Editorial
Colin Hambrook has been editing Disability Arts Online in one form or another since 2002. Increasingly he has been posting some of his own artistic output... as well as commenting on the work DAO is engaged with.
17 April 2012
Colin Hambrook discusses a recent paper on the social model of disability
It feels like things are coming inexorably to a head. Running alongside a year of arts events being rolled out under the banner of the Cultural Olympiad, there is a growing sense of foreboding as...Comments: 2
26 March 2012
Colin visits the David Hockney exhibition at the RA
Judging by the numbers of disabled people I saw at the Royal Academy's David Hockney exhibition last Saturday, there is a will that goes beyond simply paying lip service to accessibility, to...Comments: 1
12 March 2012
Colin visits Sanchita Islam's Pigment Explosion Party
Creativity is a place where difficulty and beauty can share the same bed and offer something of value. The Creative Case for Diversity is an approach - mooted by the Arts Council - in an attempt to...Comments: 0
8 March 2012
Colin comments on DAO discussions around disability/ inclusive theatre-making
DAO has published a couple of reports, recently on events about access to theatre and theatre-making. In her review on The Scottish Dance Theatre’s Pathways to the Profession Symposium, Jo...Comments: 4
1 March 2012
DAO's Director, Trish Wheatley invites readers to air their views on DAO in return for the chance to win £40 of Amazon vouchers
DAO is currently attracting record numbers of readers peaking at 14,000 visitors per month viewing over 32,000 pages in February, which is absolutely fantastic. Thank you to all our writers and...Comments: 0
15 February 2012
Colin writes on the BBC documentary 'Deaf Teens in a Hearing World'
I usually watch television documentaries on disability, expecting to be slumped in my chair groaning after two minutes, before making my excuses to the disability movement and switching off with a...Comments: 0
3 February 2012
Trish Wheatley blogs about the latest content on DAO
Here at DAO we’ve had a fantastic start to what promises to be an astonishing year for disabled artists. Each month we will aim to highlight some of the new content and alert you to...Comments: 0
22 January 2012
Colin discusses BBC Vision's program for 'Able' disabled people
In a blog on Parallel Lines recently, Aaron Williamson made the point that “the notion that an individual is disabled by their impairment is still the prevalent mainstream way of...Comments: 0
15 December 2011
Colin wishes all DAO's contributors and readers all the best for the festive season
DAO is preparing to wind down for the end of year break. Firstly I'd like to give a warm thanks to all our contributors and to wish all our readers all the best over the festive season. It has been...Comments: 0
6 December 2011
Colin reports on 'Bad News for Disabled People' research, which reveals the extent of misrepresentation of disabled people in the media
At last Saturday's MeCCSa Disability Studies Network event titled 'The Representation of Disabled People in an Age of Austerity', Nick Watson from Strathclyde Centre for Disability...Comments: 3
15 November 2011
Colin aks how do art historical texts and the media deal with disability? Answers on a postcard please...
For the Outside-In Step-Up program I am doing some research on how artists talk about themselves in terms of disability; and how art historians and academics refer to disability. As a beginning I...Comments: 8
24 September 2011
Colin reflects on decibel's aim to bring Performing Arts from across the diversity strands under one banner
A week on from decibel, the Arts Council’s Performing Arts Showcase in Manchester from 12-18 September 2011 and I am still reeling from the expanse and breadth of the work we saw there. At a...Comments: 0
12 September 2011
Colin asks 'What is Liberty?'
Last Friday I entertained a group of nine young disabled people on a research visit from Seoul in Korea. They were wanting to find out about the history of disability arts development in the UK....Comments: 2
16 August 2011
Colin reviews John O’Donoghue's memoir 'Sectioned'
I finally got around to reading John O’Donoghue’s autobiography ‘Sectioned: A life interrupted’. It won the MIND book of the year in 2010 so has been on my shelf for a...Comments: 0
30 May 2011
Colin reviews My Song scripted by Charlie Swinbourne - his highlight of the Up-Stream Festival
Up-Stream went full steam ahead at the end of last month as part of the prestigious Brighton Festival. Colin reports on some highlights I had quite a few highlights from amongst all the work...Comments: 0
1 April 2011
Colin goes from the sublime to the ridiculous and back again in the search for good music
Shut up and Listen has become compulsory listening in the last few months. Hosted by members of Carousel house band, Zombie Crash, it's a thoroughly entertaining hour. Ryan and Luc bounce off of each...Comments: 0
1 February 2011
Colin Hambrook on adopting an 'artist name'
Supporting artists to develop their artistic lives is what drives me to keep [Disability Arts Online] DAO going. It's not something I always get right... and an issue has arisen recently with an...Comments: 4
1 January 2011
Editor Colin Hambrook reviews some DAO highlights of 2010
Greetings to all the wonderful disabled artists, performers and writers who have contributed to DAO and made it such a fantastic journal to edit over the past year. Over the last eight months or so...Comments: 1
8 December 2010
Colin Hambrook takes a look at the latest Christmas offering from the Disabled Avant Garde
I caught Ed Vaizey on BBC Parliament last week. He was answering questions before a Select Committee challenging him on whether there is any justification for spending public funding on the Arts. A...Comments: 1
12 November 2010
Colin Hambrook goes in pursuit of some 'Reasons to be Cheerful'
On the way to Stratford Theatre Royal for an evening of Graeae's raved-about Reasons to be Cheerful - it was bizarre to read a report in the Daily Mail of several Labour MPs using twitter to send...Comments: 3
2 August 2010
Colin Hambrook is on his way down the mental health road
Another day, another poem, dragging through the ether. There are lots of twists and turns down the mental health road; no easy solutions, just lots of conundrums and silence scattered with unhealthy,...Comments: 3
28 July 2010
Colin Hambrook puts on a man suit
I am pleased the way that the blog section of DAO has taken off in the past few months. Having the opportunity to publish work continues to be a pleasure that I am very grateful for. When you've...Comments: 0
19 July 2010
Colin Hambrook publishes another disability poem
In the 1990s I put together a visual arts exhibition called 'Dreams of the Absurd' which got shown in various galleries in the UK and abroad. It was an extension of a series of large-scale...Comments: 3
14 July 2010
A poem on experience of ECT from Colin Hambrook
I try hard when writing poetry… sometimes too hard. Scanning this drawing into the computer somehow gave it an even more oppressive feel. Playing with the contrast made it that much...Comments: 8
6 July 2010
Colin Hambrook gets inspired by film-maker Jean Cocteau
I've been thinking of posting some of my poetry for some time now. Poetry is one of those things I do to keep going when life gets tough. I love Jean Cocteau's 1949 retelling of the story of...Comments: 10