ANIMATING DEMOCRACY E-NEWS

 Animating Democracy News and Updates

Animating Democracy staff news!

Animating Democracy Associate Andrea Assaf has been appointed artistic director of New WORLD Theater (NWT) at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. New WORLD Theater, a regional and national arts leader, is dedicated to producing works by artists of color. NWT was created in 1979 by Roberta Uno, who now serves as the program officer for Arts, Media, and Culture at the Ford Foundation.

Assaf, a writer, spoken word artist, performer, and theorist, will be designing and directing artistic programs for NWT’s regular season, New Works for a New World; a summerplay lab; and Project 2050, their youth initiative. With her sensitivity to artists, diversity, and cross-cultural exchange, Assaf was instrumental in shaping Animating Democracy Learning Exchange programs and infusing them with arts experiences. She has contributed extensively to our reflection, writing, and documentation. Since Assaf will now be based in Amherst, MA (near Barbara Schaffer Bacon and Pam Korza) we hope she will continue her association with Animating Democracy!

Cornerstone Theater Company premieres “As Vishnu Dreams”
www.cornerstonetheater.org
In November, Cornerstone Theater Company will premier the final community-specific show of its Festival of Faith. “As Vishnu Dreams,” created in collaboration with the Los Angeles Hindu community, is a contemporary adaptation of the epic Hindu poem The Ramayana, which explores the symbiosis of good and evil through the complicated relationship of the “fair” Queen Sita, the “evil” Ravana, and the “hero” Rama. Exploring the question How does faith unite and divide us?, Cornerstone’s Faith-Based Theater Project will culminate in June 2005 with an epic Faith-Based Bridge Show featuring participants from each of Los Angeles’ faith communities.

 News from the Field

2005–2006 Smithsonian Fellowships for Theorizing the Economics of Cultural Heritage offered

www.folklife.si.edu/opportunities/fellowships_RF.html
Cultural heritage today is a rubric of ever-expanding scope used globally as a basis for multinational, national, state, and local programs. Yet the concept is vastly undertheorized. It has lacked an academic, disciplinary base; has generated only an attenuated theoretical literature; and has generally left the bearers of cultural heritage out of the discussion. The 2005–2006 Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Fellows at the Smithsonian Institution Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage will help expand and refine the theoretical framework for cultural heritage to include grassroots voices. Reflecting the perspectives of civil society groups, public cultural organizations, and academic specialists, fellows' work will inform dialogues and practice across social, political, and disciplinary boundaries, as well as indicate future directions for policy. Further, fellows will be supported to carry out original thinking and writing on economic pursuits within the context of cultural heritage. The deadline for letters of interest is January 14, 2005.

Andy Warhol Museum opens “Inconvenient Evidence: Iraqi Prison Photographs from Abu Ghraib”

www.warhol.org
In September, the Andy Warhol Museum opened its doors to present a small exhibition focused on the digital photographs of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. Through large photographic reproductions, interpretive text panels, newspaper headlines, and historical materials, the exhibition examines the extraordinary impact amateur digital photographs have had on the public's view of the Iraq War, and the human rights issues that this technology exposed at Abu Ghraib prison. In keeping with the Warhol's mission to be a "vital forum" for dialogue around contemporary issues, the exhibition presents a diverse range of viewpoints on the photographs, the power of images, and the many relevant perspectives surrounding the issue. The exhibit will close December 31, 2004.

 Articles and Publications

Two new Critical Perspectives essays posted online

www.americansforthearts.org/AnimatingDemocracy/reading_room/critical_perspectives_essays/003.asp
Two essays have been added to the Critical Perspectives collection. They are by anthropologist and poet Renato Rosaldo and anthropologist and former director of MACLA Maribel Alvarez. They write about MACLA’s project, Ties That Bind, supported by Animating Democracy, a photographic installation that reflected on intermarriage between Asians and Latinos in Silicon Valley. Alvarez describes Ties That Bind as “a multilayered project that combined social science, art, and humanities and attempted to upset the rigid categories of personal and social identities that many people attributed to Asians and Latinos in Silicon Valley. By revealing through photos, artifacts, oral histories, and community dialogues the messiness and permeability that exchanges of love and desire had wreaked on people largely considered at odds with each other, Ties That Bind sought to reveal a story up to that point largely ignored within the official list mythology of Silicon Valley.”

In his essay, “The Social Life of an Art Installation,” Renato Rosaldo traces his changed view of the Ties That Bind exhibition, from initial disappointment to recognition of its value on broader social terms. From his vantage points first as an anthropologist who, along with artists Lissa Jones and Jennifer Ahn, interviewed families of intermarriage, and later as one of Animating Democracy’s Critical Perspectives writers, he discusses the different, sometimes conflicting, goals of ethnography and art, and their relationship to real life. Rosaldo describes how an unspoken contract arose in which the artist-interviewers (the guests in families’ homes), “without saying a word,” agreed to protect their hosts’ secrets. The host and guest were both made more vulnerable by their added audience-artist relationship; the subjects of the art were also present, along with their friends and family, in the audience who came to see it. This very human relationship of guest and host involved the artists confronting their assumptions about the people who were at the center of the artwork. Rosaldo concludes that the artist, by making the human relationship a priority over dramatic artistic revelations—that might have made more exciting art—instead allowed continued conversation between guest and host possible. The art installation became a conducive space for deeper dialogue among the participating families. Renato Rosaldo is professor of anthropology at New York University, a poet, and author of Culture and Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis (1989).

Maribel Alvarez’s essay, “Dialogic Gestures: Doing Artistic Things with Ethnographic Methods,” is a dynamic dialogue with the ideas and critiques offered by the three Critical Perspectives writers. As director of the Ties That Bind project, she also shares her own ideas on the ways that the project was a “chance to test ‘uncooked’ ideas, to borrow and stitch-up at random from a wide variety of approaches, and ultimately to fail and start anew.” Among several thought-provoking tracks Alvarez pursues in the essay, she looks at the project as a meditation on the question, “can ethnography 'help' art or is it the other way around?” In the choice to use the ways and means of visual representation in a gallery to manifest the things learned [through ethnographic process], she reveals how, unexpectedly, the medium of the contemporary art installation helped the participating families feel respected and dignified in a way that they did not feel occurred in conventional ethnographic representations. She concludes, “In a twist of fate, then, in Ties That Bind art redeemed anthropology.” Alvarez also reflects on the dangers of critique that focuses too much on product and too little on the process that frames the larger social/cultural project. Alvarez agrees with writer Renato Rosaldo that the exhibition had a “social life” that went beyond the art products.

Liz Lerman Dance Exchange case study posted online

www.americansforthearts.org/AnimatingDemocracy/reading_room/reading_002.asp
Throughout the Animating Democracy Initiative, we have seen multiple approaches in exploring the meaning of civic dialogue. Dance Exchange’s project—which analyzed the kinds of dialogue in which the company engages as it develops work in a community setting—gave us a deep insight into art itself as a form of dialogue. This report, written by Dance Exchange’s Director of Humanities John Borstel, offers an outstanding example of a highly respected group that looked deeply into their practices, then found ways to reflect and share those practices in the context of the Animating Democracy construct. It is rich with sidebars and photos, and offers a story within a story as it describes the genesis and development of a particularly powerful residency project.

Dell’ Arte International case study posted online

www.americansforthearts.org/AnimatingDemocracy/reading_room/reading_002.asp
Dell’ Arte International conceived The Dentalium Project in 2001 when the Blue Lake Rancheria, a sovereign native nation that abuts the small northern California town of Blue Lake, built a casino to secure its financial future. Although the Rancheria pledged significant support to the surrounding community, many Blue Lake residents took a dim view of the proposed casino, fearing an increase in traffic, crime, and noise—and, most critically, a loss of power and control over their own destiny. Dell’ Arte believed that, through its distinct aesthetic and by giving people from both communities a chance to talk with one another about their fears and visions for the future of their place, The Dentalium Project could begin to build bridges toward a healthier whole community. The project consisted of interviews with a wide variety of residents; five community dialogues; and a live radio play set in the future on the 10th anniversary of the casino’s opening, inspired by the themes that emerged from the interviews and dialogues. In addition, a documentary video capturing public perspectives interspersed with excerpts of the play was shown in the community, stimulating further dialogue.
 
This case study, written by Animating Democracy liaison Kathie DeNobriga, documents Dell’ Arte’s aesthetic considerations and process and holds lessons about the capacity of a resident theater to provoke community dialogue and create a space for the safe exploration of conflict. It examines issues of representation in the struggles of a majority white theater company making art about issues involving Native Americans. The case study also illustrates Dell’ Arte’s capacity to make an ongoing impact on its community as a corollary of its long-term presence and willingness to take risks.

Leah Lamb's Engage program featured in Richmond Times-Dispatch

www.thataway.org/news/archives/000269.html
In August, Leah Lamb's innovative theater/dialogue program, Engage, was featured in the Richmond Times-Dispatch. In “Theater as an Agent of Change,” Michael Paul Williams explores Lamb’s blend of theatrical performances and documentary footage, which investigates the connection between voting and the issues that young people are most passionate about. "I'm really sick of the vote-or-die initiatives, because voting is not enough," Lamb said. "Voting is a symptom of quality civic engagement." The event took place September 16 through 18 at Virginia Commonwealth University.

 Events on the Horizon

Anti-Racism for White Folks

Dates: November 5–7, 2004
Baltimore, MD
There is tremendous value in white people coming together supportively to dismantle racism. This workshop uses an approach that recognizes and addresses personal as well as institutional racism and is a valuable step towards a place where whites and people of color can share each other's stories, do genuine healing, and take effective action in solidarity. Particular attention is played to the more subtle ways racism plays out in the United States. To register, contact the Fusion Partnership Group at 410.889.4700 or lbezold@fusiongroup.org.

 About Animating Democracy

Animating Democracy is a four-year initiative of Americans for the Arts and is made possible with support from the Ford Foundation.

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