HAVE you ever heard of art-jamming? Or what about the graffiti artists who have been helping disaffected children in York reconnect with school?

Answers can be found on Sunday at the York Peace Festival 2010, the free community arts festival where the interactive art programme will put the emphasis on taking part.

One of the festival’s art curators, Greg McGee, of The ArtSpace in Tower Street, explains the concept behind art-jamming.

“It’s painting, but fast and loose and inside a time limit – often one hour. That makes it more vigorous. In fact, the more energetic and lively, the better,” he says.

“We try to create a relaxed but upbeat ambience; there’s always music – but it’s never Classic FM. It’s just not that kind of party.”

Greg discovered art-jamming while travelling through Japan, in 2005. “Japanese workers would emerge from their offices at the end of the working week and get together to paint, fast and loose, usually to music.”

He notes the difference in outlook between the Japanese and the British when it comes to “doing” art. “The Japanese are fearless about expressing themselves, and they see art as a pastime rather than something you pursue in order to write an essay at the end of it, or to get a qualification,” he says.

“In Japan, there’s less high-brow conceptualisation of art that people find so off-putting, as they’re left feeling that they don’t ‘get’ art.”

Greg sees a link between art-jamming and the economic downturn in Britain.

“Creativity comes to the fore during a recession,” he says. “People find they have to cut their spending, but they still need to find things to do and places to go.”

Art-jamming takes place at The Artspace every Friday night.

“We find we get all sorts of people turning up. Some use it as a springboard into the weekend; the students, for example, come and paint, then head off into town for a night out. Others see it as an alternative to a night on the town.” Art-jamming moves to Rowntree Park for the York Peace Festival.

“It’s a roaming event: we’ll be moving around the site, drawing inspiration from what’s going on around us, and encouraging anybody who wants to have a go,” says Greg.

Or you can take the plunge at The Artspace on a Friday when art-jamming sessions cost £5.

Meanwhile, if you wander over to the festival dance area more high-energy art will be happening in the form of graffiti, co-ordinated by graffiti artist-turned artist Jim David.

Jim champions the importance of community art and is passionate about youth work in the arts, spending much of his time working with disaffected children in schools, with startling results.

“Often I’ll go into a school and be presented with the tricky kids – the ones who’ve lost interest completely and won’t engage in school,” he says.

“I’ll suggest that we paint a mural and, before you know it, we’ve got our designated piece of wall and the kids who’d formerly been dubbed ‘the worst kids’ are suddenly involved.

“I get letters from some of the parents and teachers – even the kids themselves – saying how much of a difference it’s made to the children’s outlook and behaviour, and ultimately, their prospects.”

Not everything is a bed of roses for graffiti artists. “Many people still think we’re vandals, and they associate graffiti with crime,” Jim says. “Not all graffiti is art, that’s for sure, but there’s often a lot of misrepresentation about what we do.

“That said, we’ve been granted permission by Sustrans [the safer travel charity] to paint a bridge they own on the A64 – in fact they commissioned us to paint it – but I’ve lost count of the number of times the police have arrived, threatening to arrest us, even though we show them the letter from Sustrans.” What will Jim be doing at the York Peace Festival?

“We’ll be creating A Piece for Peace, which is how graffiti artists refer to their work: a ‘piece’, shortened from ‘masterpiece’. It’s going to be big and colourful, created with paint bombs – balloons filled with water-soluble paint that people can throw at the canvas.”

Later, Jim plans to use the canvas as a backdrop for a piece of graffiti art to be auctioned off for charity.

“We’ll also be painting scenes from the festival, using our environmentally friendly spray paint.”

In its 25th anniversary year, York Peace Festival will run from 11am to 7pm in Rowntree Park, York. Admission is free. Go to the website yorkpeacefestival.org.uk for more information.