Winter-Spring 2021
What do you feel is most important in culture right now? This is the driving question of the Art & Society Census, a new project launched by BPL Presents — the arts and culture division of Brooklyn Public Library — together with writer and curator Laura Raicovich and in partnership with Hyperallergic. Together we’re taking stock of changes in culture by hearing from anyone who wishes to participate in the census, beginning with a survey that can be accessed here (available in English, Mandarin, and Spanish).
The results of this short questionnaire will provide material for the formation of working groups made up of members of the public, organized by Brooklyn Public Library over the winter and spring of 2021. Both the written feedback and the outcomes of the working groups’ discussions will be presented at an expanded convening — inviting NYC residents, artists, art appreciators, national and international arts workers, museum and public institutional directors and staff — with the aim of spurring new ways to share art and culture in public spaces that will best serve the broadest collective imaginable.
Submit your Census responses here.
Congress on Art & Life June 22, 2021
A culminating event for the Art & Society Census.
For the past year, BPL and partners have engaged in radical listening from people across the country about what changes we want to see in the arts, in culture and our daily lives, while the pandemic upended all of these. Through a survey of over 1500 people and a series of focused working groups, we’ve heard and taken stock of what important changes on the part of institutions, cultural producers, and participants need to happen and what fresh imaginings can help us seize this moment.
Topics on the agenda: inverting expertise and finding new languages, financial transparency and better funding models, the importance of local organizing & institutions for our survival, what we wish to see--a series of demands.
We call together the public to hear about our learnings and voice your own.
We are joined by project organizers, working group facilitators, and working group participants.
Project Organizers: Laura Raicovich, Jakab Lászlo Orsós and Cora Fisher
Facilitators: Fadwa Abbas, Kazembe Balagun, Suhaly Bautista-Carolina, Jennifer Keeney Sendrow & Hrag Vartanian.
Participants: Open to all.
*A document will be shared with all who sign up in advance of the event, which has been compiled from the project and outlines the observations offered and changes demanded by participants.