Mon-Valley
conference
Tim- introduction. Today is all about taking a
chance.
I don’t
know who the community members are who will come to this. Break up into 3 or 4 groups. How can we enable their creative voice. Enable their
sense of creative change. From 9 to 11
we’ll break out into two separate groups.
Based on
your work:
What are the issues.
Categorize
to externalize creative authorship
some of
the local folks- can you describe some of the issues.
Budget/Race/
Economy/Environmental
Aging
population 70%
Flight of
youth
Feudalistic
foundation
Industrial
Degradation
Historical
changes in relationship to the river
Mon-
Fayette Expressway
Water
Quality
Scale of
Power (no ability to make decisions on a regional level)
Stephanie- a list of things we were calling a tool box. (I wasn’t able
to get them all)
Listening
Visioning
Caring
Paint
brushes
Maps
Being blood hound
How to
organize across disciplines
Information/research
Trust
Visual
representation
Respect
Being
Collaborative-
Making
alliances
Team
building
Self-
organization
Cheek-
carefully
Moxy
Contesting
power structures-
Critical
thinking
Risk taking
Play
Humor wit
Anti-manifesto
local imbedded
knowledge
oral
history- anecdotal
Catagories-
Self-organization
Respect for other lives in the lan
Break
out Session –
Brett Bloom - Temporary Services
Erica Fielder
Stephanie Flom
Reiko Goto
Dan Gretton – PLATFORM
Helen Harrison
Nicola Kirkham
Connie Merriman
Malcolm Miles
Ann
Rosenthal
How
do we influence public places? (if we speak personally- makes it
easier to answer)
Bret- A lot of it is giving yourself
permission to act- could be illegal, transgresive. Others can do it, too.
Helen- Others can see you doing it. What you do is a model.
Bret- Not so much being a model, but
there is a fluidity that’s already there.
For me it is not wanting to be a model- an
authority.
Helen- What I’ve observed over the years
is that when we take permissions, other people learn from that.
Bret- Yeah
Nicola- The conditions of our life and work are linked to
certain truths. What is possible to say
that the condition of your life and work can take on significance that they are
inseparable.
Reiko- We have to take this to
the community.
Malcolm- The moment we compromise the
content, we’re lost. Somehow we have to
retain the complexity, but find the language.
Connie—One of the
things I try to do is try to have polarized groups talk to each other with
respect, even if there is a big difference of opinions. Curious about civil disobedience.
Bret- For us it comes from our lives and creating a context for
others to work. It comes from our own
needs and capacities. We have a pirate radio station and we don’t hide…more
direct, non-commercial, and independent. Civil disobedience means making your
own culture.
Stephanie- Can we make a list of concrete
ways from your own practice.
Erika- From my own practice I create a situation
to make one to one change.
Stephanie- So you(Erika)
make opportunities for one on one. And Bret, you make a radio station.
Erika- And listening (which is different
than what you do) is a big part of what I do.
Malcolm- I want to point out that the
context is different and powerful in determining what we do.
Nicola- The context is your work.
Ericka- So you create your context.
Nicola- That’s the question.
Dan- What is the context for this
meeting this afternoon? How is it
framed?
Stephanie- Tim and Reiko have been organizing
around the
Nicola- Can I comment? That the discussion is always framed by the
future and the past, not in what happens now.
I suggest we talk in the present tense.
Q- Who sponsors an event? Do you need
power?
Helen- probably - we use the museums very
often. Can we use them for public dialogue. We’ve found
that for us, we deal with one hierarchically- one organization with power
invites us and them, and let the ngo’s and other organizations organize
themselves. Make a presentation and let
it evoke response. One of the ways we go
about it, we talk about a situation that exists and our response to it. Look a this
community and what could happen there. Btw. The possible, probable and the utopic. Works with hope rather than condemnation
Dan- How does that fit with what Nicola
is saying about staying in the present?
Helen- What people respond to us with is-
their present. What is wrong and …
Connie- What usually happens is Tim and Reiko usually
research the problems before the day, and then they provide the experts who can
respond to those problems. And the small groups address little problems.
Reiko- Aren’t these the issues? (Pointing
the list of issues about
Ann- I don’t think these forums could
be used as a sounding board.
Malcolm- very good cartoon… We have to be
careful that we’re not a panel of experts.
It’s
important to get to the other layer where everyone has creativity.
Reiko- How do we get there? And a lot of what we hear is about the past.
Dan- This community- if you send out
something that says- talk with artists activists and environmentalists. It’s fine to look at this as a community of interest.
(other artists, activists and environmentalists) it’s
patronizing- these people are peers.
Stephanie- Can- let us have the courage to
speak with our language- lets not put an artificial shared language that would
be banal in the extreme.
Reiko- I don’t understand.
Erika- I can share my portfolio briefly.
I think we should ask them what they want- until they speak first, even if they
fumble around.
Reiko – there is a misunderstanding- but tim
is making a powerpoint presentation about each groups work. Secondly, here in .
what they
want- they all say they want steel sculpture.
Helen-I would have said we will present ways in which
people have used to do this. And make
it clear we want to hear about them.
Give them an idea that something is possible.
Stephanie- For part two- when we get back
together as a group, we have to put those simple evocative ideas on the
table. I think we should go to number
two.
Erika- Are we finished with number one?
Nicola- With number one- we will never be
done- that there is an infinite number of ideas for
influencing public places.
Helen- The question is how can we increase the quality of life
including all life/ nature.
Erica- The eco-system.
Q- How can we increase the quality of
life for all living creatures?
Nicola- You’re
answering the question- how do you influence public space- you have to rewrite
the question.
Dan- Challenging what is regarded as
normal and acceptable.
Malcolm- I’m not sure that public space really exists any more – we have
to redefine that- radio, TV, public conversation yes- plazas no.
Bret- We’ve
banished that word of public space. We
talk about shared spaces.
Erica- I like that better because it brings in other beings.
Malcolm- It’s like –how do you reoccupy
space. How do you occupy another space
besides the domestic?
Bret- Make the shared space visible.
It’s not just outside. If it is an indoor space, it should affect outdoor.
Focus on abandoned buildings and lots. It could be a
storefronts in
Helen- In Holland,
our project Green Hart of Holland opened up all these unused spaces to artists.
Living spaces. \ The other
thing I want to talk about it storefronts- the idea we brought up in
Nicola- Bret was saying in
Bret- There is a fundamentalism about
owning property. I think we do have to
talk about temporary use and relaxing of building codes. How do you prevent
someone from coming in and taking over from the artists later on and
capitalizing on their success?
Connie- Braddock is a perfect example of
that. The whole town is boarded up. Hospital and drugs are primary economy of
Braddock.
Connie and Stephanie talk about the history of Braddock,
and the Carnegie library.
Erika- Are people wanting to celebrate that history? Are they still
wanting to recover that industry? We need to get a sense of that feeling
from them .
Stephanie- I just want to say that those
stories and longing for steel is still really powerful.
Bret- I think you have to confront that.
I don’t like to see myself as a problem
solver, but I think we have to address this.
Ann – mentions an
artists who works with getting beyond the pain. How do we pass beyond
the pain? I think we do need to address the pain by listening.
Dan- You can bury something but it will come back. If you can combine nostalgia with something
that actually exists now, like- formation of unions, like fights today about
workers rights, Wall Mart- illegal aliens, combine that story with nostalgia,
you’ve got something really alive.
Connie- Many people feel that the unions
let them down and betrayed them.
Reiko- Recently 700 city workers were
layed-off. After building
the two stadiums.
Connie- It seems like its
all so corrupt.
Reiko- Somebody named this place Steel
town. Everybody was proud. The
environment is better now, but people are not proud of that.
Dan- I think that what is really needed
is another view to see themselves. You’ve got people who’ve never been here
before and use these people who have the new eyes. If you embed the idea of a green city- then
it would be possible to strip mine a city.
Nicola- They’re
seeing the strip mine as an opportunity for jobs.
Connie- They’ll do anything for ten jobs.
Nicola- You don’t
need to tell them their town is great.
Helen- We ‘re
also seeing these spaces boarded up, but this could be potential.
Bret- there is tremendous potential- you can never
exhaust the space for culture- bingo- whatever.
Oh I think they’re going to be doing this in
Erica- I want to tie a few things together. If they don’t believe in the unions, then
they will have themselves. Maybe we can
stay in the present tense, and talk about the vacant buildings,
(and vacant lots) and think bout what people might do if they had access to
these buildings.
Connie- Main issue in this town of economy
is group parachuting in. We need a new idea of economy for this town.
Helen- Appropriate spaces need attention.
Maybe we could say appropriating spaces.
Erika- I just came from a needs to
switch systems. Grow local food as economic source. We can begin this as a
seed. Starting a local
currency. Green industry creates
a bio intensive economy. Ithica's most famous- with own bank.
Connie- Look at why we are doing this. I
think this is a special skill of artist to look at things the way they are.
This place is about industry, but Whole Foods is big new store here, and people
are laying down their money for organic produce.
Helen- Improving health is important.
Stephanie- (looking at what we need to do)
Malcom- What are the categories for?
Steph- For the toolbox.
Reiko- “Change the question”- that was a
huge tool for us this morning. There are more tools we found; listen carefully, give self a
permission to act, address present, context determine what we do, and make the
shared space visible.
Connie- Sometimes all strategies should be present, but
sometimes a certain strategy will work.
Nicola- Are you talking about strategic
knowledge?
Malcolm- The steel history was a good
industry- it provided many jobs and instilled a sense of pride. Now it’s gone. It was a bad industry- it polluted and left
little legacy for many people. It is hard to separate good or bad. We must
create a new history that
elicits pride in communities.
Dan- I think its important separate the
social history from the environmental history.
Bret- There is an amazing European
example of reinacting mining strikes around Orgreave. It (the project) seemed like it was effective
for some, and not for others. The
strikes had a huge impact on these places.
Connie- The pump house is considered like
a church to unionism.
Helen- I think this is an important
thing. Restoring of the river- say- look
we did this- can we gather people to look at the river. Don’t let your successes go unnoticed.
Erika- I’d like to go over what we’ve
discussed. (then
she went over what she was going to talk about- see summary) pre view for
getting together with the other group.
Group
discussion ensued- my fingers need a little break.
Bret- Bio-intensive urban farming. Found a way to
generate a sustainable amount of income by selling heirloom tomatoes to
high-end restaurants.
Helen- We’ve
done fish farming. (she explains a diagram: top
figure-food, middle-farming,
bottom-industry) The question is the cost of energy.
Reiko- Can you define what is shared
space?
Erika- To me, shared space includes all
species. That the town
includes places for the forest to enter the towns. It connects nature
and city.
Helen-A shared space is cared for by
diverse people.
Bret- The term shared space means a
collective understanding insisting that it’s shared: a private house or it can
be a crack house, storefront, CSO, polluted rivers, and bus stop.
Helen- Reforesting a hillside affects
wildlife and air quality.
Erika- Cheryl seemed to want to manicure
her town. And those gardens require a
lot of maintenance.
Helen- I think we should reintroduce the
idea of meadows as opposed to lawns.
Reiko- I would like to hear from Nicola and Dan
about shared space.
Nicola- The creative commons, and
creating commons.
Dan- Anywhere outside the domestic
space- anything outside the private space.
Bret- I think the idea of the commons is
just an ideal of public space. And it is problematic.
Nicola- yeah- that’s not what I meant-
lawns no, fences no. I’m not meaning the socialist utopia of commons.
Connie- It’s a political term almost.
Lunch
Tim- I’ve prepared a brief power point.
Discussion of how to organize.
Tom- is this a democracy?
More
discussion of what we’re doing.
Braddock
Library