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Conference Schedule |
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Tuesday, May 17 Boston Room of the Boston Public Library May 17, 6:30 PM Nicco Mele and Theaster Gates present the keynote address for AIC's Connected and Consequential conference. |
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Friday, June 10 Northeastern University, Egan Center 6:30 - 8:30p.m. "Stories from the Field", with artists and community practitioners Gail Burton, Michael Dowling, Mariama White-Hammond, Andi Sutton, John Osorio-Buck, moderated by Kenneth Bailey |
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Saturday, June 11 Northeastern University, Egan Center 9:00 a.m. Introductory Remarks and Video, Marie Cieri and Louisa McCall 9:15 a.m. "Art and Healing" Jeremy Nobel 9:30 - 10:30 a.m. Case Study: "SUGAR" and Story Circles with artist Robbie McCauley 10:35 - 11:35 a.m. Case Study: Ideas Team with Artistic Director of Artlink, Edinburgh, Alison Stirling, and artists Kelly Dobson, Steve Hollingsworth and Wendy Jacob 11:35 - 12:30 p.m. Open time for networking and drop in at Resource Areas: Collaboration, Resarch, Technology, and Sustainability 12:30 - 1:30pm Lunch, "Negotiating Change with Power" Judy Meredith, Institute for Public Policy 1:30 - 2:30 p.m. Case Study: "Crossing the Rubicon: On Contamination, Tragedy and the Possibility of New Cultures" with Dan Borelli, artist, Gavin Kroeber, producer, moderated by Marie Cieri, Artists in Context 2:30 - 3:30 p.m. Case Study: "The Story Behind..." with Mario E. Quiroz-Servellon, Franklin Soults, Jose Louis Falconi moderator 3:30 - 5:20 p.m. Wrap-Up with Alicia Anstead 5:20 - 5:30 p.m. Closing Remarks |
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Sunday June 12 Design Studio for Social Intervention 10:30 -1:00 Presentation of Conference Findings by Marc Zegans, discussion and networking |
Connected and Consequential
A Conference for Artists, Activists, Academics and Civic Leaders
June 10-12, 2011
Boston, MA
Purpose of the Conference
To assemble artists and other creative thinkers and practitioners who want to explore the intersection of art and other fields, including Health, Nature, Consumption and Justice. Through case studies and moderated discussions, conference participants will explore how artists and their collaborators are using their creativity and finely honed skills to intervene in the major issues of our time to produce positive social outcomes. The proceedings will focus on the best ways to develop “integrated practices”, including the role of collaboration, research, technology and sustainability.
Boston Conference Program
Download a PDF of the Boston Connected and Consequential Conference here
Conference Schedule
Keynote: art and technology in the age of activism
Nicco Mele and Theaster Gates
Held May 17, 6:30 p.m. Boston Public Library, Copley Square, Boston Room.
Presentations, Conversation and Audience Discussion on necessary imagination, truth and power
Excerpt from Marc Zegans' Summary of the Keynote Address:
Nicco Mele, webmaster for former Vermont Governor Howard Dean’s 2004 presidential race and adjust faculty member and Harvard’s Kennedy School and visual artist and urban planner Theaster Gates, director of arts programming and lecturer in visual arts at the University of Chicago joined with audience for a spirited discussion on art, activism, technology and change, the hybrid forms emerging in this space, and the skills needed to be effective in these technically accelerating times.
Theaster’s work and Nicco’s work each focuses on creating new aggregations of people. They operate though in strikingly different ways. Theaster forms aggregations around “curious social moments”, creative reuse of the built environment, and reclaimed objects. Nicco uses networked computing and social media to create mass aggregations of voters who can tip the electoral balance. Both forms of aggregation, however, operate outside conventional establishments and both engage durable institutions in novel ways. This shared outsider perspective and common practice of inventing unconventional means of mobilization as instruments of change explains thematic coherence of the conversation and points to the robustness of these themes as means of understanding and operating in the realm of art, activism and hybrid productions.
View the full summary here.
Friday, June 10 at Northeastern University, Egan Center,
6:30 – 8:30p.m. “Stories from the Field”, with artists and community practitioners Gail Burton, New Freedwoman Project; Michael Dowling, Medicine Wheel Productions; Mariama White-Hammond, Project Hip Hop; Andi Sutton, National Bitter Melon Council; John Osorio-Buck, ; moderated by Kenneth Bailey, Design Studio for Social Intervention.
Ken Bailey will moderate a “fishbowl” conversation with five Boston-based artists engaged in social practice. He will interview the participants and encourage conversation around the differences and similarities, the challenges and successes, and the long-term viability of their different practices.
Saturday, June 11 Northeastern University, Egan Center
8:00 a.m. Registration and Breakfast
9:00 a.m. Introductory Remarks and Video, Marie Cieri and Louisa McCall
9:15 a.m. Jeremy Nobel, “Art and Healing”
Jeremy Nobel is an Adjunct Lecturer on Health Policy and Management - Department of Health Policy and Management - Harvard School of Public Health and President and Founder, Foundation for Art and Healing
9:30 – 10:30 a.m. Case Study: “SUGAR” and Story Circles with artist Robbie McCauley
Moderated by Jeremy Nobel, the discussion of story circles and their impact on diabetics’ attitude, care-taking and healing will include Sharon Jackson, Mattapan Community Health Center, and Kathryn, a story circle participant. The case study will also examine how community interest and desire for this type of engagement are determined.
10:35 – 11:35 a.m. Case Study: Ideas Team with Artistic Director of Artlink, Edinburgh, Alison Stirling, and artists Kelly Dobson, Steve Hollingsworth and Wendy Jacob
How can people with profound developmental disabilities inform an artistic process? How do you bring people together to further inform and realise these ideas? In February, a group of artists, engineers, arts administrators and care workers met in Edinburgh to discuss the creation of a center -- part ideas laboratory, part university and part day center -- where individuals from across a range of abilities and disciplines could collaborate on creative projects that challenge normative ways of communication and being in the world. The aim of the center is to use the most cutting edge ideas for the most disadvantaged people.
11:45- 12:30 pm Open Time for Networking and Drop-in at skill resource tables, including:
Collaboration
Research
Technology
Sustainability
12:30 – 1:30pm Lunch, Judy Meredith, Institute for Public Policy,
“Negotiating Change with Power: How to Work with the Power Structure of Government”
1:30 -2:30 p.m. Case Study:Crossing the Rubicon: On Contamination, Tragedy and the Possibility of New Cultures with Dan Borelli, artist, Gavin Kroeber, producer, moderated by Marie Cieri, Artists in Context
Environmental contamination may be perpetrated by specific individuals and corporations, but the cultural conditions that permit such disregard are collectively produced. Starting from the environmental and social histories of Ashland, MA and the Nyanza EPA Superfund site that it is home to, this talk explores the possibility of an artwork that can trace a society's failure to address its own excesses, honor the victims and heroes of this history, and finally lay the ground for a fundamentally more complex relationship to the risks that our lifestyles produce.
2:35 – 3:35p.m. Case Study: “The Story Behind” with Mario E. Quiroz-Servellon, artist ,Franklin Soults, Communications Director, Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, moderator TBD
3:45 – 4:30 Open Time for Networking and Drop-in at skill resource tables, including Collaboration, Research, Technology, Sustainability
4:30 – 6:00 pm Wrap Up
Sunday June 12 Design Studio for Social Intervention
1946 Washington St., 2nd Floor, Boston (at the corner of Thorndike St.)
10:30-1:00 Presentation of Conference Findings, discussion and networking
Speaker Biographies
Click here to view or download a pdf of the speaker biographies.
Reports
Marc Zegans' Weaver Team Reports:
Conference Findings describes the organization, themes, and topics from the conference, as well as possible next steps.
Conference Case Studies·examines each of the projects presented at the conference, with some analysis of the critical underlying points.
Conference Evaluations is a synthesis of the feedback we received from conference participants about lessons learned and how we move forward.
Among other media, the event was recorded live in tweets at the hashtag #AIC2011. Click here to view the Alicia Anstead's twitter summary.
Article on the Groundswell Blog by AIC Adviser and Connected and Consequential Weaver Susie Husted, with a summary of the event in the participants own words
Sponsors
The Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, The Nathan Cummings Foundation, The Barr Foundation and the LEF Foundation.