Intertale / Eutopia

InterTale/Eutopia is a travelling research project to investigate curatorial and organisational practices of rural arts initiatives across Europe.

With an InterRail ticket in my hand, I am criss-crossing the continent to visit a wide range of rural creative set ups. By connecting and reconnecting with existing and future partners and networks I discuss, test and refine a series of proposed questions that stem from my transformational fieldwork research, tried and tested at Deveron Projects/the town is the venue in Huntly, Aberdeenshire.

Workshops, walkshops and talks form the encounters, alongside simply looking and listening at different models of arts development in their specific rural community settings.

Intertale relates to the stories I gain and the talks I give while travelling from place to place. Eutopia, a much-used Geddesian term, means a place that strives to be perfectly happy - stemming from the Greek εὖ ("good" or "well") and τόπος ("place"), meaning a place of ideal well-being. While Utopia is an impossible concept, Eutopia is a more realistic idea of something that is attainable, where people must put aside their personal interests for the good of the larger group.

During the first part of my journey, I travelled over two months to Switzerland, Czech Republic, Poland, Austria, Romania, Italy, France and Catalunya. I was also in Eire and Germany in 2025. The more northern and Baltic countries were visited during phase 2 in early summer 2026.

Aim is to produce a well-researched toolkit that can be applied and adopted by a range of practitioners in rural/periphery settings. Based on Geddesian principles it will form the base for an international conference and a new handbook publication. A co-designed tablecloth based on the Place/Work/Folk thinking machine is greatly assisting, alongside a set of cards designed by Yunior Aguiar that are based on 16 principles of rural arts development derived from my phd research on my work with Deveron Projects.

Shadow Curator: Charles Esche‍. ‍Supported by Creative Scotland.

Intertale/Eutopia Stops:

Stop 1: Zeitgarten/Pfyn/Switzerland

Stop 2: Broumov/Czechia

Stop 3: InSitu/Sokołowsko/Silesia/Poland

Stop 4: Studio Wilhelm Scherübl/Radstadt/Austria

Stop 5: Kunstbühel/Kitzbühel/Tirol/Austria

Stop 6: Wattens/Tirol/Austria

Stop 7: FÖN Festival/Wörgl/Tirol/Austria

Stop 8: Schmiede/Hallein/Austria

Stop 9: Künstlerstadt Gmünd

Stop 10: InContextArt/Slǎnic Moldova/Romania