Institute of Art and Ideas

Institute of Art and Ideas

Formation	2008
Location	Hay-on-Wye, Wales, U.K.
Founder	Hilary Lawson
Website	www.iai.tv

The Institute of Art and Ideas^[1] is a not-for-profit, charitable organisation founded in 2008 in London. It aims to invigorate contemporary culture by placing philosophy and big ideas at the heart of public life.

Through a digital platform and a programme of events including the world's largest philosophy and music festival HowTheLightGetsIn, the IAI generates and incubates ideas and conveys these to the public.^[2]

IAI TV

IAI TV is an online channel where the debates and talks curated by the IAI are released and made freely available to watch online. Covering philosophy, science, politics and art, IAI TV features all of the speakers appearing at HowTheLightGetsIn.

As of November 2016, over 800 videos have been posted on IAI TV. This is in addition to over 600 original articles written by the speakers and hosted on the IAI News section. Every fortnight a new video debate or talk is published. In September 2016 the videos had received in excess of 670,000 views, reaching over 1,000,000 people each year.^[3] Hilary Lawson in an interview in 2016:

"Once upon a time ideas were spread through a university, but increasingly online learning and people like ourselves and TED will provide that sort of frame that is traditionally the area of the academy. It is being eroded […] A common experience is for speakers to come to us and they’re professors and they say, ‘I wish we could get these debates happening at my university.’^[4]

IAI Academy

IAI Academy is an educational platform of free online courses in philosophy, politics, art and science. With over 45 courses from world leading thinkers including Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek and MacArthur ‘Genius Grant’ winner Nancy Cartwright, IAI Academy's stated aim is to celebrate original thinking that challenges accepted wisdom, rather than repeating the ideas of today. Since September 2016, new courses have been published on a monthly basis. It has received praise from the likes of Open Culture for helping foster "a progressive and vibrant intellectual culture".^[5]

The full range of courses can be viewed at iai.academy

HowTheLightGetsIn: the Philosophy and Music Festival at Hay

HowTheLightGetsIn Talk Tent

HowTheLightGetsIn is the world's largest philosophy and music festival hosted by the Institute of Art and Ideas.^[6] The event takes place over 10 days and features more than 700 events. It attracts some of the world's leading thinkers and practitioners to take part, including Nobel Prize-winning economists Paul Krugman and Robert Shiller, writers A.S. Byatt and Martin Amis, scientists Roger Penrose and Lawrence Krauss, philosophers John Searle and Mary Midgley, and politicians from Michael Howard to Angela Eagle to Natalie Bennett.

HowTheLightGetsIn 2016 ‘The Known, the Strange and the New’

The 2016 festival explored our continued ability to surprise ourselves in science, art, philosophy and politics, and how we seek to make sense of the world around us. Speakers included Nobel Prize-winning physicist Frank Wilczek, Green Party leader Natalie Bennett, eminent philosophers Roger Scruton and John Searle, as well as comedian Robin Ince and YBA artist Gavin Turk.

Musical highlights included headline acts Gilles Peterson, Fairport Convention, and Mercury prize nominees, ESKA and Ghostpoet.

HowTheLightGetsIn 2015 ‘Fantasy and Reality’

The 2015 festival tackled the issue of fantasy and reality head on; questioning how much of what we take to be reality is a fantasy of our own making, and which – if any – of our current fantasies should become the realities of the future. Speakers included Nobel Prize-winning economists Robert Shiller and Paul Krugman, eminent philosophers Mary Midgley and John Searle, best-selling physicists Lawrence Krauss and Roger Penrose, Bridget Jones and Smack the Pony star Sally Phillips and politicians Dianne Abbott and Michael Howard.

As part of the festival, New College of the Humanities presented the IAI School. Aimed at 16- to 18-year-olds, and led by world-leading thinkers, the IAI School explored topics such as Free Will and Politics, Sex Ethics and Morality, in a fun festival environment.

HowTheLightGetsIn 2014: ‘Heresy, Truth and the Future’

The 2014 festival covered the role of heretics in shaping the future; questioning whether breaking with orthodoxy was a primary driver of innovation, or if there was wisdom in following the path set by the trials and tribulations of others.

Speakers included Roger Penrose, who coined ‘The Theory of Everything’ during his work with Stephen Hawking, scientist and Secret Diaries of a Call Girl author Brooke Magnanti, Bruce Parry, Doon Mackichan, Cory Doctorow, Owen Jones, David Nutt, Molotov Jukebox, Moulettes, and Mr Scruff.

HowTheLightGetsIn 2013: ‘Error, Lies and Adventure’

The 2013 festival examined the role of errors as a tool for innovation; exploring how errors in our thinking are a means to find new worlds and new adventures. Speakers included moral philosopher Susan Neiman, Granta-Prize-winning novelist Joanna Kavenna, human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, Mary Midgley and controversial scientist and skeptic Rupert Sheldrake.

Musical highlights included platinum-selling, BRIT-nominated Nerina Pallot, Mercury Prize nominated musicians Sam Lee and Nick Mulvey, and the Moulettes.

HowTheLightGetsIn 2012 'Uncharted Territory: Progress for a New Era'

Last year's festival sought to question existing notions of progress through an exploration of issues surrounding political, economic and ethical advance in the West. By acknowledging the uncertainty of the future and its values, do we need to establish new ideas of progress or is such a suggestion inherently flawed?

It was held in Hay-on-Wye and ran between 31 May and 10 June 2012,^[7] during which time there were almost five hundred sessions staged across the site's five venues.

Amongst the speakers on the festival's programme were musician Brian Eno, founder of Glastonbury festival Michael Eavis, literary theorist and critic Terry Eagleton and independent scientist and inventor James Lovelock.^[8] Musical highlights included performances from Charlotte Church, Emmy the Great, and Jeffrey Lewis and the Junkyard, as well as a twelve-hour painting marathon from artist Stella Vine to accompany a performance by alternative rock band The Chapman Family.^[9]

HowTheLightGetsIn 2011 ‘New Gods: Icons and Ideas in a Changed World’

2011's HowtheLightGetsIn questioned whether the great narratives that have built and sustained the West under threat and, if so, what are the new gods that will replace them?

Speakers at the festival included critical theorist Leela Gandhi, Times columnist David Aaronovitch, poet Simon Armitage, New Statesman culture editor Jonathan Derbyshire and screenwriter Jez Butterworth.

Cultural highlights ranged from the likes of Ghostpoet, Mount Kimbie and The Correspondents, to comedy and the screening of documentaries from around the world with BBC Four.

HowTheLightGetsIn 2010 ‘Being Human’

The 2010 festival posed the questions: What is it to be alive? What is essential to our humanity and what is peripheral? What is truly important in life?

Author of Politics of Fear Frank Furedi, filmmaker David Bond, award-winning author Philip Pullman and Labour politician Jon Cruddas, were amongst the speakers on the line up.

Crunch: the Art and Music Festival at Hay

Crunch is an annual Art and Music festival^[10] that takes place in November in Hay-on-Wye, Wales. It is held by the Institute of Art and Ideas, a non-profit organization which hosts a number of cultural events throughout the year.^[11] Crunch brings together the world's leading artists, curators and critics to debate the questions that lie at the core of contemporary art. The 3-day festival features talk sessions and debates, live music, performance acts, creative workshops, art exhibitions and late night parties.

Crunch 2011 ‘Awake in the Universe’

Actress Rosie Fellner and director Nicolas Roeg at Crunch 2011

The festival has doubled in size and features controversial art historian Julian Stallabrass, artist Susan Hiller and postmodern painter and psychoanalyst Bracha Ettinger debating how art and creativity make us alive; Serpentine Director Hans Ulrich-Obrist on the rise of the curators and outspoken artist Jake Chapman in conversation with Paradise Row founder Nick Hackworth.

With exhibitions from galleries such as The View, the UK's contemporary art scene combines with a debate series featuring significant cultural figures such as former Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company Adrian Noble, novelist Mark Haddon and art historian Griselda Pollock.

Other highlights include a trio of Cabaret acts, comedy from the BBC's John-Luke Roberts and music performances from British Sea Power, Emily Barker & The Red Clay Halo and Mara Carlyle.

Crunch 2010 ‘What's the point of art?’

The 2010 festival highlighted that the art world is in a state of flux and that an emerging generation of artists and curators are pushing for a new arts agenda. It was described by Harper's Bazaar as "The art and soul of the party."^[12]

Amongst those that took part in debates were Bianca Jagger, co-director of the Serpentine Gallery Julia Peyton-Jones, art critic Matthew Collings, The Evening Standard's art correspondent Godfrey Barker, The BBC's Arts Editor Will Gompertz and musician Brian Eno.

The newly installed globe field hosted the Great British Art Debate, the Crunch Art Fair ^[13] and the ‘Globe On Fire’ installation. Inside the globe, The Museum of Everything^[14] brought its Exhibition #2 to Hay.

Crunch 2009 ‘Art in an Ephemeral Age’

Crunch 2009 explored the issues at the heart of contemporary art, with topics such as performance, environmental art and installation taking centre stage. Guest speakers included former head of The Ruskin School Michael Archer, Radio 4 presenter Godfrey Barker, sculptor Richard Wentworth, graffiti artist Felix Braun, and curators from The Saatchi Gallery, The ICA and Hayward Gallery.

Visual art performers The Paper Cinema^[15] demonstrated a blend of illustration and film with The Lost World and The Night Flyer, and musician Richard ‘Kid’ Strange performed classics from his thirty-year career.

Crunch 2008 ‘Art in a New Era’

The first annual art festival hosted by the IAI focused on the implications of the credit crunch upon the art market and the wider art community. The festival brought together some of the foremost artists and art professionals working in the UK including Gavin Turk, Anthony Hayden Guest and Ben Lewis.

It was the first official UK forum to address the effects of the global economic recession upon artists and the art market. Ben Lewis' keynote speech provided a preview of the content of his subsequent documentary on Channel 4.

Notes and references