Meet the Artist: Les Monaghan
Find out more about the artists delivering your darts activities
Les Monaghan is a socially engaged photographer and artist.
He says: “The labels, collaborative, community or participatory photographer could all be applied to me but my starting point is the same as Martha Rosler who said:
‘I realised long ago that it was not possible for me to be anything other than socially engaged… everything takes place within a matrix, or a context of human relations, so it is not possible to have any other perspective. Of course, there are other criteria and considerations when talking about aesthetic objects, but everything starts with its embeddedness in social relations.’ (2009, p115)
Les also embraces artist Beverley Naidus’s definition of social engaged art:
‘Socially engaged art, as my peers and I have experienced it, is created in an expansive place that awakens peoples’ voices, minds and spirits in various ways’. (2009, p2)
Les says:
This is how I approach and work with participants. Socially engaged practice is more than caring, it is about having an awareness of the interconnectedness of our actions and the work that we make and show together. It should have an effect on the world.
Image credit: Francis Monaghan Lovell, Salzburg, 2024
[apologies for the crop]