My experiences of art and culture in Sweden have always been genuinely rich. The Swedish way of life includes culture and heritage everyday. From simple home design, to extraordinary happenings on the streets, to events in diverse areas and international exhibits. Lets take a quick dive into Swedish life with some Street Art, Home Design and Svenska London. In june 2015 I took a day trip to a small town outside of Gothenburg one day with a couple of friends. On the advice that there was some beautiful street art PLUS amazing fika and vintage clothes shops - this place did not disapoint!  At the time i was working on a street art programme in Romford and this city had decided a year prior that they would regenerate their town through art and culture starting with a ‘painted town’ festival called ‘No Limits’ where a couple of new large-scale international artworks would be erected in the town every year until the artworks became a tourist destination themselves. Something, ten years ...

  Given the increase of natural disasters in places such as Australia, Asia and more recently the South of Europe as well as the overall 'weird' weather that the UK has been facing in the past months (i.e, the supposed tornado of London from a few weeks back), now more than ever are people aware of climate change and the need to stop it.  But how can we? That is the average human being. The main perpetrators of excessive emissions of greenhouse gases is not the average person but large corporations. With certain billionaires at the helm of these corporations, who place a thrill ride to space over saving the planet, it seems that our plea to prevent the earth dying is being ignored by those who have the most power to stop climate change.  Whilst things look bleak on this front there is still much that we as individuals can do to prevent even the smallest amount of harm being done to our planet. Importantly if we, the average human beings, all chip in as much as we can, we ...

Thank you to everyone who has so far logged into view our 'Digital Decapod Exhibition' - celebrating our members work and ten years of our humble collective.  "launched on 01/07/2020, our organisation's 10th anniversary, Digital Decapod is the first virtual exhibition curated by The NO Collective. Named after the family of multi-legged crustaceans, this group exhibition is celebratory of it's members strength in individual practise and stability in shared ethos. Our members bring huge support to the organisation's endeavours ,and in their combined sterength, continued momentum and dedication to creative practice, we are continually proud" - Natalie Bays, co-founder The NO Collective We also had our very first 'Private Zoom' as a collective where we spoke about the work exhibited, the collective's jouney over the past ten years and also the upcoming activities that NO are producing.  The Exhibition includes works from: anika manuel // char...

On June 17th, Natalie, our co-founder and MD was asked to host an international conference on the importance of cultural regeneration and creativity in public spaces. Organised by OCA Magazine and The Eurasian Creative Guild, 11 countries were represented in the call with over 25 participants joining to speak about their work and to gain inspiration for post-COVID-19 projects from each other. The main discussion points meandered around how although artists are innately flexible to their working conditions, our inspiration within public art is the positive change for its audience (the people) and members of the public should be central in reviving a creative presence in towns and cities around the world. Whether this be by online discussions, postal activities or socially distanced gatherings, the people are the beating heart of the city and there is duplicative and catalysing power between residents and artists working together. You can watch the full conversation at ‘ECG TV’ the offic...

Romford Recorder - Ken Mears  Level one of the Mercury shopping centre was transformed into a miniature town by more than 250 students who took part in various architecture workshops.  Natalie Bays deputy centre manager said "so many people, young and old, are very interested in what is happening in our town. It was so nice to see parents and children creating shops and houses together to be placed in their town centre, and also to hear young people having such sophisticated ideas on how they could upgrade their environments through lateral ideas and building techniques."   Frances Bardsley Academy students came up with ideas to introduce a Romford Green Market and younger children at the Romford Utopia workshop showed an interest in parks by adding more than 10 parks to a giant map of the town.