I seek assistance to travel to be a part of an arts lab ARTIST WANTS A LIFE taking place in a remote historical location in Central Australia in April 2012, where I have been invited to join the program as a 'mentoree provocateur'. For me this represents a new direction in thought and skills and a meeting of minds that will be advantageous to the worlds I inhabit.

The objective of ARTIST WANTS A LIFE is to navigate the geographic divide, creating dialogue, exchange and collaboration between regional and urban practicing artists and to build ideas, lateral thinking, networks and opportunity for collaboration with artists from a range of different practices. It will stand round the fire of cultural heat and surf the waves of the inland sea.

The two-week camp will be a hands-on, artist-led, experimental lab guided by exciting (and excited) innovators in inter-disciplinary practice. I stand to learn a lot from the experience in order to contribute to what I do within the arts communities I now live emotionally between - Alice Springs, Australia and Wellington, New Zealand.

I feel strongly that labs like this one are an artists rightful professional development time and that these opportunities to exchange help to grow artists understanding of their part in the world and their communities while creating meaningful relationships.

Rebecca Conroy, Artist Wants a Life Provocateur, says, “Lab environments allow artists to step outside of their creative comfort zones and take a few risks; it’s also a rare but necessary opportunity to spend deep slow time marinating in ideas with new collaborators. Particularly those artists you may never have had the chance to work with before because of the tyranny of distance.”

The two provocateurs are designing a flexible program of events based on information provided by participating artists and their own experience as facilitators and participants in related programs. Provocateurs would help artists interpret their thoughts, responses and conversations and move into activity and skills building engagement. The desert landscape and the history of the proposed site will have an influence on the theme and engagement with surroundings and process.

Artists will work both collaboratively and independently in a dynamic environment that encourages critical thinking, risk-taking and play. Artist Wants a Life is an opportunity for artists who work in the visual arts, design, installation, digital media, theatre, dance, sound, text and across creative disciplines.

Dara Gill, a current director of Firstdraft, one of Australia’s longest running ARIs,says, "Artist Wants a Life’ provides a unique opportunity for artists from alldisciplines to engage in a dynamic and rigorous collaboration that is genre busting, at the cutting edge of contemporary arts discourse and most importantly, lead by the artists themselves! As an ARI we believe in artist’s potential to be at the forefront ofresponsive and immediate discourse that can bridge any geographic distance."

ABOUT BETH: A Pakeha New Zealander, born and raised in the Manawatu, who inadvertently landed in Australia aged twenty. In 2003 she became involved with the Pitjantjatjara community at Ernabella and this led to work in numerous projects with that community most notably Big hART's Ngapartji Ngapartji – a multi-layered arts and social change project focused around the issue of indigenous language maintenance and revival. Beth has worked as a curator, producer, musician, workshop facilitator, musical director, arts administrator and artist. She has been involved in a range of theatrical and musical performances, exhibitions and recording projects. In 2009 she published a postcard compendium ‘from sometimes love beth’ and in 2010 toured ‘The Unbearable Whiteness of Being’ to the Adelaide Fringe Festival. In 2011 she attended 'Splendid' arts lab in Lismore, NSW, as an artist and worked as the co-ordinator of Watch This Space Artist Run Initiative Gallery in Alice Springs. She has been based in Alice Springs for the past four years however this year has returned to continue studies in fine arts at Massey University in Wellington and rediscover home.