Let us dream a little and talk philosophically for a second, what is the duty of artists in times of crisis? In other words, what is the duty of artists in times like today?
We’re living through a time of crisis—no question about it. The climate crisis, the cost of living crisis, student debt, Palestine, Trump, soaring rents, being an artist in London. There was once a “war on terror,” and now our prime minister is eyeing cuts to aid in favor of… war with Russia. Meanwhile, the arts are still reeling from the impact of lockdowns, where funding bodies prioritised basic survival over creative industries. We weren’t deemed essential. Theatre, performance, visual art—none of it was considered as important as key workers, as though art didn’t also keep people alive in different ways.
And now, the industry is still struggling. More and more artists are turning to luxury branding, marketing, or commercial theatre just to make ends meet. Others, disillusioned, are leaving entirely, seeking careers that feel more stable or “worthwhile.” Because what’s the alternative? Starve and make art no one will fund? Play the game, network with the wealthy, learn how to speak in the language of grants and investments? The irony is not lost on us—the wealthiest few getting richer at the expense of the rest, while funding bodies demand “match funding” from artists who can barely afford their rent.
So now I’ve painted this very bleak picture. Let us dream a little and talk philosophically for a second, what is the duty of artists in times of crisis? In other words, what is the duty of artists in times like today? In this article I am doing something radical actually, I speak of hope and a world where art transcends personal expression to become a powerful tool for healing, resistance and empowering marginalised voices.
“In times of dread, artists must never remain silent. This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That’s how civilizations heal.” – Toni Morrison
Art has always been a response to crisis. It is not just an escape; it is documentation, a record of what it means to exist in turbulent times. Take Guernica—Picasso’s visceral response to the bombing of a Basque town during the Spanish Civil War. It doesn’t just tell us what happened; it makes us feel it. The screaming mothers, the broken bodies, the monochrome palette that turns grief into something timeless.
The show I am bringing to Sprint 2025, The Pigs Are Coming, was born from lived experience, an attempt to turn the personal reality of PTSD following state violence into something larger. In it, I played with symbolism and metamorphosis into the pig to translate my own fears and frustrations into a shared space. It’s a form of resistance to document and bear witness.
Art, when wielded with intent, is a force of resistance. In an age where racialised communities are demonised in the media, where politicians and pundits paint Muslims, refugees, and other marginalised groups as violent, art is a way to fight back. To humanise, to complicate, to reveal truths that mainstream narratives try to erase.
Feminist philosophy has long appealed to the mantra that the personal is political and form is just as important as the content, so the style in which we write cannot pretend to be separated from her experiences, so let us embrace our lived experience and be transparent about our motivations, our desires. When we empower ourselves to tell our own stories authentically we challenge dominant patriarchal narratives, we are doing something deeply radical by holding up a mirror to society, providing a container for our anger and frustrations, and then as a call to action, a way to envision futures that don’t yet exist.
I think about Scenes of Mourning, a performance I developed during an artist residency with Commun where I shared my personal experience of witnessing a live streamed genocide into a public moment of grief. Like Hogarth’s depictions of homelessness—capturing the cruelty of a system that discards people—art can demand that we look, really look, at what we are becoming.
Art doesn’t just document the world as it is—it imagines the world as it could be. And this is crucial, because in times of crisis, imagination is one of the first things to be stolen from us. Protest art, speculative fiction, dystopian theatre—these forms remind us that other worlds are possible. For example, my play The Final Trumpet explores climate change, but it doesn’t do so through documentary theatre. It doesn’t preach to the converted. Instead, it uses storytelling to help us to immerse ourselves in a version of the world that might be, if we do not act.
Climate dramaturg Zoë Svendsen puts it best:
“Theatre works can act as witnesses to the coming times and be ahead of the curve in anticipating our experiences; [they can] offer and share narratives as activism to help make our future more liveable emotionally, as well as practically.”
This is the duty of artists in times of crisis. To witness. To document. To resist. To dream. To hold onto hope, not as something passive, but as something active. As something necessary.
Tues 11 Mar at 7:15pm
Tickets £8
