Panel Discussion

Understanding the Potential of L3Cs in the Arts and Culture

On November 16, Andrew Taylor, the Artful Manager, moderated a panel discussion at Columbia University in New York City on the Low-Profit Limited Liability Company (L3C), and its potential for the arts. The panelists included two of the leading national experts on the business entity (Marc J. Lane and Rick Zwetch), alongside two masters from the theater world (Gregory Moser, Victoria Bailey), and one change agent from the arts business infrastructure (Adam Huttler).

Andrew Taylor is a faculty member of American University’s Arts Management Program in Washington, DC. An author, lecturer, researcher, and consultant on a broad range of arts management issues, Andrew specializes in business model development for cultural initiatives and the impact of communications technology on the arts.

Some basic information on the L3C can be found on wikipedia by clicking here:

A low-profit limited liability company (L3C) is a legal form of business entity in the United States that was created to bridge the gap between non-profit and for-profit investing by providing a structure that facilitates investments in socially beneficial, for-profit ventures while simplifying compliance with Internal Revenue Service rules for program-related investments, a type of investment that private foundations are allowed to make.

The video might require a little of your time, but is worth it if you have an interest in emerging models for production in the United States.

[iframe http://cdn.livestream.com/embed/newplay?layout=4&clip=pla_728700a0-97c5-4bfe-a227-7bb9a80624d7& 500 340]

Ai Weiwei – Never Sorry

This post comes to you from Cultura21

Hitting screens: film portrait of an artist and critic

Right in time Ai Weiwei´s house arrest is being lifted: The documentation Ai Weiwei: Never sorry hits screens these days. For three years the producer Alison Klayman shadowed his life, resuming in an film portrait of one of the most compelling public figures in China. Now everybody gets the chance to gaze at the life of the known conceptual artist.

The film isn’t a media unknown to the artist: Ai Weiwei uses social media and finds a great platform for political activism in the Internet. Artist and regime critic, Ai Weiwei unites these positions. Trough art he communicates and expresses himself, creatively and radically he deals with his China. In his political-artistic driven activism the dissident tries to make grievance obvious and fight injustice. He aims at a world, free of human rights abuse.

Ai Weiwei works with pictures and let’s them talk. The outcome is volitional, but due to his behavor the artist and his family are affected by reprisals on a regular basis. Last year he was detained for a few months and has spendt his days since in house arrest in Peking.

Last year a panel discussion on Ai Weiwei’s role in art and activism was held at Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany (co-organized by Cultura21 and the FIDH).

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

An Ecology of Mind ¦ A Daughter’s Portrait of Gregory Bateson

This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

An Ecology Of Mind | A Daughter's Portrait of Gregory Bateson

An Ecology Of Mind | A Daughter’s Portrait of Gregory Bateson.

There will be a screening and panel discussion of Nora Bateson’s film of Gregory Bateson,

Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture,

L1 Minto House, Chambers Street, Edinburgh

5.30 – 8pm on 23 February 2012

There will be a workshop on 24 Feb for students of any discipline, Masters level and above, at Edinburgh College of Art, Lauriston Place. Please email chris@fremnatle.org if you wish to attend the film. This event is sponsored by the School of Architecture and the CORE research group.

ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.

It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology.
Go to EcoArtScotland

Designing out Waste – panel discussion at the Royal College of Art

On Monday 7 November, Arcola participated in an exciting discussion about designing out waste in the art and design sector. It was organised by the London Community Resource Network with speakers from TRAID  and the East London Furniture Project; it was an exploration of how artists and designers can ensure sustainability in the first place by Designing Out Waste.

The talk was part of the Sustain series of talks at the RCA. For more information, see HERE

Go to Arcola Energy

The 1st Cultura21 Forum in Germany

This post comes to you from Cultura21

Cultura21 e.V. is happy to announce the first „Cultura21 Forum“ in Germany:

The Cultivation of Ecology/-ies:
gardens and complexity in rural and urban areas

September 23rd to 25th, 2011 – “Studio Kunst und Landschaft” in Hude (aprox. 13 km from Oldenburg)

Registration is required (see below) – Please notice that this event will be bilingual, but the main language will be German (and there will be no translation service)!

The “Cultura21 Forum” starts on Friday evening with a public event in the “Studio Kunst und Landschaft”. The ecological artist Insa Winkler will offer a guided tour on the terrain. Three guest speakers will give an introduction to “culture(s) of sustainability (the role of gardening culture)”. On Saturday registered participants of the “Cultura21 Forum” will get the chance to take part in specific workshops and open space sessions. The Sunday also is a public event and will contain three speeches and a panel discussion. The speakers will deal with the vision of participative and collective cultivation of ecology in rural and urban areas. The forum will end with a “guerilla gardening” intervention, which will be prepared the day before.

The concept of the “Cultura21 Forum”

By organizing an annual “Cultura21 Forum”, Cultura21 in Germany wants to concentrate all the positive energy of its members and also of like-minded organisations. The aim is to make possible a regular exchange between the participants. Furthermore, other initiatives treating the issue of a “culture of sustainability” should be given room to grow and develop. The basic idea of the forum is to have both a thematic focus and an open space part in the program. The open space part is meant to be the source for new project ideas, created in free exchange and discussions. These parts are linked with each other in the program and complement one another.

2011 edition: the cultivation of ecology/-ies

The main topic of the “Cultura21 Forum” 2011 is: “The cultivation of ecology/-ies: gardens and complexity in rural and urban areas”. Our attention will be especially turned to “guerilla gardening”: guerilla gardening is known as a creative-subversive type of civil disobedience and political protest from the 1970s in New York. Over the years a development has taken place, and nowadays guerilla gardening can be seen with the perspective of “urban agriculture” and “urban gardens”. This type of protest combines the adornment of concrete-dominated urban areas, the temporary use, the greening of idle areas and also the possibility to harvest.

Besides planting “surprise gardens”, seed bombs are the most familiar type of creative protest. They contain a mixture of seeds, soil and clay, shaped like a ball. You then normally just drop these bombs wherever you wish. Further aims are the enforcement of self-supply, protest against the agro-industry and the sowing of unusual seeds. Guerilla gardening is quite controversial and therefore will be discussed in the panel discussion. There will also be a workshop on “seed bombs”. On Sunday, they are supposed to be launched/sowed by the participants next to a piece of farmland.

Program

The complete program can be downloaded as a PDF file: Cultura21Forum_Program(ENG)

Preparatory online exchanges for the “Open Space” sessions are conducted on this website, on our online forum: Click here

About the speakers

Sacha Kagan, Lüneburg
Research Associate at the Institute of Cultural Theory, Research, and the Arts (ICRA/IKKK) at the Leuphana University Lüneburg ; member of Cultura21 e.V. since 2006 ; founding coordinator of the international platform of Cultura21 and founding director of the International Summer School of Arts and Sciences for Sustainability in Social Transformation (ASSiST). The focus of his scientific and cultural work is on the transdisciplinary field of arts an (un)sustainability.

Oleg Koefoed, Copenhagen
Oleg Koefoed, action philosopher, is the founder of the “Gravitations Center for Action Philosophy” and founding director of Cultura21 Nordic (with its headquarters in Copenhagen).

Hildegard Kurt, Berlin (Workshop “Jeder Mensch ein Künstler?” [Every human being an artist?])
Hildegard Kurt, cultural scientist, author and working on social sculpture, is one of the key figures for the intercession of arts and sustainability in Germany. She is head of the Berlin “und.Institute für Kunst, Kultur und Zukunftsfähigkeit“ (und.Institut) [und.institute for arts, culture and sustainability] which she was a co-founder of. She is also working at the “Social Sculpture Research Unit (SSRU)” at Oxford Brookes University in the UK (which is led by the artist and former Beuys-student Shelley Sacks).

Elisabeth Meyer-Renschhausen, Berlin (Community Gardens in New York)
Elisabeth Meyer-Renschhausen works as an independent journalist and sociologist in Berlin, doing research, editing, teaching and consulting. (In former days, self-help agriculture was ill-reputed as informal self-help economy of women. Today it returns to the cities and to the mind of the people: wild vegetable cultivation on fallow, guerilla gardening, “hard core vegetable cultivation”, “intercultural gardens” from New York to Berlin…)

Christa Müller, Berlin/Munich
For the “anstiftung & ertomis” foundation, Christa Müller did research on the intercultural potential of urban gardening in the international gardens of Göttingen. She co-founded the network “Interkulturelle Gärten” [intercultural gardens] and the “Interkultur” foundation.

Rana Öztürk, Berlin
Cultural scientist, Rana Öztürk did her MA Thesis on “Sustainable Fashion: New Approaches within the Fashion Industry”. Member of Cultura21 e.V. since 2007 ; Chairwoman of the German organization since 2010., Rana Öztürk is the Communication Administrator at the artist’s workshop of Anselm Reyle.

Insa Winkler, Hude/Wüsting
Insa Winkler works as a landscape architect and environmental artist. “Die Artenvielfalt-Route” [the biodiversity route] is a participative project “in my neighborhood” about art and ecology. By means of education and visualization of life-forms, a mapping exercise of biodiversity is conducted. The result is a new corridor between the agrarian landscape and the urban areas, which is perceived as an ecological and public area. People are actively motivated to protect areas or even to increase the biodiversity in their own garden.

Practical Information

The participation fee (including coffee, drinks, snacks) for 3 days is:
– participants who are not paying members of Cultura21 Germany: 30€/20€ reduced
– participants who are members of Cultura21 Germany: 10€/15€ reduced

… for 1 day:
– participants who are not members of Cultura21 Germany: 15€/ 8€ reduced
– participants who are members of Cultura21 Germany: 10€/ 5€ reduced

Reduced participation fees are only for students and unemployed persons (please provide supporting documents by email).

Please transfer the participation fee until September 10th (please write “Cultura21 Forum” in the comment field) to this bank account:

Cultura21 e.V., Kto-Nr. 40 18 97 17 00, GLS-Bank, BLZ 43060967 ; BIC: GENODEM1GLS ; IBAN: DE35 4306 0967 4018 9717 00

Registration

To make the planning easier, please register online for the event: Click here

Accommodation and travel must be organized by yourself. We recommend to book a room early enough and are happy to help you if necessary. Please find here a list with accommodations near Hude: PDF file (in German language).

The Organizers

The Forum will take place in cooperation with the “Studio Kunst und Landschaft” in Hude and is kindly supported by the city of Oldenburg.

The „Studio Kunst und Landschaft” invites you to look at various theme gardens and park elements on their 1ha territory. Furthermore can be found several sculptural works and objects created by Insa Winkler and other artists. This is also the main office of “artecology-network”, founded in 2010. The Winkler family, who runs the place, also offers space for seminars, exhibitions, concerts, readings and conferences. As well, Insa Winkler’s landscape architecture office and her studio are situated on the premises.

 

 

 

 

 

Crowfunding : Help us finance the event!

If you cannot come to the event but wish to help finance the Cultura21 Forum, please contribute to our Crowdfunding effort: Click here (the crowdfunding webpage is currently available only in German language).

This post is also available in: German

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

ashdenizen: tipping point launches first of four discussions

At this weekend’s Tipping Point conference, there’ll be a panel discussion on the first morning at the Examination Schools, Oxford (pic), which will examine ‘A History of Cultural Responses to Climate Change’.

The discussion is chaired by Quentin Cooper (presenter of Radio 4’sMaterial World) and the panel includes Diana Liverman, Nigel Clark,Siobhan Davies and Wallace Heim, the Ashden Directory co-editor, and guest blogger here.

This is the first of four discussions on culture and climate change, organised by Joe Smith and myself. The discussions will be recorded and made available on the Open University iTunesU.

This blog will be reporting on the panel discussion and, more widely, on the two days of the Tipping Point conference.

via ashdenizen: tipping point launches first of four discussions.

THE CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE PRACTICE IN THE ARTS ANNOUNCES PANELISTS FOR “SUSTAINABILITY IN THEATRE”, A PANEL DISCUSSION WITH UK AND US LEADERS IN GREENING THE ARTS.

 

CLICK HERE TO RESERVE A TICKET FOR FREE

The Center for Sustainable Practice in the Arts (CSPA) will host a panel on issue of sustainability and “greening” the arts on Monday, August the 16th. A leader in the sustainable arts movement in the US, the CSPA will bring together key players in the sustainable arts movement in the UK to talk about the future of theatre and performance in the face of climate change. Guests will include Sam Goldblatt, Wallace Heim, Mhora Samuel, Bryan Raven of White Light LTD, and CSPA directors Ian Garrett and Miranda Wright. The panel will be presented from  10:00am until noon on Monday, August 16th at Fringe Central. The event is free, but ticket reservations are encourage and can be made through the fringe box office.

In addition to showcasing the latest news from UK innovators in sustainable practice for the arts, the CSPA’s directors Ian Garrett and Miranda Wright will present initiatives and resources being developed around the world. These will include San Diego’s Mo’olelo Performing Arts Company’s Green Theater Choices Toolkit, Toronoto’s York University and their MFA in sustainable design for the theater, Mexico’s “El Sabino” led by Laura Kuri and her brother Claudio Kuri, director of Montezeuma at the Edinburgh International Festival, and Denmark’s Wooloo with their New Life Festival focused on Art and Hospitality.

  • Sam Goldblatt is an arts and events producer, and author of the textbook Greener Meetings and Events, to be published by John Wiley & Sons in 2011 as part of their Event Management Series. In Washington, DC, he served as Environmental Officer for the Capital Fringe Festival, creating theatre venues from reused building materials.
  • Dr. Wallace Heim researches, writes and teaches on performance and nature, on the philosophical dimensions of ‘art and ecology’, and on climate change and social practice. She does this in many places. She is co-editor ofwww.ashdendirectory.org.uk; and is on the editorial board for the Journal of Performance and Ecology. She taught on the MA Arts and Ecology at Dartington College of Arts; co-curated the conference/event BETWEEN NATURE; co-edited Nature Performed. Environment, Culture and Performance. She is a director of the research communication group PublicSpace, an FRSA, and a trustee for PLATFORM. She also has worked for many years as a set designer for theatre and television/film, and was a co-founder of the Gate Theatre, London.
  • Mhora Samuel began her career as a dancer and choreographer in Scotland and as Administrator for the Gregory Nash Group in Oxford. She moved to London in 1989 as Centre Co-ordinator for Chisenhale Dance Space, and in 1991 was appointed as Director of Total Theatre, the UK lead body for physical and visual performance. She joined ABL Cultural Consulting in 1998 where she worked on a range of capital feasibility studies and arts strategies. In 2001 she was appointed Chief Executive of the Cultural Industries Development Agency, the leading business support regeneration agency for the cultural and creative industries sector in East London. Mhora joined The Theatres Trust in January 2006 as Director and has led on the development of specific environmental advice for theatres, contributing to the Mayor of London’s Green Theatre Plan in 2008 and successfully achieving European Funding for the Trust’s Three Year Ecovenue project, helping to improve the environmental performance of London’s theatres.
  • Bryan Raven is Managing Director of White Light and has been with the company for over 23 years. Since then White Light has grown from 17 staff with a turnover of just over £1M to the current size with 120 staff and turnover of nearly £20M and projects all over the world as well as continuing to be the leading supplier of lighting to the UK theatre industry. His career started with a brief spell at Theatre Projects after spending two years realising that lighting was a lot more fun than mechanical engineering at Imperial College. He has been at the forefront of White Light’s desire to improve both it’s own environmental record and also that of the industry as a whole. He was part of the team responsible for Mayor of London’s Greening London Theatre programmes and is a member of Julies Bicycle theatre steering group.

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Design Walks – 2nd Sustainable Summer School

The “2nd Sustainable Summer School” for design students from all around the world starts on August 30 and ends September 4, 2010.

It will take place in Jüchen, near the city of Cologne (Germany).

Creative ideas for a sustainable design of our daily life will again be in the spotlight, this year by looking at “Societies, Systems and Swarms”. Introduced to the subject by a public expert day, the students will work together for several days in inspiring workshops conducted by well known institutions.

The “2nd Sustainable Summer School” offered students from all over the world the unique possibility to design and to shape the future lifestyle in a sustainable way.

Information and Registration:

http://www.designwalks.org/

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Expert day on August 30, 2010

(ecosign – Academy for Design, Cologne)

9.30 Session 1

- Prof. Uwe Schneidewind, Director of the Wuppertal Institute: Swarm Economy
Are economic swarm phenomena part of the problem or part of the solution regaring sustainable development?

- Prof. Jens Krause:  Swarm Models
To which extent can scientific swarm studies develop models for society and design?

13.00 Session 2

- Prof. Johannes Weyer: Swarm Technology - New Modes of Governance of Complex Systems in the Era of Autonomous Technology
What are risks and opportunities of swarm structures for the human-technological interface?

- Prof. Harald Welzer: Swarm sociality
What are immanent values, dynamics, and obstacles of climate cultures?

17.00 Public Panel Discussion
– Swarms, Societies, Sustainable Development
Diverse Perspectives on the Future of Sustainable Development and the Role of Design

APInews: Artists, Scientists Meet in Monson Project

Artists and scientists will explore “Moving Perspectives – approaches to understanding water through geology, environment, art and society” at the Urbana Free Library in Illinois, October 13, 2009. The panel discussion includes George Roadcap, Illinois Water Survey; Cecily Smith, Prairie Rivers Network; Brett Bloom, artist and activist; Brigit Kelly, poet; choreographer Jennifer Monson; and moderator Michael Scoville, an environmental philosopher. The talk is part of Monsons Mahomet Aquifer Project, a series of public dance performances, workshops and a mobile gallery, October 10-18, to inform and engage the communities in East Central Illinois dependent on the aquifer and draw the audience into their own understanding of their relationship to water. Monson intends the iLAND project to “draw connections between our scientific and political relationships to natural resources and the cultural frameworks that shape our perception and relationship to these resources.”

via APInews: Artists, Scientists Meet in Monson Project .

APInews: Michigan Prisoners Address Climate Crisis

April 8, 2009, is the last day of the 14th Annual Exhibition of Art by Michigan Prisoners, this year showing works addressing the global climate crisis. The show, presented annually by the Prison Creative Arts Project PCAP, opened March 24 at the Duderstadt Center Gallery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Curated by UM Professors Buzz Alexander, Janie Paul and Jason Wright, it shows 300 works by 200 artists from 40 prisons. Events included a keynote speech by Chicago Citizen of the Year William Ayers, a panel discussion on women and children inside prison, a speak-out by Detroit youth, an artists talkback, a conversation about Michigan Parole and Commutation Board practices, a film about art inside Jackson Prison and release of the first annual Literary Review of Writing by Michigan Prisoners. “Acts of Art,” a PBS documentary about PCAP, was broadcast across Michigan in March and April.

via APInews: Michigan Prisoners Address Climate Crisis .