Arts Bridging Communities

05/22/2020

An offering from Chris Jordan (from Tacoma's Fab-5) to Arts Bridging Communities - a talk on Community Engagement - Pathways to Relevant Public Art

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT Pathways to relevant public art. Chris Paul Jordan

05/15/2020

A video about the Arts Bridging Communities group, which organizes free art-based events in Tacoma, Washington - Made by UWT Alumna Brianna

05/10/2020

We invite members of the UWT community as well as folks in the Tacoma area to submit material to La Sirena Magdalena who is curating this series. She is the poet laureate of Springfield, MA as well as an outstanding playwright, educator and activist.

05/05/2020

Hello! We invite you to an exciting two-part, international, virtual event: a partnership between Story Bridge and Arts Bridging Communities (funded by the UW Tacoma Strategic Initiative Fund). See text below and attached flyer:

The coronavirus makes 2.2 new relationships as it moves through us. Staying apart stops the infecting but changes everything else. What have you experienced?
What new relationships has the coronavirus brought you? What’s possible now that wasn’t possible before? Felt any antibodies of hope or love?

2.2 Stories invites us to share with strangers our personal stories and bring the stories to life as performances. What kind of stories? What kind of performances? That’s up to us.

Bring yourself and your willingness to make at least 2.2 new connections.

Join Story Bridge’s Dr. Richard Owen Geer and Arts Bridging Communities on Tuesday, May 19 and Friday, May 22, 2020 from 9 am – 10:30 am PDT/12 – 1:30 EDT. Please register by sending an email to [email protected] with the subject line “2.2 Stories.” You will then receive instructions to the Zoom meeting room.

04/28/2020

In October when I was a guest artist in China, I became friends with my translator, Zhu, a contemporary photographer and graduating art student from the Sichuan Fine Art Institute in Chongqing, China. He is inviting everyone globally to participate in this exhibition. It is free to participate. He sees the pandemic as an opportunity to create "bridges" through art. The deadline has been extended to May 6th.

礼尚往来:邮包计划2020
公开邀请信
Lishangwanglai: Gift Exchange Project 2020
An open invitation letter
* 礼尚往来 Lishangwanglai: A Chinese idiom, meaning to treat each other with courtesy and love
First of all, I want to ask you sincerely: How are you?
Today, as I am currently writing this letter to you in a cafe in the center of Chongqing, China, I ended my 90-day self-quarantine. I was watching pedestrians and busy traffic through the window this whole afternoon, and never thought that just by seeing these scenes that used to be so normal can make me felt so blessed and deeply moved. After several months of lock down, the city finally begin to recover to its daily routine.
Just a week ago, Wuhan, the city is now well-known in the world due to its first outbreak of COVID-19 , was officially reopened. Chinese people today are gradually returning to normal life after experiencing the test of life and death in the fight against the virus. I know that this is a global pandemic and we are all in this together, the virus is not going to treat us differently because of our skin color, race, culture, or beliefs. I also learned that while the Chinese people have just seen the dawn of hope, people in the United States, Europe, East Asia, and many other countries around the world are still suffering and battling hard. But please remain hopeful and stay strong, and believe that we can and we will win the fight against the virus — the sun is always gonna rise up after the storm and heavy rain, hope is something that units us all and give us strength to move on.
My heart is with each of you, I’m thinking of all of you, and praying for you.
———————————————————————————————————————————
Lishangwanglai: Gift Exchange Project 2020 is initiated and curated by me and my team in the context of this global pandemic. During this tough time we were all separated by individuals or families practicing social distancing, like the many “isolated islands” drifting alone on the surface of the ocean, and we believed that during this global crisis, people are scared and families has been torn apart, fear has gone into a lot of people’s minds, and that’s when the artist, the designer, the thinker rise and spread hope and love and kindness to the world, that’s how we fight against the virus, it’s to raise awareness, to promote unity instead of division, to heal people’s spiritual mind.
I want to explain this project to you by telling my own experience which inspired me to launch this project in the first place: due to the outbreak of the epidemic, every city of China has locked down, I have not been able to stay with my family in the past 90 days. From the end of January to the Chinese New Year to April, I lived alone In my apartment. I feel so depressed, sad and lonely. And the delivery guy is my only contact for
3 months, all my food, daily supplies and anti-virus equipment are delivered by him. The delivery guy gave me so much hope and made me feel less fear and stressed. In a strange way, we bonded and became friends. He would deliver my supplies every day, and we would chat and laugh, and cheer each other up.
My experience also resinate with millions of others, according to the data reported by the National Post Bureau of the People's Republic of China in February 2020, the express delivery index reported that 2.7 billion express parcels were delivered during the epidemic in February, which means that on average each Chinese sent approximately 1.92 parcels. The cumulative delivery of prevention and control materials was 43,500 tons, 152 million parcels, 17,200 vehicles were shipped, and 291 freight flights. A number of private courier companies carried emergency supplies free of charge, and helped the construction of multiple new hospitals. Many delivery workers like the one who I have contact with risked their own lives in order to help others to connect with the rest of the world. The express delivery industry played an essential role in fighting the virus and connecting people when we are all isolated.
This project will use the Internet as the medium to invite&unite people and the express delivery network as the carrier to implement around the world. How to be a part of this project is quite simple and easy: by mailing your creation of a “Gift” which could show your understanding of love, hope, compassion and optimism, you’ll also receive one in the near future. I will also curating an exhibition about this project at Luozhongli Art Museum this may, the “gifts” received will be exhibit there. Luozhongli Art Museum is the biggest and most influential art museum in Chongqing, so all of the “gifts” have a chance to be viewed and well received by thousands of people online and offline.
I sincerely invite you to join Lishangwanglai: Gift Exchange Project 2020 with me. The ultimate goal and idea of this project is to connect individuals and unit people in this historical crucial time with the love, hope, compassion and optimism, to connect each "isolated islands”, stimulate the imagination and creativity of the global community, and finally create something bigger than all of us together.
Sincerely, Zhu Xianfan
———————————————————————————————————————————
Project Information:
• Creation theme of Gift: love, hope, compassion and optimism
• Creation form&medium of Gift : use your creativity and skills, through art or design or any other forms.
The final gift should be able to deliver through mailing service or could be implemented in China in
certain special condition implement
• Deadline: Send the gift as soon as possible before May 1st * If you have any special circumstances for
delay, please contact me.
• Participation Steps:
1: Create your gift.
2: Delivery your gift: Send to the following address via international mail service:

Name: Zhu Xianfan
Address: Building 29, Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, Shapingba District, Chongqing, China Phone: +8617754925415
Zip Code: 401331
3: Exhibition, The exhibition will be held in mid to late May, Luozhongli Art Museum(still in discussion with our institute, more detail will be send via email/instagram for you)
4: Gift Delivery, we will send a "gift" created by other participants, please imagine what you will receive?
Notes:
1: Postage:we will be responsible for the round-trip postage, please keep the receipt for the postage you send, we will provide you with the payment back at the end of the project.
2: Delivery: Please attach your handwritten "gift" information when sending, including * name * gift name * gift description
3: Special Circumstances: If the mailing service is restricted in your place, we will discuss a solution (such as rendering through high-definition pictures, or through other technical means, or I can implement the production of the gift for you in China)

03/04/2020

Updated flyer! Please note the time change.

Join Tacoma-based community artist and activist Saiyare Refaei for an afternoon to create a space for learning, connection and coalition building for those interested in learning more about efforts of No LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) and Shut Down NWDC (Northwest Detention Center). There will be facilitated activity, education around the issues before creating art together that will be displayed in the 350 Tacoma storefront and potentially utilized for future movement building and actions.

Link to register: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/art-in-action-tickets-97041352297?fbclid=IwAR0hFMJbw53vaYx3dKIaWzdgD6OhreypDUK2ycaQY_Or4-ELlcQaGJyIkPg

02/23/2020

This Monday night!

02/23/2020

INVITATION:The Seattle-based organizers of the Art of Resistance gatherings in 2004 and 2005 are rebooting for 2020. The original gatherings brought in artists from across the country, with lectures, discussions, workshops, exhibits and performances. Artists were able to connect with each other and be inspired. We believe that there’s an urgent necessity to call us back into conversations, skill-sharing, and possible collaborations in this time. We are inviting activist artists, artful activists, socially engaged artists and community-based artists to come together to discuss our work and strategies for bringing our imaginations more effectively focused on the tasks ahead. There are many urgent issues that must be addressed if we are going to survive as a species with thriving ecosystems and equity for all. Many of us work in communities or with activist groups, and others have had more isolated practices, collaborating with others whenever we can. We can all benefit from this kind of cross feeding and the feedback from peers. The initial organizers want to take a back seat in this new iteration of AoR, and eagerly invite a diversity of folks to come together, take leadership, and create momentum.We are going to start by meeting up on Sunday, March 29th from 1-3 pm at UW Tacoma’s Whitney Building (1901 Fawcett Ave – formerly a brown brick church) for some conversation and questions: What kind of gathering do we want to create now? How can the organizing base, and the projected audience, be expanded to cover numerous and diverse communities? How can we expand the geographic reach into Tacoma and other local areas? Can the event—or events—be put together to serve the needs of local communities? Can we move beyond “art of resistance” to something closer to “art of resistance, art of connection?” Will you join us on March 29th at UW Tacoma campus?

02/02/2020

Next in our series of monthly workshops! Come join us!

01/21/2020

Photos from the amazing writing workshop facilitated by Nikita Nelin. Hopefully we'll be having more of these.