UPDATE: The application deadline has been extended to Friday, March 19th (and Shunpike is doing one in King County, and another in Pierce County!)

WHAT IS ARTS LEADERSHIP LAB?

The mission of Arts Leadership Lab (ALL) is to recognize and empower arts practitioners as valuable, effective partners in the community development of the Puget Sound region. Under the stewardship of 4Culture, ALL was founded in late 2006 as the Emerging Arts Leaders of King County, a group connected to the national Emerging Leaders Network coordinated by Americans for the Arts; in 2008 the group re-formed as Arts Leadership Lab, led by the Core Team, and in early 2010, ALL moved to its new home as a program of Shunpike.

KEY ACTIVITIES

ALL’s main work has been to produce monthly panels, presentations and networking events that focus on issues and opportunities concerning the cultural ecology of our region.

The Core Team produces one of each of the following public events every quarter:

*Accountability in the Arts – Seminars in best practices for arts management

*Creative Conversations – Forums/panels on issues impacting arts and culture (e.g. space, technology, advocacy, etc.)

*SPIKE’d/ALL Out – Happy hour networking events

Beginning in 2010, the Core Team will also produce and host an “UnConference,” a half-day of short presentations by innovators in cultural ecology.

THE CORE TEAM

The ALL Core Team is an 18-month professional development, peer learning and community building opportunity that asks: What are the major opportunities of our time? How can art makers, managers and supporters be effective partners in pursuing them? Eight – 12 selected participants govern ALL and collaborate to discover new opportunities for innovation in arts leadership. Shunpike provides the Core Team with administrative support and guidance in programming.

For more information about becoming a part of the CORE TEAM, CLICK HERE to download the application.

The Eastside is home to some of the most powerful technology-based companies. It is also home to a community of technology creatives: artists and technologists for whom the lines of distinction blur. Join in presentations and conversations on those blurring lines and opportunities for cross-over and collaboration. Then, let’s enjoy a post-panel reception, together.

Featuring panelists Hugo Solis Garcia, Elan Lee, Genevieve Tremblay and Kristina Erickson Hudson, moderated by Susie J. Lee.

Stepping up to bring you this goodness: 4Culture, Dorkbot, KBCS 91.3 FM Community Radio, Kirkland Arts Center, and Open Satellite.

Susie J. Lee, artist
A new media artist, Susie merges digital technologies with physical objects, to create systems of experiential art forms from material phenomena. Exploring the potential of experimental technologies, her installations and sculptures investigate the time-based activation of light, sound and image to hover between the physical and the ephemeral. In her recent work “For these Unclosings,” she developed a complex, real-time composition that seamlessly integrated movement, sound and image. Three distinct characters – dancer, line and music – pushed, pulled, and reacted to one another in this performance. Boundaries dissolved between illusion and reality, digital and analog, and presence and absence. Lee’s work has been exhibited locally, throughout the US, and internationally in Korea and Italy, and has been collected by prominent private institution collections. She has taught at the Frye Art Museum, Centrum Arts Organization and the University of Washington, written about the intersection of art and science in the Journal of Science Communication in Naples, and has been awarded a number of grants, awards and public commissions. Her background is in Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University with a Masters in Science Education at Columbia University. She received her MFA at the University of Washington. Susie is represented by Lawrimore Project in Seattle and Galleria Tiziana Di Caro in Italy.

Hugo Solis Garcia, artist
Interested in technology and improvisatory music, Hugo is founder of the NICROM Trio, an interdisciplinary ensemble of electro-acoustic improvisatory music with action painting. Playing piano and electronics, he has collaborated in many interdisciplinary projects in conjunction with dancers, painters, film-makers and radio-artists. A PhD student at DXARTS, Hugo’s main interests are musical structure of improvised music, human computer musical interaction, and audiovisual systems. He is currently working on the development of sonic and visual extensions for acoustic pianos, the production of tools for collective creation, the creation of interactive and multimedia installations, and also plays with the Juum duet. He holds a DEA of Computer Sciences and Digital Communication from the Pompeu Fabra University where he was a member of the Music Technology Group, and an MA in Media Arts and Sciences from the MIT Laboratory Opera of the Future group where he developed the Improvisatory Music and Painting Interface, the audiovisual program for improvisatory music.

Elan Lee, Founder/Chief Designer at Fourth Wall Studios
Considered among the foremost Alternate Reality Gamer creators in the world, Elan Lee believes that if you’re bored, you’re doing something wrong. A self-identified entertainment-addict, Elan has spent his career finding and sharing ways to extract adventure from the world around us. From surfing down the flooded streets of LA to broadcasting a radio drama over thousands of ringing payphones, Elan has pioneered breakthroughs in the area of entertainment and immersive gaming. Elan started his career at the Microsoft Game Studio where he was a Lead Designer for the X-Box launch portfolio. Next, he co-founded and served as the Vice President of 24 Entertainment (the company behind I Love Bees, The Vanishing Point, Nine Inch Nails: Year Zero, and The Dark Knight.) He was also the Co-Founder of EDOC Laundry, and most recently the Co-Founder and Chief Designer at Fourth Wall Studios.

Genevieve Tremblay, cultural entrepreneur
Genevieve is a creative catalyst and public scholar who provides strategic vision to pioneering community ventures at the digital convergence. She has worked with community leaders and educators at all levels to develop programs and partnerships, residencies and roundtables that leverage the synergy between artists, designers, scholars, technologists and industry professionals to serve the public good. Her current research and curatorial efforts identify innovators who are redefining culture, community and the environment through public art and the creative application of digital, social, mobile and gaming technologies. Genevieve is working to drive the development of cultural assets in our community and has recently worked with an interdisciplinary team to create a model for a public/private partnership and catalyst real estate asset for digital arts/technology in the newly rezoned Bel-Red Corridor.

Kristina Erickson Hudson, Director of Washington Interactive Network for enterpriseSeattle
Kristina is the Director of the Washington Interactive Network for enterprise Seattle, a public private economic development partnership representing King County. Guided by a strong industry task force, Kristina works to promote, nurture, and grow the interactive media and technology industries in Seattle. Five years ago, she founded the Washington Interactive Network, a program designed to brand the Seattle region as a global center for video game development. She believes that his region is the apex of arts and technology – a place where the technology is disruptive and the spirit of innovation thrives.

Climate: As we face economic development challenges, now more than ever, public support for culture is expanding to reflect the deep interdependence of arts & entertainment (from professional to amateur), local business, built environment and everyday neighborhood culture. In his February 16 article, Is this any time to increase arts funding?, David Brewster reflects on this current climate:

In his 2008 book, How Greed and Neglect Have Destroyed Our Cultural Rights, [Obama adviser and former chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, Bill Ivey] argues for shifting funding from major institutions to the “expressive life” of communities and the more indigenous American cultural forms. This is dramatic stuff, for it would mean less emphasis on fine-arts institutions such as museums and more on getting money to where culture actually happens. Here’s how Andras Szanto puts it in a fascinating article in The Art Newspaper:

“Ivey is hardly alone in pushing beyond traditional notions of high culture. He represents a new school of arts-policy thinking that places value on hitherto underappreciated, amateur, community-based, digitally-mediated, often commercial arts—the kind of creative pursuits, in short, which most Americans enjoy. This broadening of perspective would constitute the biggest shift in policy since the implementation of large-scale cultural support in the post-war era.”

While I don’t think community arts and major institutions should be placed at odds (in fact they feed each other), CODAC has been driven by this same tide of interest in finding new ways to support America’s many cultures on their own terms. Through CODAC, Seattle is looking for ways to support physical space for the fluid, everyday, community-based arts that have driven the character of neighborhoods like Central Area, Georgetown and Capitol Hill.

What: CODAC is an advisory committee created by Seattle City Council with the lead sponsorship of Councilmembers Nick Licata and Sally Clark. Council created CODAC in response to a series of events establishing growing consensus that new land use planning and policy tools can help neighborhoods successfully retain and develop beloved local cultural amenities. (Watch a film of the culminating rally / special meeting of City Council and read the Seattle Times article leading for it.)

Why: Cultural Overlay Districts can help the city achieve its economic development, social services, & smart growth goals. We all value places of assembly. Places to hang out, express, organize and define ourselves. Increasingly, business owners, developers, property/land owners recognize the value of these places while Cities recognize their multiple public benefits. At the same time, these places are coming under considerable pressure related to rising property values.

Culturally relevant community spaces are a critical ingredient in successful urban density. Cultural infrastructure, affordable housing, open space and social services, are all key strategies that help mitigate the impacts of gentrification on existing residents in our urban neighborhoods. Through projects like Living Cities, an urban development funding partnership established by 19 of the world’s largest foundations, and the “Sustainable Communities Initiative,” a joint project of the federal HUD and DOT that has set a goal of seeing “every major metropolitan area in the country conduct integrated housing, transportation, and land use planning and investment in the next four years,” we are seeing that districts are increasingly recognized as a particularly effective scale for coordinated community infrastructure development and revitalization.

The CODAC’s district-based regulatory, zoning and financing recommendations can be a model for local governments throughout our region who are increasingly looking to cultural spaces to serve as critical anchors in their own sustainable economic development and land use planning. CODAC proposes innovations that systemically account for the value the creative industries drive in neighborhoods, giving cultural infrastructure advocates an empowered seat at the table of regional planning and development.

Outcome: There are many ways to support local culture at a policy level that should continue to be pursued. CODAC’s mandate is specifically to look at creating a program available to any neighborhood during the neighborhood planning process. The program would allow establishing a district in your neighborhood to incentivize and concentrate attractive amenities of the neighborhood’s choosing. On Capitol Hill, for example, it could mean placing an arts & entertainment overlay district on Broadway to lead revitalization and meet the community’s demands for maintaining Capitol Hill’s legacy as an accessible place for fringe arts & entertainment.

The CODAC’s proposal includes the formation of cultural districts, the expansion of incentive zoning to encompass cultural uses, and the creation of a city position to facilitate cultural development. Seattle is a national leader in this work.

Currently: CODAC is charged with making recommendations to the City in April 2009 that will be the basis of legislation.

Challenges & Opportunities: What is the niche / value-added of the CODAC project to other existing policies and organizing? How will this fit with the neighborhood planning process? There’s so much action and planning surrounding light rail station areas…

How can we grow the capacity to ensure these new CODAC tools can be put to use right away?

What challenges and opportunities do you see?

Guest blogger Sabrina Roach, Development & Outreach Director at KBCS 91.3 Community Radio,

What if we had a mix of public and privately owned neighborhood media centers where people could build skills across platforms – like recording studio engineering, video making, and writing for the stage, print, broadcast, and online?

I’ve been thinking about what might happen if we further resourced community based media in our county and at the city level. It could be incorporated into Parks and Rec departments and into the work of existing arts, culture, and heritage organizations.

Would it further amplify art, cultural expression, and stories about our heritage? Would it be a useful way to facilitate connection and cultural inquiry in our digital age? I think so.

Fast and light versions could start now, as portable digital equipment is inexpensive and many of our libraries and community centers have available meeting rooms for workshops. Video and sound files could be posted to linked Web sites serving as community media hubs. DVDs and CDs could be produced and presented at community listening parties with food. This could help us break out of our silos where parallel work often evolves separately…theory aside, who doesn’t love a good party?

Many businesses and community based organizations are already doing work similar to this in our county. I have some favorites like KBCS 91.3 FM Community Radio (where I work), Jack Straw Productions, Youth Media Institute at Youngstown Cultural Arts Center, Northwest Film Forum, OseaO, Hidmo Eritrean Cuisine, and the Museum of History and Industry.

One collaborative project I was involved with recently went some of the distance, but could have had even more broad-based community involvement using some of these ideas.

On November 17th, 206 Zulu, KBCS 91.3 FM, and Youngstown produced “Zulu Radio Live” as Zulu Nation celebrates November as Hip Hop history month. Prior to the event, producers Hollis Wong-Wear and Danny Kogita interviewed folks representing local Hip Hop’s past, present, and future at the KBCS studios in Bellevue.

Cham Ba, Janice Kang, and Huyen Nguyen of Youth Media Institute then used equipment at Youngstown to edit the interviews into a short audio feature which aired on KBCS in advance of the event. 206 Zulu used the same content to produce segments which aired during the live broadcast.

Next time, I’d like us to hold a few workshops where local Hip Hop artists (who likely already know how to record and edit themselves) interviewed each other about what happened “back in the day”, now, or where they hope to see the local scene go.

It was a good time as it was. Let’s make community based media happen more often. Email me at sro...@kbcs.fm. Let’s talk.