Events

13th January 2020 by Jon Eland

Leeds Creative Timebank: We declare a Climate Emergency

Let’s take the words off the page and kick-start actions!

This Lightbulb Moment event is delivered in partnership with Hannah Directory and Zero Carbon Yorkshire and features speakers from Zero Carbon Yorkshire and the Leeds Creative Timebank membership.

4th February 2020

Why declare a Climate Emergency now?

Humanity faces the combined catastrophes of climate change, a mass extinction of vital biodiversity and a degradation of the ecosystem’s health.

This has become an emergency situation because governments and industry have not shown the necessary leadership, and have not acted fast enough. We are not waiting for more efficient wind-turbines or cheaper solar-panels. What is lacking is visionary leadership.

Humans are fortunately capable of responding in a remarkable variety of ways to accelerate climate solutions and adaptations, and culture can help stir up human response as well as creating new stories and visions for our world.

Leeds Creative Timebank has aligned with a wide range of arts and cultural institutions and individual practitioners and declared its commitment to using its social and cultural resources as a platform and model for accelerating change.

Looking back to the inception of the Timebank – as a cultural response to the 2008 banking crisis – we want now to invite members to share their experiences, practice and knowledge to connect together to:

inform ourselves with current information and data to help present the case
share individual or other collective practice that offer resistance and
co-produce strategies and tactics for the arts and wider society.

We hope a number of member-led actions (workshops, exhibitions, performances, narratives etc) will emerge from this initial session and be a catalyst for further events and activity.

So come along and be part of practical actions emerging to declare a climate emergency!

This event is in partnership with Zero Carbon Yorkshire and Hannah Directory.

Tuesday 4^th February – 6.30-8.30pm
Centre for Live Art Yorkshire (CLAY) – formerly Live Arts Bistro (LAB)
2 Regent St, Leeds LS2 7QA
Please bring food to share. There will be a pay bar.

10th December 2019 by Jon Eland

Solstice Social

We’re inviting everyone to join us for a social – at one of our members’ spaces the brilliant Centre for Live Arts Yorkshire (CLAY).

Meet members, catch up with old friends, make new ones and have a drink.

As well as taking the opportunity to socialise we’d love to tell you about our recent visit to Scotland and share some of the questions that were raised about time banking. We would also welcome any questions or ideas you may have about the future of Leeds Creative Timebank.

Here’s a provocation to kick things off…

Who decides? And who decides who decides?

All welcome – members, their friends and any creatives interested in the Timebank. You are welcome to bring snacks to share if you’d like.
Timebank members will gain two time credits for attending.
Tuesday 17th December
Doors open from 6pm – things will be getting going at around 7pm.
Centre for Live Arts Yorkshire (CLAY) – formerly Live Arts Bistro (LAB)
Regent Street, Leeds LS27QA

29th March 2019 by Zoe Parker

Guess what’s happening here ?

Here are a few images of some of the amazing transactions that have taken place through the Timebank. So can you remember or guess when these pictures were taken and/ or by whom and/or which members were involved, or even what year it was ? Or do you remember other brilliant projects that have used the Timebank? Do let us know by emailing or via our Instagram, twitter or Facebook accounts.

2nd March 2019 by Sue Johnson

Leeds Creative Timebank Social

Light Bulb Moments

For our 10th anniversary we want to begin to change how the Timebank works and move towards a new era of supporting your creativity.

Do you have a Big Idea or would you like to help devise one?

Email us with your idea before the night or just bring it on the night.

Come along, meet other Timebank members, eat, drink, chat and have fun.

What’s in for you?

Boost your hours – Bring homemade food and get 1 hr time credit, 2 hrs time credit for attending.

Be part of shifting LCT into the next decade.

When is it?

Leeds Creative Timebank SOCIAL – 9th March 6.30 – 9.30
in Workshop Press Basement Gallery at 10 Back Newton Grove.

Please email us to let us know you are coming.

14th September 2018 by Sue Johnson

Next Induction

Our next induction will be 2pm – 4pm, Saturday 15th September 2018.

It will be in Chapeltown (Leeds 7).

Please email us for more details or to let us know you are coming.

28th November 2017 by Sue Ball

Winter Social and Design Hack

The Winter Social and Design Hack took place at Live Art Bistro on 23rd November 2017 and was organised by Timebank members Reet-so ( Alice and Lucy).This is the second member led social. If you are interested in organising the NEXT social event, get in touch! It’s a good way to earn lots of time credits and to get involved and to know other members.

This event was about sharing, looking forward and thinking about new plans! We invited all Timebank members and other interested people to join us and bring along a book that had inspired their artistic practice to gift, share or exchange with others.
A ‘design hack’ of the timebank was also part of this Social and what we discussed at the social will begin a year where we are looking to make changes and ensure the timebank works at its BEST for you and its network of members.

So a quick update on why happened. The questions asked in the design hack helped us to explore ways we could make the experience for members better and also the experience for those taking more responsibility like time brokers and management group more enjoyable and productive.
We ( very briefly) looked at some alternative models in other time banks and other alternative currency systems. We then had a chat in small groups about what the issues with using the Timebank were and the issues with running/managing the Timebank.

Some main points raised:

TIMEBANK SYSTEM – can feel unappealing to use and very off putting. This is the timebanking.org site but maybe also other aspects of the system like the formal language used. There is a form now on our website but more about this later in this post.

FUNCTIONALITY – are the many jobs to run the Timebank too complex – could we strip it back?

VISIBILITY OF THE TIMEBANK – its often just not in the mind of members, could we be more visible on social media?
Would it be useful to have profiles for each member, if so how can this be created easily given 150 members and who is in agreement that it is a good idea?

So actions from this around: modernising the Timebank and making it more user friendly in its virtual interface, more connected and visible in social media and less admin heavy.

STEP 1 – Thanks to Jessica Sweet who will work out what we do and is needed logistically by meeting with management group early ish January. ( Jessica to email)

STEP 2 – Thanks to Adam Young who together with any members who are tech millennial alternative currency savvy will explore options available of other currency systems we may be able to tap in to that would make the Timebank more user friendly.

ACTION 1: Can you recommend any open source software or systems from which we can develop an App that locates timebank members through their art-form tags to initiate an exchange’ If you could click here to share ideas to our Facebook group that would be ideal, or for those who do not use Facebook, email us with this information/ suggestions which we will pass on to Adam Young.

OTHER IDEAS/ STEPS:

REGULAR TIMEBANK PLAY DAYS – a suggestion to connect with Leftbank open artist days each month ? Is that right? To be run by a member not in management group. Who provides hours? Timebank? Is it like socials?

DISCUSSIONS around TWITTER and making Timebank more visible. Twitter is about conversation. In first instance – I have switched to directly engaging on twitter rather than linking only with Facebook posts. If members could tweet and Facebook more about the Timebank using the hashtag #timebankleeds when talking about Timebank ( this is for members who use social media).

Making a Request can now happen directly from our own website here

ACTION 2: We hope this form has simplified and improved the user experience. If members could click on this link and have a try at making a request this way ( if you put the words TEST in the request we will know it is not a real request) Then feedback to us if this has improved usability/ made things better and in what ways this still needs improving.Many thanks for reading and please get in touch if you have ideas or thoughts on the things raised.

This post was written by Zoe Parker @Zoe_Parker – a Timebank member, time broker and member of management group. Zoe is a choreographer, producer and performer working in multidisciplinary arts projects that are socially engaged. She is one part of Tea & Tolerance and Yorkshire Life Aquatic.