Community Arts and Culture Initiatives in Singapore (Routledge Research on Urban Asia)

What Can Space Do for the Arts?; What Can Arts Do for Space?; and What Can Arts and Space Do for the Community?

Through the lenses of creative placemaking and neighbourhood arts ecology, Trivic re-examines the position of community arts in the spatial, social and cultural landscape. Emphasising urban design considerations of complex interdependent relationships between arts, space and people, he re-explores the role of community-based arts activities in shaping urban neighbourhoods, enriching public life and empowering communities. This is divided into an analysis of spatial opportunities for the arts in the neighbourhood; and a study of the impacts of bringing arts and culture activities into local neighbourhoods and communities, using Singapore’s nodal approach as a developed case study. Using spatial opportunity analysis, the book demonstrates a step-by-step procedure for identification and evaluation of the neighbourhood spaces that work best for community arts and culture activities. In the study of impacts, Trivic proposes a holistic framework for capturing and evaluating the non-economic impacts of arts and culture, on space, society, well-being, education and participation.

An invaluable template for arts event organisers and artists to assess and maximise the outcomes of their creative efforts in local neighbourhoods, as well as an important reading for students and practitioners of neighbourhood planning, urban design, and creative placemaking.

Zdravko Trivic is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Architecture, School of Design and Environment (SDE), National University of Singapore (NUS). He works closely with CSAC (Centre for Sustainable Asian Cities) and CARE (Centre for Ageing Research in the Environment), SDE, NUS, where he leads several research projects related to multi-sensorial urbanism, health-supportive and ageing-friendly urban space and neighbourhood design, community participation and creative placemaking.