D-AiR's residency programme has three overlapping aims:

1. to provide opportunities for recent art graduates to develop work in collaboration with, or in response to, non-arts organisations within the city.

2. to provide Dundee-based artists with a critical forum to reflect upon and develop contemporary art practice within the city.

3. to provide non-arts organisations with the skills and imaginative insights that arts practitioners offer.

Our main residency is, of course, the city of Dundee. With that in mind we encourage all Dundee residents to celebrate their creativity and re-perform the city.

More formally, D-AiR were resident in the Hannah Maclure Centre from March - August 2010. This residency resulted in the launch of Dundee Live, a public art and performance programme running from September 2010 - August 2011.

To coincide with Dundee Live two other residencies were established. Sarah Gittins was resident at Dundee Botanic Gardens. This residency focused on food sustainability and security, seen through the ecology of rice. It culminated in an exhibition, talk and rice picnic for Dundee Live. (For more information please see Sarah's blog.)

We were also resident at Tayside Foundation for the Conservation of Resources (otherwise known as the Tayside Recyclers). Here, in collaboration with Tayside Recyclers' staff and volunteers and Dundee University's People and Planet, D-AiR established a skill share workshop and an Urban vegetable garden (the latter in collaboration with Dundee Transition Town). Both the skill share workshop and the garden continue to flourish. (Please see Tayside Recyclers website for details.) As part of this residency Mary Somerville was commissioned to create a series of video works responding to Tayside Recyclers. This work was shown as part of the Dundee Live Festival along with a live performance by Mary and Alison Whyte at the Guerrilla Gallery opening event. (Click here for a selection of Mary's videos.)

Not quite a residency, but working towards one, we also had a reading towards action group performing live at Dundee Central Library. We were situated, appropriately, between 'Scottish Interest', 'Fiction' and 'Non-Fiction'. This led to, among other things, an exhibition at the Central Library called 'Mappa Mundi'; again, as part of the Dundee Live Festival. (Sarah Gittins' pillar drawing can still be seen in the Leisure Reading section.)

Next up we'll be supporting 4 new residency-response projects from September 2011 - June 2012. More about those soon.

Finally, and as a matter of interest, see the following two articles about the Artists Placement Group (one and two). These articles raise questions about artists working in non-art contexts. Whilst different in emphasis to D-AiR the APG have significance for our practice.