[Basekamp Events] Democratic Innovation - May 11 2010

[scott at basekamp.com]

======== DEMOCRATIC INNOVATION ===============================================

May 11, 2010 - 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Hi Everyone,

This Tuesday is another event in a year-long series of weekly conversations  
and exhibits in 2010 shedding light on examples of Plausible Artworlds.

This week we’ll be talking with Kent Hansen from the Copenhagen-based  
initiative, Democratic Innovation.

Several times in previous weeks’ discussions, the question of democracy has  
come up — as an aspiration, a modus operandi, an exigency, but most often  
as stemming from a desire for a more inclusive aesthetics of decision making.  
There isn’t much substantive democracy on offer in the mainstream artworld  
— nor in the broader lifeworld — but is it really plausible for artworlds  
to promote and practice democracy? What, if anything, do artworlds have to do  
with democratic will formation?

Democratic Innovation was founded in 1998 by Kent Hansen as a way of  
fostering greater interplay between art, free association and working life.  
Though not a collective/group per se, the initiative’s focus is definitely  
on collective work — and the collective workplace is the site of its  
interventions. Responding to the challenges facing democracy in today’s  
neoliberal economy, Democratic Innovation instigates collaborations within  
institutions, organizations and corporations. Typically, Hansen and his  
collaborators work with people in factories and businesses, seeking to  
integrate other artists and groups using art as an organizing platform, to  
consider how democracy — as it is currently understood, but also as it  
could be reconfigured — might be used to improve people’s working lives.

Experiences and knowledge creation in the workplace play an extensive role in  
cultural and societal developments — and are carefully scrutinized by  
neo-management as a way of increasing profits. But what if they were to be  
taken seriously on their own terms? Would that not be something of a  
“democratic innovation”? Thus, the initial ‘platform’ for democratic  
innovation is the notion that the ‘collective workplace’ is a time-space  
where different norms and conceptions about ‘production’,  
‘procedures’ and ‘life’ are struggling for legitimacy — and where  
collective aesthetic strategies can challenge the ‘ordinary’ practice of  
organizing and decision-making regarding ‘production’ – be it cultural,  
societal or industrial.

Democratic Innovation is thus seeking alternative models to ‘managerial  
practices’. Can art practices contribute to the development of a critique  
of current neo-management practices and organizing regimes? Do participatory  
collaborative art practices merely mimic soft-management tactics or do they  
have the potential to point the way to democratic innovation?

http://www.demokratisk-innovation.dk/

See you all then!

Join us every Tuesday night – in person, or on Skype, skypename:  
‘basekamp’
If you come to the potluck chat in person, be sure to bring a dish :)
Basekamp space: 723 Chestnut St, 2nd floor, Philadelphia usa

NOTE: All Skype “Join” links are broken this week. In the meantime, to  
join this week’s Potluck Chat:
 * Download from skype.com if you don’t already have it
 * In Skype “Add a contact”: basekamp
 * Send a message when you want to join the chat, by selecting us from your
   list and clicking ‘Start chat’
 * We’ll add you to the text chat, and when everyone is ready we’ll start
   the conference call


Follow Plausible Artworlds:
http://twitter.com/basekamp
http://basekamp.com/info

Comment here
http://basekamp.com/about/events/democratic-innovation#comments [1]

/Plausible Artworlds is a project organized by Basekamp and Stephen Wright,  
and has been funded by The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage through the  
Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative./


[1] http://basekamp.com/about/events/democratic-innovation#comments
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://basekamp.com/pipermail/bk-event-list_basekamp.com/attachments/20100510/5c7da3c2/attachment.html>