ACAVA (Curator, Young People, Children and Families, 2024-present)

Jack is currently Curator of Young People, Children and Families with award-winning social justice arts charity ACAVA (Association for the Cultural Advancement of the Visual Arts), where his role is to cultivate and develop social practice programmes with community collaboration and care at the heart of everything he does. ACAVA's programmes include Flourish, a free school holiday programme for families in North Kensington and Brent foregrounding intergenerational creativity, and Cultivate Create, a creative growing project for families in North Kensington with a focus on creative health and wellbeing. 

A key aspect Jack has introduced to this role is the Arts Action Group model: a form of collective governance that places local young people and adults at the heart of programme decision-making. Using an asset-based approach to community arts, participants share their needs, ambitions and ideas, from materials and infrastructure design to artist choices, across their neighbourhoods, schools and homes. This model is the principal method for developing ACAVA programme, and reflects his deep commitment to youth voice and cultural democracy. 

ACAVA have also developed an anti-racist, trauma-informed, radical safeguarding framework called 'Commitment to Care'. This meets statutory safeguarding requirements and yet moves beyond compliance-based approaches to embed relational, collective and rights-based principles across their work as a means of building agency and addressing structural oppression.

Click here to find out more about ACAVA's Children, Young People and Families programme.

Flourish is shaped by five core values:

Authenticity – Artists share the creative journey with families, building trust through connection and an equal exchange of ideas.

Discovery – Sessions provide space for children and families to experiment, learn, and create without judgement.

Exploration – Each session can be experienced individually or as part of an ongoing creative journey, with all levels of engagement welcomed.

Play – Creativity builds confidence and strengthens bonds, with outdoor play encouraging interaction with nature.

Wellbeing – The programme fosters connections between families and strengthens emotional resilience.