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Creative Scotland is running a £400,000 pilot programme to support five of Scotland’s artist-led spaces to explore the best ways to sustain artist-run and collectively organised activity. Glasgow-based artist and writer Jessica Ramm considers the questions that will be asked.

Five a-n News writers based in Eastbourne, Leeds, London and Glasgow pick the top five UK exhibitions they’ve seen this year.

Six a-n writers – based in Glasgow, Manchester and London – pick, in no particular order, their top five exhibitions of the year.

Artist and former teacher Henry Ward is head of education at the Freelands Foundation, founded last year by Elisabeth Murdoch. a-n Writer Development Programme participant Lydia Ashman finds out more about the foundation and its forthcoming Art Is… symposium at Tate Modern.

AirSpace Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent is celebrating 10 years of artist-led activity amidst the shifting environment of the city’s post-industrial regeneration. a-n Writer Development Programme participant Anneka French talks to its directors and takes a look at the gallery’s ten-strong birthday show.

The Europarc Project has seen North East Lincolnshire-based artist Marc Renshaw researching the strangely detached world of the region’s ‘flagship’ business park. a-n Writer Development Programme participant James Steventon talks to him as an exhibition of his work goes on show at The Collection, Lincoln.

Out There: Our Post-War Public Art focuses on the period 1945-85 including 1972’s City Sculpture Project, which saw artworks temporarily sited in eight cities across the UK. After attending an event featuring Sculpture Project artists Garth Evans and Liliane Lijn, a-n Writer Development Programme participant James Steventon considers the notion of ‘shelf life’ in public art.

London-based artist Tash Kahn carefully curates the detritus she photographs on London’s streets on her @thisladypaints Instagram. Laura Davidson enters her world of trash.

For her show at Glasgow’s Transmission gallery, Scottish artist Rabiya Choudhry presents selected works from a six-year period including paintings, printed fabrics and a neon window sign in tribute to her dad. Jessica Ramm asks where her vibrant but troubled paintings come from and what it means to fly solo at this important artist-run space.

For the inaugural York Mediale festival, which presents work by artists who incorporate technology in their practices, female digital artists and activists Deep Lab tackle the ‘invisibility’ of refugees with a video work projected on York’s city walls. Laura Davidson reports.

Christine Borland’s current show ‘to The Power of Twelve’ looks at the history of Mount Stuart, a neo-gothic country mansion on the island of Bute, during the first world war when it was used as a naval hospital. She talks to Jessica Ramm about the project which sees her return to Mount Stuart fifteen years on from her first exhibition at the Grade A listed house.

For his exhibition ‘Fellowship of Citizens’ London-based Icelandic artist Saemundur Thor Helgason is promoting a lottery set up to help fund a campaign to bring about the idea of a basic income for each person in Iceland. Laura Davidson visits the show at arebyte Gallery and talks to Helgason about his plans.

For ‘A Woman’s Place at Knole’, six female artists including 2017 Turner Prize winner Lubaina Himid have responded to the usually hidden, gendered stories of an historic National Trust property in Kent to produce artworks that span painting, sculpture, film and online. Judith Alder reports.

While its spread-out nature presents plenty of challenges for artists and galleries in the counties of Carmarthenshire, Pembrokeshire and parts of Ceredigion, west Wales nevertheless has a lively and varied visual arts scene. For the latest in our ongoing series, Bob Gelsthorpe provides a snapshot of current activity.

During this year’s Glasgow International, artists Ailie Rutherford and Janie Nicoll presented In Kind, an action research project using the festival as a case study in order to chart the “hidden economies of the visual arts”. Fellow Glasgow-based artist Jessica Ramm finds out what they discovered and ponders where to go next.

For the latest in our ongoing Scene Report series, Preston-based artist Martin Hamblen provides a tour of the city’s visual arts activity and asks whether the much vaunted ‘Preston Model’ of inward investment stretches to investing in the artists living and working in the area.

As he prepares for his Glasgow International solo show at Kelvin Hall, Jessica Ramm – who is also exhibiting during GI – talks to the Glasgow-based artist about authority, control and power, and how his work offsets some of the grandeur of the city’s colonial past.

This Might Be The Future, funded by an a-n artist-led bursary, stems from AltMFA’s year-long ‘The Future’ programme and features a pleasingly chaotic collection of contributions that AltMFA co-founder Louise Ashcroft describes as a “clear reflection of our values in an object”. Laura Davidson reports.

For latest in our ongoing Scene Report series, Bath-based artist Trevor H. Smith takes a look at the contemporary art landscape in his home city and the county of Somerset.

The former director of Southend-on-Sea’s Focal Point Gallery takes up his new role in Eastbourne at a difficult time for the gallery, as local council cuts mean a 50% reduction in funding over the next four years. Judith Alder finds him relishing the challenges ahead, and with a focus on opportunities for the gallery to play a more central role in the life of the East Sussex town.

A year after it launched in the Devonshire Ward of the East Sussex town, the Devonshire Collective is hosting its second Digital Weekender as it continues to work with artists to develop and strengthen the local scene. Eastbourne-based artist Judith Alder reports.

London-based artist Larry Achiampong has had a busy year, including commissions for Somerset House, the Jerwood Visual Arts 3-Phase programme and the Diaspora Pavilion during the Venice Biennale. He reflects on a “full on” 2017 that has been tainted by the avoidable tragedy of Grenfell.

A new exhibition and free pop-up summer school from Create London and the William Morris Gallery celebrates the cultural and educational legacy of Walthamstow School of Art, which from 1957 to 1967 became a hotbed of artistic ideas and talent. Lydia Ashman talks to two of the people behind the ‘Be Magnificent’ project.

For the latest in our ongoing series looking at art scenes around the UK, Corby-based James Steventon takes a tour of Northamptonshire which also includes the former industrial towns of Northampton and Kettering in its borders.

As conflict and war continues across the world, artists are exploring ways to cut through the mainstream news narrative in order to highlight the ongoing refugee crisis. Lydia Ashman looks at current projects, artworks, and exhibitions that are tackling this urgent humanitarian and political issue.