The Play, Creativity and Wellbeing Project is an applied research project that critically examines the role and capability of play in adult cultural practice.  It investigates sites of play to identify and explore those elements of play that elicit forms of creative and collaborative engagement, and to examine the impact of these elements on players and their environments.

Located as we are in the ACT, the Play, Creativity and Wellbeing Project aims to position Canberra as a laboratory of the possible, and to collaborate with local individuals and institutions to make Canberra a 'playful' city – to inspire play in myriad, diverse and beneficial ways – for improved life and wellbeing.

The Play, Creativity and Wellbeing Project's research connects to the community through the .

Investigators

Associate Professor Cathy Hope, Associate Professor Bethaney Turner, Dr Denise Thwaites, and Dr Sam Hinton

Funding

Various projects ACT Government

Over 40 years Ginninderry will become home to 30,000 people residing in around 11,500 housing options, built at the rate of 300 to 400 homes a year. The Ginninderry vision is to create a sustainable community of international significance in the Capital Region. At the heart of the Ginninderry vision is;

• a high quality of life for the people living in Ginninderry through project planning and design. 
• a community that exemplifies world’s best practice in its design, construction and long-term liveability. 
• a model of sustainable community living that, as a place and community, can be showcased throughout Australia and internationally. 

To deliver on this vision Ginninderry has adopted a living lab framework and is a founding member of the Australian Living Lab Innovation Network (ALLIN). 

The aim of this UC/Ginninderry partnership is to develop a research framework for the Ginninderry Living Lab to improve liveability, sustainability and wellbeing in the Ginninderry private (housing) and also public realm over the mid-long term. 

Ginninderry is already a 6 Star Green Star Community with a range of housing (e.g. flex living, duo living, ageing in place) and public space options. This Ginninderry/UC project extends on Ginninderry’s commitment to challenging the traditional ‘cookie-cutter’ developer approach with the co-creation of a research framework that would iteratively inform and innovate design and planning in Ginninderry for more responsive private and public land use offerings with improved sustainability and liveability outcomes for owners/residents and the ACT. 

Chief Investigators

Dr Bethaney Turner, Professor Barbara Norman, Dr Cathy Hope, Dr Vahri Mckenzie, Dr Kate Bishop (UNSW), Associate Professor Gavin Smith (ANU)

Funder

Riverview Projects

Partners 

University of New South Wales, Australian National University, Riverview Projects

Cathy is contracted by Dionysus Cultural Development as the Community Engagement Manager for the Place Management team that is designing and delivering placemaking activities for the City Renewal Authority’s City Precinct, including Dickson, Braddon, Haig Park, City East and City West and West Basin.. This project includes co-designing and co-delivering community stakeholder and engagement activities and events with community that are responsive to needs and aspirations, as well as to place. 

Investigators

Professor Jason Bainbridge (CI), Associate Professor Cathy Hope, Professor Jen Webb, Dr Vahri McKenzie, Assistant Professor Denise Thwaites, Dr Ben Ennis Butler, Professor Robert Tanton, Professor Lain Dare, Associate Professor Leonie Pearson, Associate Professor Yogi Vidyattama, Dr Stephen Cassidy, Dr Jee Young Lee

Funder

ACT Government

The ACT Government allocated $711,000 toacc a new Creative Recovery and Resilience Program (CRRP); designed to focus on employment and economic stimulus for the creative sector in the ACT. Six new projects were delivered in partnership with local organisations to enable recovery and building resilience for artists and arts workers.  

Under this umbrella program, the Forum is a platform for exploring themes, issues and opportunities for the ACT creative sector relating to recovery and resilience. The Residency Program supports the ACT creative sector through skills and knowledge exchange that fosters life-long learning for both artists and host organisations. 

Home Economix is an Australian network of media artists, curators, designers, researchers, creative technologists and writers, exploring digital and mixed reality (XR) interventions in domestic and public space. Our founding members are Jess Herrington, Anna Madeleine Raupach, Kate Matthews, Daniel Savage and Denise Thwaites, with the support of Tactical Space Lab, Ainslie + Gorman Arts Centres, the University of Canberra and Australia Council for the Arts. 

Chief Investigators

Denise Thwaites (UC), Fanke Peng (UC), Jessica Herrington, Anna Madeleine, Daniel Savage, Kate Matthews, Adelaide Rief and Josh Harle 

Funder

Australia Council for the Arts 

This project plans to analyse national graduate employment in Australia's creative and cultural industries, and compare the utility of 'creative' and 'cultural' models for tracking employment outcomes. Although the image of work in the creative and cultural industries is attractive to students and course planners alike, international evidence suggests graduates face very poor employment prospects. The project plans to use a proven model for mapping creative graduates to compare the value of creative degrees for the creative workforce in two nations, Australia and the United Kingdom; and to use sophisticated quantitative analysis of national datasets and interviews to produce a comprehensive study of creative graduate work. The three year project will produce the first ever international mapping of graduate creative work using the 2009 UNESCO framework for cultural statistics. 

In 2016 the team commenced modelling Australian GDS and Census data and presented a panel at the International Crossroads in Cultural Studies conference, University of Sydney, in December 2016.

Investigators

Distinguished Prof Jen Webb (Lead CI, Director CCCR), Prof Jonathan Corcoran (Director of the Queensland Centre for Population Research, UQ), Prof Alessandra Faggian (Director of the Social Sciences, Gran Sasso Institute, Italy) Dr Roberta Comunian (Kings College, UK), Emeritus Professor Phil Lewis (BGL, UC) 

Funding

Australian Research Council Discovery Project 2016–2018 

The research seeks to understand how graduates of creative arts programs in Australia and China build creative vocations. It investigates the motivations for and rewards of unpaid cultural work across three areas of graduate work (visual arts, creative writing and performance) in two United Nations-recognised Creative Cities: Melbourne and Shanghai. Such research is of high significance for curriculum developers, as studies show that employment outcomes for creative arts graduates remain very poor, despite a growing cultural economy. The project is expected to lead to a theoretically innovative, evidence-based and globally transferable account of the practical economy of arts work, one that can assist creative arts programs to better prepare students. 

In 2016 Associate Professor Scott Brook and Professor Jen Webb were busy with Year 2 of this 3 year funded ARC Discovery Project. Scott travelled regularly to Melbourne to interview graduates of writing and visual arts courses, while Prof Webb commenced work on a curriculum review of writing and visual arts programs. Scott gave a paper at the International Conference for Cultural Policy Studies in Seoul, while the pair presented on a panel with Prof David Throsby (MQ) at the annual conference of The Australian Sociological Association in Melbourne. 

Investigators

 Professor Jen Webb & Associate Professor Scott Brook, University of Canberra, Professor Justin O'Connor, Monash University (Lead CI) and Professor Shilian Shan, Shanghai Jiaotong University 

Funding

Australian Research Council Discovery Project (DP150101477) 2015–2017.