Julia Farrington, at the time head of arts at Index on Censorship, examines the impact of gatekeepers, the police, the audience, media, public opinion and arts educators on what is permissible to say or do in the public realm — and in particular the nature of self-censorship that is pervasive in the arts. How is artistic freedom of expression supported, undermined, reported and defended in the UK? This talk includes a discussion of the UK laws on, for example, libel, censorship, and protest, which should be considered of its time; new laws such as the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill of 2022 have changed the legalities of free expression in the UK even further.
This talk was part of Crossing Borders 2014 and was produced in partnership with London Contemporary Dance School.
Julia Farrington is a freelance producer and campaigner. She was Head of Arts at Index on Censorship for 8 years where she now works as Arts Associate, where her work focuses on UK, Burma, Ethiopia and Turkey. Before joining Index she ran the arts programme at Union Chapel. She started life as a freelance musician, playing jazz and improvised music and working in a wide variety of performance and community settings in UK, Europe, North America and New Zealand.
As published in 2014.
