Bella Milroy, Curator and Director of Mob-Shop, 2022. 

“My intentions with this project were rooted in the desire to develop a caring and informed curatorial practice by facilitating structures of flexible, accesibile practices. I wanted to do this not only through the public face of the project in its outcomes, but also internally and logistically too.

We wanted to share this process, commissioning an external evaluation of the project that would stand as a resource for our peers, as well as the wider creative industry. 

We invited writer Pippa Stacey to carry out this work, where we asked her to meet with us at various stages throughout the project to keep her updated with changes and progress. Pippa also came to see the exhibitions in person at all three library sites in Derbyshire, and we spent time discussing the work, the outcomes of the projects, our ambitions for what we wanted the project to do, and the criticisms of what we did. We invited Pippa as an independent thinker and part of our vibrant disabled community to consider Mob-Shop and what the project embodies, and how it’s working structure might be of use to others. 

We really wanted Pippa to create a broad, detailed document that would provide critical reflection on the project, inform creative methodologies, and provide insight to improve upon working curatorial practices. We wanted to capture a range of accessible working practices, using this document to act as a resource tool for better understanding, more meaningful support, and facilitate more positive working experiences for disabled people, particularly within the creative arts and cultural sector.

We wanted to approach this evaluation as an active resource that can be used once this iteration of Mob-Shop is complete, something that could be used internally to better my own methods of working, and also as a public document for others to use and learn from.

Lastly, this document was kindly considered and reviewed by all the artists we worked with in the production of Mob-Shop, to ensure that what is portrayed here was a thorough and accurate reflection of their experience of working with us.

Many thanks to Pippa for her thoughtful enthusiasm in producing this critical piece.

If you’d like to get in touch about the ways in which you could use and share this document, how you could apply some of how we've worked to better advocate for your own needs, discuss better working practices for the disabled artists you are working with or share critiques on what we’ve done, please get in touch!”

You can read the document here.

You can listen to an audio description of the work below: