'Art for Equality' exhibition/Art Social #7 event

What a super cool night! A big thanks to Shannon Kelly (@cosmikdebris.nz / @art_social.chch) for facilitating a fun evening for a great cause.

Enjoy your exclusive access to the full 'Art for Equality' exhibition/Art Social #7 event. ~ Isaac.

My 5 year Journey into the unknown | Words from the Exchange Operator

lets keep it simple

After having a group of urban planners/designers from across NZ in for a visit, I shared the history, purpose, and potential of XCHC. It’s been a while since I’ve done that publically, so I decided to write a few things down.

Photo by Ingmar Wein Photography

Hi, I’m Preston; the ringleader here.

XCHC has been explained as many things; a location, a community, even a philosophy. All are true, and most people come from a world where businesses are encouraged to do 1 thing well, not 5 things at once.

But, that’s us, and we’re ok with it. I would rather have a couple of options than feel bored from doing 1 thing over and over again… I think people actually can relate to that.

A few principles are what really hold it all together though.

I’m the only employee here and what I’ve learned is, if you really want creativity to flourish:
1. give it a designated space
2. enable others to have agency
3. stay out of the way
4. if it’s meant to be messy, let it be
5. help when asked
6. celebrate the attempts as much as the successes
7. and offer constructive feedback if it’s welcomed.

Boom, a risk is taken, and something new is born. Who knows where it might go next.

How do we manage 250 events a year, artist studios, residencies, and a bar?
This is a Do’ocracy. I try to remind myself to:
- Loosen up. There isn’t meant to be a tight grip on creativity. It’s easier to stay out of the way than to control someone else’s idea/path.
- Patience. The creative process is hard. Don’t rush it. It often takes trying something a few times before it starts to “work”. Believe me, 5 years here and I’m still learning every day.
- Enable others to solve their own problems and encourage participation and agency.
- Systems are a must, but don’t leave out the ‘soul’ of being a fellow human (funders, I’m looking at you). Systems can be simple; connect, express, confirm, deliver, reflect, repeat.
- #halp. Surround yourself with talented and active problem solvers. Then ask for their help when you need it. I do often and probably still not often enough.

What are the ingredients needed to cultivate creativity?
SPACE
- Production space to make it
- Showcase space to share it.
- Social space to talk about it.

COMMUNITY
- Like-minded people for contructive feedback
- New people, to expand into any direction.

CULTURE
- The creative process/standing out is intimidating, so be supportive
- Be an active participant, not a spectator
- Don’t be a dick.

What gap do you feel like XCHC fills?
Creative people throughout history have found ways of working together to achieve incredible things; New Zealand seems to lack well-designed infrastructures for this; like, everyone wants to hold a piece of it, but not the whole.

Incubators, funders, makerspaces, galleries, mentorship programs, they’re mostly siloed and actually competing for resources. We can’t create thriving livelihoods doing what we love if we’re constantly trying to maneuve all of these ‘options’. They can actually become barriers that lead to feeling stuck, excluded, or alone in ones creative journey.

We take a more zoomed-out ecological approach, acknowledging all the pieces, but providing the right one at the right time. How? Be:
- Flexible; adapt to the needs of others
- Affordable; we have affordable rent, a small team, and inexpensive things. This lowers the risk of trying new creative things.
- Clear Intention; we’re here to grow and support the growth of others’ creative ideas, practices, or businesses. If that’s what you’re after, we’ll do our best to help.

What benefits does XCHC bring to the community, city, and beyond?
- Creates opportunities for creatives to build their community, practice, and business.
- Enables connections that inherently improve our sense of belonging and mental health.
- Increases confidence and self-agency in individuals to become problem solvers.
- When people express and test creative ideas openly, it adds color and diversity to our world.
- A city with a thriving creative and open culture are reputably happier and more attractive places to live and visit.
- Creative industries build more economically diverse and resilient economies.

That much going on at once sounds like chaos; is it?
Absolutely. But the benefits of what is learned in a shared space for a diversity of activities far outways the risk of someone not liking it.

Inspiration, motivation, and potential is increased when multiple things are happening at once… the artist painting in the background while the café patrons sip their coffee and watch while the band is setting up for a gig that night; the point is for creativity to be seen out in the open and for it to create opportunities to socialize.

Sounds interesting. How can others be involved?
We’re not in the business of telling people what to do. You have to come here and figure it out for yourself. Usually the first steps are
1. Come in for a coffee/beer.
2. Introduce yourself to someone new
3. Attend an event
4. Participate, help with, or host an event
5. Join the studios

What’s your Funding model:
We’re a not-for-profit, so the priority is to keep things affordable for creativity's sake.
We were funded around $400,000 to start XCHC.
Since then, we’ve paid the bills by:
1. hiring the spaces (studios, venue, kitchen, apartments)
2. Sales from the cafe/bar
3. Subscription and 1-off donations.

How do you measure success?
Easy. We’ve:
1. supported hundreds of creative people/projects
2. Have and are in some really great stories
3. Have shared a lot of new learnings with others
4. Have momentum for new things
5. We still don’t need funding
6. We haven’t closed

What more do you need?

But it’s really the diversity that is a sign of our success. The Arts feel quite exclusive in Christchurch (maybe all cities struggle with this in some way) and despite a lot of public events, the crowds are often the same. We’re actually focused on growing the industry by adding people to it; creatives and audiences alike. Those people might be parents, neuro-diverse, emerging artists, young, old, recently moved here or facing some disadvantage. We’re here for all people looking for something more in life.

What’s your secret sauce?
simple.
Most arts institutions have a lot of governance and costs, but produce a fairly low amount of activity. We’re the opposite.

resourceful.
The size of the community and our relationship to others means we’re familiar with each others strengths, weaknesses, skills, experiences, and assets; we share things constantly.

social.
Real people with real ideas. Our agenda is to see others the same way. To help them succeed, have more positive experiences, and create opportunities to learn/grow. That includes our team, employees, residents, event hosts, attendees, exhibitors, practicing artists, artists to-be, and the general public.

What are you most proud of recently?
Since hosting themed parties last year, people have started to see us as a safe and more creative alternative to the binge-culture common in town. People show more respect to our space, themselves, the women, and each other; not what we often see at bars in the city. It’s key to differentiate we are a creative space that has a bar on-site; drinking is not the point.

To further this, our focus for the next 2 years is to be creating a more alternative, social, and creative late-night option. A place for not only events, but where bartenders can celebrate their craft and host mixology workshops, local food suppliers can play with experimental foods and menus, and so on.

Whats something you’re working on?
I’d love to start offering our 1-bedroom apartment (above the bar) to DJ’s, dancers, performers, and artists that want to visit Christchurch and be a part of our space or the night-life scene we’re creating; create it with them really.

I’d also love to create an affordable membership that helps us track who’s actually a part of this community; beyond the physical walls. This would let people support what we do from afar and, if we had the financial support of our whole network, we would be unstoppable and could start testing even further edges of our creative impact here.

One way this could happen is by starting with simple things. Imagine instead of getting a free wine/beer at your next exhibition opening, you pay for it (as usual), but instead of that money going to the bar, it’s shared with the artist that’s providing the entertainment they’ve spent probably months creating… the artist showing their work, after all, is the reason you’re there in the first place isn’t it?… makes sense to me.

Whats something you need help with now?
Exposure. Story-telling content. Social media.
We do so much, it’s almost impossible to keep up with all the stories/ journeys that come through here.

What is your next avenue of growth?
We really need to own a bigger building to increase our offerings and secure our place in the future of this, or any city.
Property and housing prices in Wellington and Auckland are going up, we’ve seen a lot of creatives moving to Christchurch. If we had a bigger space, we could offer more places to live and settle into a local creative scene. I don’t think any other art institution or the local council is doing this; which is honestly crazy to me! Get more artists living in the city, having fun, and working together!

Hope to see you around.