With passion for activist causes growing in a world focused on physical direct action, how can people with disabilities have their voices heard online and offline?

The 2016 engage International Conference

Liverpool Hope University & venues across Liverpool

13 & 14 October; Fringe 12, 13 & 15 October #engageinLiverpool

The engage International Conference 2016 will explore how issues of access and activism impact on gallery and visual arts approaches to education and outreach.

Taking place in Liverpool, a city renowned for its radicalism and creativity, at the time of the Liverpool Biennial, this year's Conference programme will have a strong focus on arts activism – how it has changed not only society's response to art, but also how it has irrevocably altered the way in which the arts world now engages with society at large.

Conference will consider the exciting methods of engagement which have developed from the early days of activism, examples of how intervention achieves its aims and the ways in which the arts can create value in contemporary society. It will examine how the arts can effectively engage with schools and ask if the curricula, or styles of interaction need to change. A discussion about how best to provide sustainable careers for artists will bring the two days of interaction and conversation to a close.

Last December, Life & Deaf won the Arts and Culture Award at Children and Young People Now Awards, sponsored by Arts Award. Their winning project What the Jackdaw Saw is a children's book that takes an inventive look at sign language.