Brock { Abroad }

The Social Innovation Safari in Amsterdam was an absolute hit. As a follow up to a week of imaginative innovations that came out of five local project-based assignments, I’m creating a blog post harvesting all the great things that came out of the Safari. Taken from the Kennisland website, here are the cases:

• Jeugdzorg Amsterdam (Office for Juvenile Care) is a looking for ways to innovate in their complex organisation. What is going wrong? Interview the people involved and design simple intervention for a complex problem.
• IJburg is one of the youngest neighbourhood in Amsterdam and already facing serious challenges: small enterpreneurs are having a hard time surviving, different social groups don’t mix. A group of active residents of IJburg want to make their neighbourhood more livable and need your help!
• Filmmuseum Amsterdam will be moving to a new location (Amsterdam Noord) and wants to involve the neighbourhood. What ways can be found to make this cultural institution part of the neighbourhood and how can the people living there profit from this and add their value?
• Mixacademy: An alternative art academy in the center of Amsterdam. What can they do to stimulate creative entrepreneurschip and offer chances to talented people without focusing on prior education?
• Weekend School: A one-day extra-curricular educational program that is looking for a way to better connect their alumni to each other and also to the school’s network.

I’m especially focusing on the project I took on with the Mix Academy.

The Mix Academy, in simple terms, is an incredibly open alternative school for the arts located in the heart of the city. Recognizing that artists need to be entrepreneurs in order to reach their public, it trains students from all walks of life to discover their true self through their creativity. Whether it is through free painting, graphic design, 3D work, illustration, or photography, Mix Academy allows the individual to build a network around them that can launch them into the world. Combining high and low art through a very mixed curriculum, the Mix academy is a concept I greatly believe in.

Which is why it was so easy to take on this assignment that combined my interest in innovative education with art. Ralph de Lange, the initiator of the Mix, is a lovable character who was an absolute joy to work with. Strongly believing in his message that he wants to spread to the world, my team of six spent three days (and nights) working in parks, cafes, and even my apartment one very long evening. Here is the presentation full of innovative ideas that we gave to a full room of guests, including the local media, on the final evening:

For the full list of presentations that came out of the week-long program, see here.

Here are some other resources I’ve harvested on the final outcomes from the Safari:

An article written by Pieter Hilhorst of De Volkskrant, an Amsterdam newspaper. (Dutch, but can be translated)

The beginning of a great blog series on the Safari by Tage Skotvold, a participant and new friend.

An article by Hannah Aukes

Photos: KL Safari First Days

KL Safari Mix Academy

KL Safari BBQ

KL Safari Closing Event

A blog on the Safari by Patrick Veenhoff

Have I missed any other good sources? If so, let me know!

“The Glimpse Correspondents Program is for talented writers and photographers with a passion for storytelling and a knack for finding truly unique stories. The program is open to anyone between the ages of 18 and 36 who will be working, volunteering, or studying outside of their home country for at least 10 weeks.”

Here is a artistic statement written from the prompt:
“Why you are interested in being a Glimpse Correspondent? We also want to know what issues you hope to explore and/or what kinds of cultural adventures you hope to embark on.”

On Pilgrimage:

The ability to craft stories that create a meaningful connection between author, reader, and the snapshot moments spent with people on the path makes up my life. When it comes to using my talents in a passionate way and making a positive impact on the world, storytelling is more than my medium. Storytelling is my passion. There is a Zen belief affirming that upon leaping, a net will appear. This seems a fitting statement for the story. My extremely brief life has been a journey of leaps that led me to Amsterdam. After a long and bitter cold winter squatting with circus performers in Montreal, I became a Knowmad. As a nomadic knowledge worker at The New Business School for the World, my other passion for travel is used on a daily basis.

Joining an international team of young social entrepreneurs working and learning from each other has challenged me to “combine, passion, business, and playful learning,” as our motto states. Studying process design, social innovation and sustainability, new business design, personal leadership, and international project design, Knowmads aims to “educate change-makers.”

I continue exploring my learning journey that has brought me on pilgrimage with purpose. From Santiago to Varanasi, Palestine to Paris, I view life as pilgrimage. I’ve realized now on this journey that the destination never seems to arrive. Taking this approach to heart, I find myself constantly exploring this theme in my writing while listening to the life philosophies and stories of people from all over the world.

When it comes to travel, it’s often the people that make the place. As we continue flowing into an increasingly chaotic world, there’s a certain silence in the stories of people, all over the world. I believe this creates a story in the telling that no other medium can quite replicate. In story, a voice is given to the voiceless. In telling, a much louder sound emerges. This is a sound that holds more power than any army could possibly provide. As a storyteller, I am seeking autonomy from a society that has mastered the art of fear in the unknown through mass-management and hysteria in media and politics.

As I explore myself further through my craft, I also want to explore the broader implications travel has on socio-cultural interactions and innovations. Through bringing people together, there lies a necessity for an authentic cultural understanding. Through story, I attempt to break down the barriers and stigma modern culture and society has been spoon-fed by mainstream media. Through their telling, I hope to close the border between places and their people. I believe this responsibility is the natural step that can break down not just borders within myself, but also the borders within this world.

Who is the artist?

What is the role of art and the artist in the 21st Century?

Last week at Knowmads, we did an almost day-long workshop on creativity. You can read the blog post here.

We had seven minutes to spend with a walnut. I couldn’t help but admire my walnut for a moment. But only a moment. Soon after, I clamped my jaw down on the hard surface. Momentarily sliding along the smooth edge, I found my place. I chomped. The shell was broken and I explored the insides. I used my senses. Soon, salivating, I savored the flavor. Then I wrote a poem about it:

I felt like eating you- but you-
you probably didn’t have a clue.

I felt like leaving you, but couldn’t-
I’d already had a chew.

So here I sit-
waiting to go to the loo.

After being asked to interpret it, I was able to take much more meaning than I’d initially expected. To put it in a nutshell, (no pun intended) the poem asks the question:
Can you sit, waiting to go to the loo, or do you just forget that you ever had a chew?

The sun’s rays burn your porcelain paper skin
deeper than mine

Mine;
mine is-
peppered
under the heat,
but you-
you ignite-

shadows speak for the silence we share.

And there’s a purple sunset
playing its twilight orchestra

The stars will soon illuminate our insides
as we pull our penumbra up to our chins
trying to stay warm.

the moon glazes over our eyes
gesticulation, mastication,
all the words that feel so dirty-
taste decadent-
when the day is done.
bathing in the moonlight

Taken from my journal on The Camino de Santiago:

“Imagine’ by John Lennon is playing right now as I sit at a café next to a park overlooking the next village I’ve yet to enter. Although I don’t exactly miss music while walking during the day, either. In the end, it just makes me appreciate the sound all the more when it finally does enter my ears. What a simple way  to better appreciate a luxury such as music.! I’m learning to appreciate everything a little more on this camino, actually. Now I get it when all the grown-ups say thinks like: “You know, it really is… the little things in life!”

Listening to the words of  the song, I am reminded of an old mentor I’d had. As artistic director of a non-profit theatre company for youth, I’d spent a good amount of  my last two years school working on a show with her. She was a good soul who, on the night before Christmas, lit a candle as we joined hands and said our own little prayers for the world built  passionately together under her guidance. I still remember all the things she’d read to us as she shared her immense and inspirational spirit. I was grateful for her, and other people who had guided me along the path at some point or another. It was then I decided I’d write letters to a handful of these people who, at some point,  I’d  kept in my closest circle. I can feel their spirits on this path at trying moments. I at least owe them a ‘thank-you.’