Kirsty Harris is an artist and maker whose installations and performances invite people to step inside and take part. Her work places the audience at the centre—encouraging them to weave their own stories into the spaces around them. 

Recently, as Community Artist at The Stove Network, she’s continued exploring how creativity can transform places and perspectives. Grounded in real materials, generosity, and play, Kirsty’s practice is about making art that connects people through shared experience. 

What We Do Now (WWDN) is a creative placemaking network based in Dumfries & Galloway. We bring together artists and community organizations to co-create projects, shape local plans, share knowledge, and foster enterprise, driving positive change through collaboration.

Find out more here: https://whatwedonow.scot/

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Yvonne Barber, Centre Manager at A’ the Airts, speaks about her work leading one of Dumfries and Galloway’s most vibrant community arts centres. A’ the Airts has become a cultural hub for the area, offering a rich programme of arts, crafts, events, and activities for all ages. 

Set in a town renowned for its traditional knitted textiles, the centre celebrates and revitalises Sanquhar’s creative heritage. Under Yvonne’s leadership, A’ the Airts has played a key role in making Sanquhar a must-visit destination, driving both artistic innovation and community pride. 

What We Do Now (WWDN) is a creative placemaking network based in Dumfries & Galloway. We bring together artists and community organizations to co-create projects, shape local plans, share knowledge, and foster enterprise, driving positive change through collaboration.

Find out more here: https://whatwedonow.scot/

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Matt Baker, the founder and outgoing CEO of The Stove Network, discusses the origins and evolution of the Stove - from outsider to part of the cultural establishment. Along with WWDN lead and Stove Development Director, Katharine Wheeler, they explore the civic role culture plays in communities and look at the future of creative placemaking.

What We Do Now (WWDN) is a creative placemaking network based in Dumfries & Galloway. We bring together artists and community organizations to co-create projects, shape local plans, share knowledge, and foster enterprise, driving positive change through collaboration.

Find out more here: https://whatwedonow.scot/

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In August 2024, Ellisland Farm came to The Stove proposing an exciting project to create a zine for their upcoming exhibition, Beyond Burns: Ellisland's People. The zine was to act as a take-home for visitors to encourage reflection on the exhibition and expand the museum's boundaries as a whole. The commission was given to two young artists/illustrators: Korey Patterson and James Gough, former and current Creative Spaces associates, respectively.

For this podcast, Korey and James met up with Adam Dickson (Museum Project Officer) and Logan Fry (Volunteer Researcher) of Ellisland Farm to discuss the creative process and to give some context for the exhibition itself.

Creative Spaces is a Dumfries-based collective of young creatives, working with and advocating for our region’s young artists.

Situated in the heart of Dumfries, Creative Spaces collaborates with young creatives from across the region, providing young people with opportunities to engage in the arts. Whether it’s through events, workshops, mentorships, or our annual Associates Programme, we aim to enhance Dumfries and Galloway’s creative scene by offering free access to opportunities and paid commissions.

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In this debut episode, we chat with Cameron Hunter—audio producer, musician, and drummer for North Atlas. Cameron shares insights into his work mentoring young artists in Dumfries & Galloway and his journey in music and production.

What We Do Now (WWDN) is a creative placemaking network based in Dumfries & Galloway. We bring together artists and community organizations to co-create projects, shape local plans, share knowledge, and foster enterprise, driving positive change through collaboration.

Find out more here: https://whatwedonow.scot/

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Back in September our Creative Spaces Team; Anna, Sonah & James hosted their first event at the Stove - The Freshers Mixer.

With live performances, goodie bags and a (slightly chaotic) quiz, listen to the team talking through the project and their experience of throwing a stowed-out party on Dumfries High Street 🕺


Creative Spaces is a Dumfries-based collective of young creatives, working with and advocating for our region’s young artists.

Situated in the heart of Dumfries, Creative Spaces collaborates with young creatives from across the region, providing young people with opportunities to engage in the arts. Whether it’s through events, workshops, mentorships, or our annual Associates Programme, we aim to enhance Dumfries and Galloway’s creative scene by offering free access to opportunities and paid commission. 

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As part of this programme, The Stove’s Artistic Director, Martin O’Neill, sat down for an insightful discussion with a panel of speakers whose expertise ranged from history to investigative journalism, Riso printing techniques, and working in the former news and print spaces of Dumfries’ high street.

While examining the current landscape in Scottish grassroots print and journalism, the panel tackled how communities, creatives, and journalists can reclaim their agency while navigating an era marked by an increasingly divided mass media and heightened public scrutiny regarding the accuracy and biases of printed media. This discussion revealed insights and sparked a hopeful community dialogue on the potential future of print, media, and journalism in Dumfries and Galloway.

The discussion directly followed a screening of the film-work Imprints in Time by artist John Wallace, documenting the master printmakers and enduring machinery still in use at Solway Print while uncovering the printing heritage of Dumfries town centre.

The panel comprised Judith Hewitt (Museums Curator East for the Dumfries and Galloway Council), Johnny Gailey (Out of the Blueprint Project Manager), Karen Goodwin (Investigative Journalist and Co-Editor of The Ferret), Pete Fortune (Doonhamer and Printmaker), and John Wallace (Artist & Filmmaker).

Each panellist brought unique and specialised knowledge to the discussion.

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In this final episode of our 3 part series, we speak with artist and filmmaker duo Colin Tennent and Saskia Coulson of CT Productions. 

Throughout their project entitled Stories of Radical Landownership, the duo sought to co-create visual stories with the community landowners through a mixture of multimedia works, including photographs, audio recordings, and moving images. The pair wanted  the communities to use the process as a way to reflect on their achievements, but also to consider the future challenges they might face. Working alongside Bridgend Farmhouse in Edinburgh, South West Mull & Iona Development, North Harris Trust and Isle of Eigg Heritage Trust, the final works are a series of photographs and a short film in Gaelic and English. The work represents their brief dive into the deep, rich world of community land ownership. The works are testimony to this moment in time and the ambition of community landowners during a very remarkable year. 

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Welcome to the Radical Land. 

he Galson Estate is a community-owned estate of 56,000 acres of coast, agricultural land and moor in the North West of the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. The estate comprises 22 villages running from Upper Barvas to Port of Ness with a population of nearly 2,000 people. The estate passed into community ownership on 12 January 2007 to be managed on their behalf by the Trust.  

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In this episode, we visit Abriachan Forest Trust near Inverness.

A scattered rural community of about 130 people set high above the shores of Loch Ness in the Highlands of Scotland. In 1998 the community purchased 540 hectares of forest and open hill ground from Forest Enterprise. Since then, as a social enterprise, the Abriachan Forest Trust has managed this land to create local employment, improve the environment and encourage it’s enjoyment by the public through a network of spectacular paths, family suited mountain bike trails, innovative outdoor learning as well as health and well-being opportunities.

We speak with Suzanne, a community member and manager of the forest trust, alongside artist Richard Bracken, who has been in residence with the trust since mid 2020. During this time, Richard has worked closely with the local community in the design and build of several hand-crafted walking sticks, each bearing a poetic inscription, in which scenery, skies and people intertwine with purpose, responsibility and invitation. 

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