sidewalk assembly

[sidewalkassembly-blog]

Building a Coalition

We've been at it a year now and have learned some things, mostly that footwork is key. Go into places you don't know and ask them if they're down. It's what we did today after we coffee'd up. The schools are all back from Spring Break today and we walked without appointment into one at Classon and Sterling, got visitor passes and directed to the office. 

It's weird being an adult in a middle school, the kids were all taller than us and suspiciously polite. In the office there is a mother who wants to get her kids into school and they are there translating for her. Across the hallway we hear a teacher yelling at a kid who must be acting out. "You think you're slick, don't you?" Her voice sounded fierce. Salome and I were scared from twenty feet away.

We talked to a couple administrators and programmers and they liked what they heard and pointed us to further contacts. We've been the last few weeks building a coalition of support. We've got a lot of people on board for the Crown Heights Mic and are excited to share more in early May.  

Yo artists, yo anyone for that matter, how do you think you're supposed to act in a community? Go slowly, talk to people. Present your project, your intentions, your questions, your cool selves. Folks are receptive, they want your weird projects. But go slow, near haltingly, we make footprints, it's proper to act with respect and not like aliens dropping UFOs in the middle of a much-traveled thruway. 

[sidewalkassembly-blog]

social practice is a hot buzz word

“If you’re interested in doing work out in the world, you need another box of tools,” he says—tools that go beyond studio practice and art history. “You need classes on social theory, theories of politics, and theories of public space.”

SOCIAL PRACTICE THE NEW ILL ART 

[sidewalkassembly-blog]

re:purpose @ five myles

I forgot to mention y'all (I'm not convinced anyone is checking this space regularly) should definitely go to Five Myles and check out the show filled with repurposed things. 

Walking the parkway I ran into one of the artist's (Pamela Council) performing. She was helping passersby with preparing their will. She handed out a pamphlet and I asked if I should hand it back to her when I was finished allocating my belongings, and she said no and I realized I don't own many important things except a sick roadbike and a few choice friendships. 

Go out and check it: http://www.fivemyles.org/re-purpose

[sidewalkassembly-blog]

see us out here on the weekly, you know

Today we were on the parkway asking questions about the neighborhood and to be honest not many people stopped, but those who did stuck around. We talked with people about the new buildings that have gone up and about how New York is too removed from nature, how the money here turns people vicious and turns the sky into smog. 

There was a guy who told us about his work to make wearable technology more fashionable and a teenager whose lived right on the parkway her entire life and thinks it's gotten better. She hopes it only becomes more better. 

It was a slow day on the parkway but me and Salome covered good ground. We talked about the #cancelcolbert conversation and asked ourselves what it means to be an ally. Salome says "talk less and talk last" and I like that, it's humble.

We're going to be out here on the weekly now with new mappings and new questions. 

We got lots of questions all along the lines of what does it mean to know your neighbors, to live in your neighborhood? But mostly we want to hear your questions. We want to know the best way to ask you for your questions. 

We got ideas, but we got ears too. 

Talk less and talk last means listen more and listen first.

[sidewalkassembly-blog]

Radio Piracy + Crown Heights + Spring Time

Hey Y'all. We're alive. And we're pushing new content!

Query: How can residents of a quickly changing neighborhood create and sustain dialogic spaces?

The Crown Heights Mic is a collaboratively built broadcast network in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. As residents and neighborhood stakeholders, we want to develop a means of communicating with each other and local officials that doesn't depend on the bureaucracy of traditional routes. Through several sound funnels scattered around the neighborhood, we are able to engage in conversations specific to our neighborhood needs and wants. These sound funnels are strategically placed in front of the sites we already congregate--schools, religious centers, and libraries-- so we can hear the health of our neighborhood through each other's voices. This broadcast network creates a safe and anonymous forum that is determined, used, and sustained by those of us present and on the streets.

Check the website and keep us in view:

http://www.crownheightsmic.com/

[sidewalkassembly-blog]

An Introduction to Sidewalk Occupations

A Sidewalk Occupation is a project in demographics. It is an impromptu street party meets census inquiry.

Our essential question: What is around us?

Our essential goal: To map physically and forcibly.

By transforming the passerby into cartographer and wall into map, in our Sidewalk Occupations we test the belief that the places around us are transformable too. Does a wall just have to be a wall? Or can it be entry-point into learning all there is to know about our neighborhood? Does a sidewalk have to be just a place to pass over or can it be a place of exchange and meeting?

This past Saturday we asked people to map their favorite place in the neighborhood. People stopped and participated. They asked questions and blew bubbles, they talked with people they hadn’t known beforehand and argued over geography. Two kids on the block Nasseem and Youllanda stuck around for an hour and helped us clean up. Their favorite spots were their school and Eastern Parkway respectively. They insisted they are not best friends.

Going forward we will be occupying weekly. To finetune the process we are going to repeat the same wall at the corner of St. Johns and Franklin while we meet people and begin to get a better hold on what is possible. IF YOU HAVE AN IDEA FOR A QUESTION YOU’D LIKE TO SEE MAPPED EMAIL US AT [email protected]