What are “walking interviews”? And how can they be used to research co-creation in the cultural sector? 

For their Collaborate project, Compass Live Art has partnered with researchers at the Institute for Social Justice, York St John University to explore the impact of co-creation. As part of this project, lead researcher Lauren Hall is undertaking “walking interviews”, where participants will revisit the locations of previous Compass Festival events to explore enduring memories.

As Lauren outlines in her new blog post:

“It is argued that walking interviews generate richer data, because interviewees are prompted by meanings and connections to the surrounding environment and are less likely to try and give the right answer.”

Lauren has now started piloting walking interviews. So far, the methodology has been found to generate more place-specific data. It has also opened questions about people’s relationships with places and issues surrounding sustainability and the legacy of co-creation.

Read Lauren’s blog post about walking interviews in full at Compass Live Arts.  

We have just re-opened our Collaborate fund to expressions of interest from the UK cultural sector.

The fund supports research partnerships that investigate under-explored questions of cultural value. The deadline for cultural sector applicants is 25 November 2022. We will open the fund to academics in January 2023. Please visit this webpage for more details on how to apply to the fund.