Spring 2020 - ACE

Week 14- A Genealogy What changed about your understanding of community-based arts after reviewing this genealogy?  After this, I had a new understanding of how the viewer receives art is a part of the art itself, the frame in which it is viewed is the art. I cannot believe that a sculpture in a public space could change a mind or hurt/help someone. I remember the effort it takes to make art is very small but the effort to make effective change is huge. Performance art has been a part of our history without us even knowing it. A few of these artforms I’m very familiar with.   What questions emerged for you? Who is supposed to take responsibility to correct the mistakes of others through art? Why do we choose art as a mode for change? Who is the audience that listens to artists trying to effect change, and what are the answers to correct “bad art”? In what ways are law enforcement and artists similar? What’s an example of art that has a very negative imp...

a) It is clear that Marten’s film “Enjoy Poverty'' was an unethical production and that he is an egocentric producer (pg 599) .. However, this part of the essay made me consider more generally how much we should consider whether art collaborative art that is trying to get across a political message is ethical based on what the overall positive change which that art may cause. If the art is simply displaying a current social issue but the art does not create any lasting change, is that enough to consider it unethical.    When reading about how ethnography is defined by James Clifford I  (pg.594) was able to think about how long the duration of such observation would need to be to create an accurate representation of the indidical, location or community that is being studied in the production of art. More so, this part of the essay allowed me to consider how the duration of observation relates to the ethics of collaborative art. Is longer observation more ethic...

After reviewing the slideshow, many thoughts emerged for me when considering the way in which my perception and means of interacting with community based arts has changed over the course of one semester. For starters, I wanted to analyze the term genealogy and what exactly that means for community engagement and the arts. I had never really seen the term used outside of the context of creating a family tree or exploring genetics/ancestry. I understand that it can serve a broader purpose when stitching together a timeline or lifespan of an idea or concept: however, genealogy I think serves as a great term for community engagement through arts. When we visited Esperanza on the class field trip, one of the things that these kinds of projects prove to me is the weight of familial relationships and cultural ties within the artistic community. Esperanza I realize, was a place for creative placemaking, a term I was not familiar with prior to this class. However, creative placemaking or soci...

What surprised me is how long community based art existed. It never really occurred to me that there are many forms in which such art can exist. It reminds me of a discussion I had in class about the politics of architecture and how certain designs in space can be a reaction to a political schema or can be directly used to manipulate the behaviour of large communities. It also brings up questions in how we few art today. On one hand you have aesthetically pleasing art like the works of Yayoi Kusama and on the other you have more political pieces like the works of Banksy. The "Fountain" would be a great example of something like this. From a traditional point of view, the "Fountain" would be just an average toilet, but because of the context in which it was made, the piece became a provocative piece of art that would influence a large number of artists today.

A) Highlight 3 insights that your reading has helped bring to the surface. Use specific test evidence to link your insights B) If you could ask the author 3 questions what would the be? C) What applications might this work have to your understanding of an ethical approach to community-engaged arts? D) Consider the work we have been exploring this semester. Choose one artist or project that resonated with you. What ethical considerations were in place on this project? A) "...it is not the tattoo that is of interest here, to paraphrase the artist, but the very fact that the social, economic and political conditions exist whereby such events can take place." - Ok so basically what the artist is trying to do is show that we live in a time where bad things can happen, and then he proceeds to do those bad things to make a point?!?! "Collaborative art practices, in short, appear to be judged on the basis of the ethical efficacy underwriting the artist’s relationship t...

The toolkit I chose was “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” In this reading, Peggy McIntosh discusses the ways in which white privilege is crafted into our way of life and culture. Some ideas she discussed that I found to be most interesting or new compared to concepts or ideas of white privilege that I have previously been introduced to, was the idea of how we have learned that racism is referring to outwardly racist or “mean” acts of hatred. We learn this because we do not hold ourselves accountable or responsible for things that we perceive are in the past, while failing to recognize that the same foundational racism that created America, has never left, and will not until we are able to dismantle racism as a principal part of the way in which white people thrive in our society, with little to no effort, comparatively to people of color. McIntosh discusses how her education played a large part in her understanding of racism at an early age. I was able to infer a l...