By Week 9, a shift becomes noticeable because there’s a deeper awareness of what sits beneath the blocks we’ve been naming week after week. This time, the focus turned toward something both essential and often overlooked: compassion. More specifically, how we extend it to ourselves.

This summer, the Barbican has extended its offering of events for Project a Black Planet. This is their centre-wide season exploring the global influence of Pan-Africanism on contemporary art, music, politics and culture.

Creative loss isn’t always failure but often interruption or being pushed out of alignment. We reflected on the ways creatives are discouraged, through critique or spaces that prioritise intellect over instinct. It highlighted the importance of discernment; knowing which voices support your work, and which quietly diminish it.

The Met Gala gave the fashion world an easy one this year. The dress code for the Costume Institute's Costume Art exhibition was a thesis statement, not a prompt: Fashion Is Art. Not fashion inspired by art. Not fashion referencing art. Fashion — the designed, constructed, worn object — declared as art in its own right. All guests had to do was prove it. What the carpet revealed instead was a gap between what the museum was arguing inside and what most guests were willing to

At ourppls, we have joined forces with City Splash to offer four emerging event producers the chance to receive £500 to bring their event idea to life during City Splash Week.

There’s something subtle but powerful about the idea of connection. It’s not always loud or visible, but it shapes how we move, create and respond to the world around us. Week 7 of The Artist’s Way invites us to return to this idea, not as something external, but as something we can actively recover. A connection to self, to intuition, to others and to the creative force that is God, that moves through us.

May feels like an opening, the point in the year where things begin to stretch where the days, the ideas, the invitations to step outside of routine and into something more expansive are clear. Cover photo by Cintia Villalobos

“Recovering a sense of abundance” sounds expansive in theory, but in practice, it asks us to confront the places where we feel most limited. And for many in the group, money surfaced immediately as both a practical and emotional barrier.