An exhibition of works by BEAM artists with the support of Southwark Outreach Services

Eddie Lougheed, Georgina Edema, Isayas Solomon, Rajah Rahman, Richard Brooks, Robert Weeks, Rose Kasozi, Ruth Sutton, Sharon White, Ursula Michael, Yvonne Poulson.

Private View: Friday 30th of April 2010 - 5 pm to 10 pm

Exhibition runs from: Friday 30th of April – Thursday 6th of May 2010
Gallery Opening Hours: Mon - Fri: 11am to 6.30 pm -  Sat: 12.30 pm - 5.00 pm
Last day of Exhibition: Thursday 6th of May: 10.00 am to 5.00 pm

The BEAM artists are a collective of disabled artists who have been exhibiting their work with the support of Southwark Outreach Services since 2006.

Southwark Outreach Services were established in 2004 and provides a variety of social, creative and physical activity programmes for approximately 100 disabled service-users in Southwark. Our primary aim is to increase participants’ access to community facilities and to help develop independence and confidence.

The purpose of BEAM is to provide physically disabled artists within Southwark, with a supportive meeting place, enabling them to develop their art practice, and to create and broaden their opportunities and to exhibit their work as a group within the community. The vision of The Beam Artists’ is to discover each person’s creativity, nurture it, value it, and share it.

Exploring the idea of seeing creativity from a new perspective, the artists involved with BEAM have all discovered art as an incredibly empowering and healing medium. Through the use of imagination the ordinary turns into something extraordinary.

As an example, Sharon White takes colouring book scenes of British tourist attractions and transforms them into a psychedelic wonderland. She mentions how important it is to see her work exhibited: “It’s amazing. If someone likes my work, it’s like I’ve made a new friend.”

Richard Brooks’ explores the beauty in a light bulb, through photography, drawing our attention to the mundane things in life. Often people have commented that Richard’s work has opened up a whole new way of seeing everyday objects.

Eddie Lougheed, a stroke survivor, used painting to help him regain the dexterity of his hands, explains: “I’d never done art before, but the green in my painting shows that there is growth there. I want to express myself. It’s a metaphor for my life. One of the things I’ve learned is - in Art nothing is wrong. The only thing is people might see it differently in other ways, in portraying what you’re trying to achieve.”

Robert Weeks says “Being a part of Outreach and BEAM has changed my life. And it made me see life in a completely different way and made my stroke bearable”.

Yvonne Poulson mentions that being a part of BEAM “made it possible for me to cope with the loss of manual dexterity through ageing”.

The Outreach Art Development Programme is underpinned by:

• Human Rights Article 19, 2: Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice.

• Our belief that Art provides a vehicle for physical, intellectual, emotional and lifelong learning.