We’ve just wrapped our first Massively Open Online Course (MOOC) Leading Innovation in Arts and Culture. This unique course was created by Dave Owens at Vanderbilt University and customized for the arts and culture sector by National Arts Strategies. This eight-week course, offered on the Coursera platform, brought more than 9,000 artists, arts administrators and cultural entrepreneurs from around the world together to discuss the specific constraints to creating good ideas in our field and to build strategies for successful innovation. This … [Read more...]
What is Creative Placemaking?
This whole conversation began as a means to talk about creative placemaking. What is it? What is its role and why should we care? We’ve spent the last few weeks hearing from our Creative Community Fellows and you. Today we want to wrap up the discussion by tackling the biggest question: what is creative placemaking? Amanda Thompson notes that the term creative placemaking acts as an inclusive phrase for a range of arts and culture activities that benefit communities: “Creative placemaking is a nice catch-all phrase that allows artists, … [Read more...]
Scott Burkholder & Ali Fadlallah: A Conversation
This week we will be featuring conversations with leaders working in communities. Scott Burkholder is an entrepreneurial minded, art promoting engineer based in Baltimore. He oversaw the business side of the Baltimore Love Project, the largest self initiated public art project in Baltimore and is currently working on utilizing art as a tool to teach empathy. Inspired by his teaching experience as an eleventh grade English teacher with Teach for America, Ali Fadlallah merged his passions for music and arts education by founding Personality … [Read more...]
Creative Placemaking: A Reader’s Response
We asked all of you to join in on this conversation as well. Mary Means works as a consultant for her firm Mary Means + Associates and has extensive experience in community-based strategic planning. Prior to entering consulting, Mary was Vice President of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, where she is best known for having created the National Main Street program. The following are her answers to our questions posed on creative placemaking. How do you define “community?” It depends on where and what I am working on. I’m a … [Read more...]
Nicolle Bennett & Sifiso Maposa: A Conversation
This week we will be featuring conversations with leaders working in communities. Nicolle Bennett, is currently working with an arts education and advocacy organization called Feel the Music! She is developing a technology platform for artists, community-based organizations and policymakers to connect in a more meaningful way. Sifiso Maposa is a social entrepreneur working in the culture and creative industries. Based in South Africa, she is creating a digital platform that connects the creative industries of Africa to each other and to global … [Read more...]
Julie Rada & Chris Webb: A Conversation
This week we will be featuring conversations with leaders working in communities. Julie Rada is a contemporary performance director using art to create enrichment opportunities for prisoners in Arizona. Chris Webb, originally from Cleveland, Ohio is currently working as a poet, actor and public speaker in LA. Both are Creative Community Fellows. The following is a recounting of what they learned from their conversation. City with a C By Julie Rada I hold an image: of artists and neighbors painting their anger and resentment into a wall … [Read more...]
Josh Rice & Emilia White: A Conversation
This week we will be featuring conversations with leaders working in communities. Josh Rice and Emilia White are members of our Creative Community Fellows program. Josh is a performer, puppeteer, producer, playwright, director, designer, choreographer, improviser & teaching artist based in New York City. Emilia is an artist and community organizer. She is also Programming Coordinator at University of Michigan and Curator of Performance Laboratory Detroit. They recorded their conversation and have shared it below. [soundcloud … [Read more...]
Sara Greer & Valerie Liais: A Conversation
This week we will be featuring conversations with artists and cultural entrepreneurs working in communities. Sara Greer is an artist who notices the wins & fails of parks & urban planning. She works in illustration, photography, set dressing & creative placemaking. Valerie Liais is a cultural manager in Morocco, co-founder of a cultural start-up designed to promote local emerging talents and projects. The images below chronicle their conversation. … [Read more...]
What is the place of cultural institutions within their communities?
Watch the following video in which Tisa Ho, Executive Director of the Hong Kong Arts Festival and a faculty member of the Salzburg Global Forum for Young Cultural Leaders, suggests that to be truly relevant an organization must be "in, of, for and about" its community. Add your voice to the discussion. Use the comments below to weigh in with your thoughts on the role of an arts organization. … [Read more...]