ARTSPACE FORUM:  SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2014  10AM – 2 PM in Chicago
TITLE:  Designing a Better Future: A Participatory Platform for Exchange
Session Producers: Jacki Apple & Mat Rappaport

Artists and designers operating as thinkers and communicators, visualizers and producers can be leaders in changing how we think, live, and act, in order to make a better world.

Are we ready to discuss cultural production and the arts as viable and meaningful practices beyond the established system of commodity trading? What potential models of an effective creative practice can we envision and develop?

Artists, designers, media producers, photographers, filmmakers, architects, writers, theorists, educators, cultural historians are invited to submit proposals for presentation and discussion that will inspire others to join them in imagining, inventing, and actualizing a more sustainable and enlightened possible future, whether it be local or global.

What would you do to effect change?  What would that look like? Do esthetics matter?

We seek provocative and challenging theoretical concepts and/or models for practical application. Visionary, daring, unconventional ideas, collaborations across fields in the arts, sciences, and  humanities that conceive different ways to address social, economic, and environmental realities are encouraged.

General topics/themes to consider

1. Climate Change, the Environment and Sustainable Living:
   • Consumption
   • Energy
   • Waste
   •  Food
   • Water
   • Air
   • Economic & Social Consequences.
2. The Culture of Violence:
   • social
   • political
   • cultural
   • economic manifestations
3. Technology and Human Rights:
   • biological
   • political
   • intellectual
   • spiritual.
4. Other

PRESENTATION FORMAT

The format for presentation will be an interactive forum of exchange between speakers and audience. There will be no podium. Speakers will be placed within the audience. Presentations may include visuals – images, texts, charts, etc.

Each speaker will be given 7 minutes to present her/his proposal. The audience will then have equal time – 7 minutes to respond and discuss. Time may be slightly less or more depending on the number of outstanding proposals selected.

SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

Please send a description of your topic and the theoretical concepts and/or model that you intend to propose in approximately 300 words, plus a brief bio/CV of no more than 2 pages. The 300 word proposal must include a title, name/s of author(s), address, email, phone number. Please submit all proposal files as PDF documents. 

TO: studio@meme01.com

DEADLINE: FOR PROPOSALS: June 1, 2013                                                             

NOTIFICATION OF SELECTION: June 20, 2013