ART IS CHANGE: Strategies & Skills for Activist Artists & Cultural Organizers

Scott Rankin : When I describe BIGhART to folks in the US they accuse me of making it up. In this episode Scott Rankin, BIGhART’s founder, describes how this expansive, constantly morphing, multi-disciplinary, thirty-year long enterprise became one of the world's leading arts and social change organizations. This is first of two episodes featuring Scott. You can listen to Chapter 2 HERE BIO Scott...

Tisidra Jones: is a poster child for cross-sector, hybrid creative community leadership. Trained in theater, and music, and as a lawyer, Tisidra has built a company that uses all of these assets in service to people and organizations working for change. BIO Tisidra is a sought-after speaker, award-winning artist and lawyer who works at the intersection of inclusion, engagement and equal opportunit...

In Episode 34 Henry Frank shared the story of his long trek from San Quentin as a lifer, to finding both freedom and a community eager to learn from him as an artist, teacher, and healer. Here are three amazing new chapters that that Henry shared about his continuing journey. Bio I am a descendant of the great nations of the Yurok and Pomo Tribes. I am a returning resident, former Arts In Correcti...

Àmọ̀kẹ́ Kubat's work rises up in a dozen different overlapping directions. In North Minneapolis you'll likely hear her described as an organizer, a puppeteer, a healer, a priestess, a playwright, a counselor, a writer, a teacher, an actress, a curator, a storyteller, and more often than not, a provocateur. Bio: Amoke Kubat is an artist, weaver, sacred doll maker, and sometimes stand-up comedian, w...

Bio Barry Gillespie was introduced to meditation practice in 1978, through the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Ashram. In 2003 he began exploring Theravada Buddhist practice, sitting many long retreats at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA and Spirit Rock in Woodacre, CA. His principal teacher is Guy Armstrong. Barry is an affiliated teacher with the  Insight Meditation Community of Colorado...

Prison Truth Through Fiction How do you prepare artists to teach in the foggy upside down netherworld of prison? This episode tells how California's Arts in Corrections program answered that question with a twist. Excerpted from the recently published, The Book of Judith (New Village Press) and tells the amazing story of how poet/teacher Judith Tannenbaum's crafted the story of a fictional prison...

In our last conversation, ( Episode 26) we shared Alice Lovelace's tumultuous history as a solo teaching artist and performer working with young writers all across the rural south. What follows is Alice's next chapter. In it she talks about building an extraordinary multi-disciplinary, cross-sector cultural institution that rises up from the funky detritus of the pandemic as a new beachhead of cre...

Throughout his career, activist, organizer, educator, and author Harry Boyte. has asked a simple, but obviously challenging question: How can we make democracy an everyday practice for everyone? Given the warnings about the end of democracy, our discussion about role of culture in the labor and civil rights movements, and the inseparable nature of imagination and democracy is timely, to say the le...

Carlton Turner understands that when you can't feed yourself the imagination is the first thing to go And if you can't "see" a different future you can't make change. Sipp Culture is about feeding both the body and the mind's eye. BIO Carlton Turner is an artist, agriculturalist, researcher, and co-founder of the Mississippi Center for Cultural Production (Sipp Culture). Sipp Culture uses food and...

Over the past four decades, this episode's guest, Cynthia Winton-Henry , and the worldwide community, she and her collaborator, Phil Porter, have helped to grow, have sparked a reconvening of the pre-historic circle of dance and song, and story that animated and nurtured the nascent human community. For more inspiring change maker stories also check out the Change the Story Collection BIO Cynthia...

Episode 76: Alice Lovelace: How to Thrive as a Creative Change Agent (Reprise) Lately, we have heard from many artists and arts organizations who are joining the creative change movement. In response, we are revisiting Alice's story of creativity, chutzpah, and courage as a peaceful disrupter making serious change across the deep south under the most challenging conditions. For more inspiring chan...

Spending time with the Breaking Ice theater based diversity, equity, and inclusion program gave rise to a question: How might new insights about how the brain works might help us better understand the how and why of our continuing struggle with difference? Here is what ensued.  LISTEN TO Breaking Ice Chapter 1 LISTEN TO Breaking Ice Chapter 2 Change the Story / All Episodes  Change...

Breaking Ice - Chapter 2 Fear of judgement, the courage of sharing pain, or guilt, or confusion, owning that not knowing is not an excuse for hurting, that humility is hard, that learning hard things is harder, and accepting responsibility is a daily struggle. This is the rocky relational landscape being explored by five BreakIng Ice performers on a bare stage at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. loui...

This episode and next will tell the story my time with Breaking Ice and share what I learned about the program's evolution and history, its impact, and its innovative approach helping workplaces large and small "cultivate courageous dialogue around issues of diversity, equity and inclusion. BIO's Noël Raymond holds an MFA in Acting from the University of Minnesota and a BFA from Ithaca College in...

In Episode 71, Dominic Campbell talked about the community building power of Caribbean Carnival and working with cutting edge brain science at the Global Brain Health Institute. In this episode, Dominic Campbell explores questions like: What roles can artists can play at the intersection of science, healthcare, and policymaking? What conditions support radical collaborative thinking and design? An...

In this episode international arts and aging leader Dominic Campbell will share his thoughts about some intriguing questions: Can an active creative culture change the scary stories we tell ourselves about getting older? Can large scale festivals help communities find common ground in their work with older citizens? What is creative aging and why is it being embraced by gerontologists, and brain s...

In this episode Veronica Rojas talks about working to advance new insights and ideas about creative aging alongside neurologists, architects, journalists, economists, psychologists, educators, and other artists as a Fellow at the Global Brain Health Institute at the University of California, San Francisco. It's quite an adventure. BIO Veronica Rojas : Veronica Rojas (b. Mexico City, 1973) was born...

ANNE BASTING's work at the crossroads of Arts and Aging has allowed her to pioneer new approaches to the challenges faced by our aging population. In this episode we learn how her efforts have helped advance the creative aging approach as a powerful and effective prescription for reducing isolation, promoting social connections, and mitigating a the symptoms of dementia. BIO Anne Basting is a writ...

This episode is Art in a Democracy: Selected Plays of Roadside Theater. Our conversation with editor Ben Fink and contributor Arnaldo J. Lopez. explores Roadside's 50-year history of creative collaboration percolating at the crossroads of art, community, and America's struggle to craft an authentic living democracy. BIO’s Ben Fink : Ben Fink worked with the Roadside ensemble from 2015 through 2020...

This episode's guest is artist, educator, and global cultural leader, Eric Booth. Eric’s passion is activating the artistry of others to foster wellness, create thriving communities and change behaviors for the better. Eric has written seven books, taught at Juilliard, Stanford, Lincoln Center, and consulted on arts, learning, teaching, and innovation across the globe. BIO In 2015 Eric Booth...

Arlene Goldbard In this episode we talk to author, visual artist, educator, and activist Arlene Goldbard about her new book. In the Camp of Angels of Freedom: What Does it Mean to be Educated . In it she explores her life's journey along with a camp of 11 angels that include James Baldwin, Nina Simone, Paolo Freire, Doris Lessing, and Jane Jacobs.  Bio Arlene Goldbard ( www.arlenegoldbard.com...

This week we visit with researcher, writer, planner, Lorrie Chang to talk about her work with ArtPlace America's Community Development Investment (CDI) program. Along the way we will explore how artists from the Zuni Pueblo, and Southwest Minnesota worked with community developers to integrate arts-based tools and strategies as an enduring core of their practice? BIO Lorrie Chang centers an arts a...

In Episode 63 of Change the Story / Change the World, Liz Lerman shared stories about her early years and her creative path as a choreographer, teacher, and as a lifelong practicing heretic. In this Episode, (64) we hear about Wicked Bodies , her latest work, exploring the ugly, the beautiful, and the sublime embedded in the age-old story of witches. Special Thanks to the Yerba Buena Center for th...

Liz Lerman In chapter one of our conversation with Liz Lerman we'll talk about her early years, her career as a heretic, the critical response process, the Heisenberg Uncertainty, the power of the horizontal, and how dance can make the world a better place.  BIO Liz Lerman is a choreographer, performer, writer, teacher, and speaker. She has spent the past four decades making her artistic rese...

Where did Change the Story / Change the World come from? How about a bad home, drugs, and prison. A predictable story? Sure, except when you throw in the National Cathedral Choir, a geodesic dome, and the stubborn belief that art can save the world. You never know! In this episode we are going back to the beginning with the first episode of what was then a new podcast produced by the Center for th...