An invisible ball passed between each other.
Transfer to hand stacking game.
Weigh against each other, to make up for.
Look to the camera for reassurance.*
Marley Starskey Butler’s exhibition Compensare: For the Swallows We Weigh** has been developed during a ten-month placement at Beacon Family Services, an organisation in Birmingham providing therapeutic and relational play services for parents, carers, and families. Their approaches support children and their parents or caregivers, particularly those in adoptive or fostering families, to make sense of their family’s world and strengthen their relationships.
Set against a backdrop where political priorities and funding decisions continually shape access to therapeutic services, the exhibition illuminates how these systemic forces intersect with the lived realities of families and the professionals who support them. Embedded in the inner workings of the organisation, Marley engaged in wide-ranging conversations with staff and observed their use of Theraplay® and Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy (DDP) techniques, which gave root to this new multidimensional artwork.
By observing family and carer-child-therapist interactions, Marley attuned to the subtle nuances of verbal and physical communication within these therapeutic practices, reflecting on the experience of consciously working with each other’s energies and ultimately connecting through the joyful medium of relational play.Drawing on these reflections, and blending them with overarching themes that emerged through staff discussions, they built a library of notes and instructions designed to be translated through movement and sound into films and music.
Marley worked with movement artists Kim Bormann and Marley Starkey Joyner to translate this material, directing them with multilayered prompts and choreographic devices that allowed them to progressively move from relational play games to movement that explores the emotional, psychosocial and political landscapes that shape family support.
The resulting choreographic experiments are presented as films alongside a newly composed piece of music, inside a large circular carpeted area whose design has been reverse engineered from glitches in the video recording system and converted into a space for movement, listening and watching.
The swallows know there is hope,
There is always hope.***
* Examples of prompts offered by Marley to the movement artists.
** Compensare, Latin for ‘to counterbalance, to make up for, to weigh against each other’ is the root of the English word compensate.
*** Marley Starskey Butler, 2025.
About Marley
Marley Starskey Butler is a Birmingham based interdisciplinary artist and qualified social worker. Their practice interweaves storytelling, memory, and emotional landscapes to explore how people make meaning of personal and collective narratives within systems of care. Grounded in lived professional and familial experience in child protection, fostering, adoption, and mental health, their work centres on themes of well-being, social justice, and human rights. These experiences inform both the content and methodology of their practice, positioning it at an intersection of art and social care.
Marley is working with Eastside Projects as an Incidental Artist supported by a Wheatley Fellowship from Birmingham School of Arts, Birmingham City University. Recent exhibitions and projects include Thirty-Six, Midlands Art Centre, Birmingham (2024); Hospital Rooms – Sandwell CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services) (2023/4); Dwelling, Eagle Works Studios, Wolverhampton (2024); Reclaiming Narratives: Voices from the College of Medicine and Health, Barber Institute of Fine Arts (2024/25); Reflector, The New Art Gallery Walsall (2024/25), Blast Creative Network, The Wolverhampton School of Art, Wolverhampton (2023); Picturing High Streets, FORMAT International Photography Festival, Derby (2023); Freedom, National Justice Museum, Nottingham (2023); Portrait of Britain, British Journal of Photography, Nationwide – JCDecaux Screen (2022); East Meets West, FORMAT International Photography Festival, Derby (2021).
About Beacon Family Services
Beacon Family Services believe every child deserves the chance to thrive, and know that begins with strong, nurturing relationships at home and school. Founded in 2018, and based in Sutton Coldfield. they support families in the West Midlands by addressing the pressing need for early mental health support with relational, authentic, and inclusive services that make a real difference.
With the Children’s Commissioner finding only 32% of children receiving the help they need and one in four children expected to face mental health challenges by 2028, the stakes are higher than ever.
Beacon's focus is on empowering parents, including adoptive parents and special guardians, to build strong healthy connections with their children. They offer fresh and impactful services designed to meet each family’s unique needs. Their evidence-based, flexible approaches provide parents, carers and professionals with the tools to foster emotional well-being and resilience in children. Their support is flexible, practical, inclusive and enriched by play therapies that strengthen relationships and address behavioural challenges in a meaningful way. Find out more at www.beaconservices.org.uk
