Description
The Other MA (TOMA) is an 18-month artist-run learning programme based in Southend-on-Sea supporting artists who have faced barriers accessing art education and the ‘art world’.
TOMA was set up in 2016 to offer affordable, accessible and responsive art education to artists and we are the only postgraduate level art programme in Essex after all others were stopped by their host universities. We are unaccredited in the traditional sense, but provide a programme of learning that benefits artists in the same way. We are looking for a new cohort of 15 artists to join TOMA for 2024.
TOMA was born out of and has been shaped by austerity and the decades long businessification and dismantling of creative education. This, alongside the rise of tuition fees, means it is difficult for artists to flourish unless they become part of the financialised art world.
We believe in collaboration over competition and the power of people coming together to create change. These are the politics that bought TOMA into existence. TOMA has a core structure of happenings over the 18 months while also being responsive to its artists. As the world changes we are constantly reconfiguring in a way that continues to excite us and those we work with, making sure we feel present.
With support from the TOMA team, artists organise and install their own public facing exhibitions, events and learn how to survive, do and make whilst negotiating the challenging 21st century art landscape. TOMA artists experience this through a supportive programme, meeting at least three times a month to take part in a variety of activities including monthly online check-ins with the TOMA team.
Find out more here.