Two of our 2017 Artistic Activism grantees, Arian Kajtezovic of Croatia and Kate McGrew of Ireland, talk about TRANSummer Camp, A Day in the Life of An Escort and their other projects.
Author Archives: Rebecca Bray
Webinar #18: How Do We Know If It Works? Part 1
This is one of our most popular webinars. We’re sorry if you missed it happening live, but you can check out the video, which is 97.587% as great. Sign up for future webinars to get in on the live action. In this webinar, Steve and Steve talked with the fantastic scholar/activist Jan Cohen-Cruz and A …
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Webinar #17: Intelligent Mischief and the Culture of Black Liberation
In this webinar, Steve Lambert has a great talk with Terry about how he uses satire, story, surrealism, comics, video, stickers, art exhibits, products, and so much more to create transformational experiences. We love how Terry talks about fearless creative experimentation, world-building, and diegetic prototypes to help move forward any progressive idea. Terry has been …
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Webinar: Guerrilla Futures
Our new webinar season launched December 1st, 2017 with Stuart Candy and Jake Dunagan of Guerrilla Futures. They use future studies to understand how we can all use visionary thinking to imagine and create better tomorrows. While many futurists engage in thinking about the future theoretically, these guys actually experiment. Their Experiential Futures work using …
We Got a “Silver Medal” at the World Democracy Forum!
On November 8 – 10, 2017 C4AA was invited to present to the Council of Europe in Strasbourg France at their annual World Forum for Democracy. The Council of Europe is the continent’s leading human rights organization. C4AA Co-Founder Steve Duncombe made the case for artistic activism as a way to defeat right-wing populism, describing …
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West Africa Training in December
West Africa Art Action AcademyDecember 17 – 21, 2017 OSIWA (Open Society Initiative for West Africa), C4AA (The Center for Artistic Activism) and Association Culturelle La Muse invite artists to apply to participate in a 5-day Art Action Academy from December 17-21, 2017 in Conakry, Guinea. The workshop is open to artists from West Africa …
Press: We Make Money Not Art on Center for Artistic Activism
Yesterday, We Make Money Not Art featured our webinars and one of our favorite examples of truly artistic activism, the occupation of Alcatraz Island by Native American activists in 1969. We talk about this in our trainings as one example of fully realized creative activism that incorporates spectacular story, imagery and humor in a strategic …
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What Would Jesus Do? (as a Creative Activist)
By C4AA Co-Founder Stephen Duncombe My proselytizing here is of a political rather than religious nature. It isn’t the divine figure of Christ I am interested in but the purely historical Jesus, a radical Mediterranean Jewish peasant building a revolutionary movement two millennia ago. Jesus of Nazareth was an activist, and, judging by the two-thousand …
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How to Win #14: Learn from Hollywood
With a savvy entertainer in the White House, we need to really understand how entertainment works, and wield that knowledge like a flaming sword on a windy but beautiful hilltop. With a savvy entertainer in the White House, we need to really understand how entertainment works, and wield that knowledge like a flaming sword on a windy but beautiful hilltop. What …
Artistic Action: Sex Worker Rights in Dublin
As part of our Arts Action Academy in December 2016 in Dublin, sex workers, artists and activists created and performed this creative action to raise awareness about, and fight against, laws that criminalize sex workers. All of this was conceived and implemented by the Academy participants in 24 hours as the last day of our intensive AAA training. …
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5 Ways to Up Your Artistic Action Game
Here are 5 things you can do if you want to make change in the world: 1. Steal from the Past Borrow from successful creative movements (video). Make time to be inspired by others (check out Actipedia). 2. Know How to Manipulate Change Minds Use cognitive and behavioral science to understand how to make change starting …
How to Win #13: Learn from South Africa
While having an autocratic, erratic and narcissistic madman as a president might be new to artistic activists in the US, this is standard operating procedure for activists in other parts of the world. In this webinar we talked with veteran South African activists Ishtar Lakhani and Marlise Richter to learn how to navigate, and effectively operate in, …
How to Win Webinar #12: Loot the Museums
This is one in a series of webinars. You can see all of them here. You don’t need to watch all of them, or watch them in order, and they’re open to everyone – please share! See the list of all of our webinars. Feel free to share with friends. Donate to keep these webinars free.
How to Win Webinar #11: Recalibrate Reality
Why Recalibrate Reality? Should artistic activists use our work to hold a mirror up to reality to make the invisible visible? Or should we use our talents to imagine new possibilities of what reality could be? Or can we do both? Steve and Steve give a brief course on the latest aesthetic and cultural theory, and …
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How To Win Webinar #10: Make Your Meetings Inventive
Why a Webinar about Meetings? We’ve all been in a lot of action planning meetings lately, and some of them… are less than productive. This training is on how to lead Action Planning Meetings that don’t suck and are super creative and effective. Steve Lambert and Steve Duncombe give you tricks from their years of artistic …
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Apply for the Johannesburg Art Action Academy
Are you an artist or creative practitioner interested in challenging public perceptions about sex work in South Africa? If so, please apply to attend our Art Action Academy in May! In collaboration with SWEAT – Sex Workers Education & Advocacy Taskforce and Sonke Gender Justice, we invite artists (and creative practitioners of all kinds) interested …
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How to Win Webinar #9: Mine Pop Culture
How can progressives borrow and steal from pop culture to make real change? Pop culture can be read as a map to popular desire. In this video of our live webinar, Co-founder Steve Duncombe and Chair of our Board Pat Jerido of Leadership Matters Consulting show how to read the map and exploit the phantasmagoric …
How to Win Webinar #8: Change Minds
Our founders (The Artist! The Historian!) got deep into the Slap Chop, the Snuggie, and the Ginsu 2000! They shared what they’ve learned from infomercials (and some heavy communications theory) and revealed some simple tools to better understand audiences and communicate persuasively to people who don’t already agree. Notes from the webinar Lambert will be …
C4AA Fundamentals #7: Stay Hopeful & Avoid Burnout
In the Star Trek universe, Vulcans like Dr. Spock always think objectively and rationally. We’re not Vulcans. Human beings have a tendency toward self-deception – a trait that was a valuable part of human evolution and helped us survive over centuries. But fight or flight responses aren’t as needed or useful in everyday 2017. Steve …
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Imagine You Are A Superhero
This is one of the favorite brief exercises in our artistic activism trainings, and a great place to start. Step 1 Imagine that you are a superhero. Yes, a superhero. Like all superheroes you have special powers – we’ll get to that soon. You also have an outfit. You are very strong and powerful. The …