Co-Lab is an annual series of artist-led workshops, organised in collaboration with LU Arts and free to all Loughborough University Students. Taking place across one week each January, workshops are designed to cross disciplinary and methodological boundaries, introducing participants to artistic methods that can be used to address contemporary social, political and technological concerns. 

Will Shannon's workshop will function as the first stage of his commission with LU Arts, which is responding to the University's historic Handicrafts Unit. Over 2020, he will work with students to produce a carpenter's workbench in the student village, providing a practical space for making by all.

Traditionally a place to develop skills and share knowledge, the workbench will here be transformed into an open workspace with no prescribed use. It might be used for student workshops in furniture making or bicycle repair; ad hoc exhibitions; table top sales or simply provide a place to shelter from the rain.

This first workshop will be run as a consultation and practical workshop. It will explore what uses the workbench might have and determine how these might influence its design. Will will also help participants develop simple skills and practical knowledges for the making of basic furniture items. 

Conversations may explore:

• How are practical making skills shared in the digital age?
• How do we create spaces that encourage conversations and share knowledge ?
• Can public space be useful in the age of consumerism?
• What can we learn form the street traders of the past?
• How might we imagine new types of architecture for making?

Booking

Please click here to book (Loughborough University students only). A £3 deposit is required, refunded to those who attend the workshop. No prior experience or specialist knowledge is required.

Will Shannon is an artist who now works with wood to create imaginative artworks that are shown in galleries and public spaces.