [online] 4 Jun.
- Hunt, J., 2018. Be There At The Start – Attenborough Arts Centre showcases Unlimited’s research and development programme.
- Mulders, Jacinta M. 2018. “MD4: Mysticism and Insecurity | UCL Events.” UCL Events, News and Reviews (blog). January 5, 2018.
- University College London, Institute of Advanced Studies. 2017. “Talking Points: Dr Kai Syng Tan on The Artist-Researcher as Connector-Disrupter-Running Messenger?” UCL MediaCentral. December 5, 2017.
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