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Summary of Activist Arts: Cultural Interaction Through the Creative Arts, March 23, 2010, the Arts Arena at The American University of Paris.

In partnership with UNESCO, Melody for Dialogue Among Civilizations, and the International Music Council, the Arts Arena on March 23, 2010 presented the first forum in a four-part series designed to support UNESCO’s International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures.  With the title “Activist Arts: Cultural Interaction Through the Creative Arts,” the inaugural forum focused on the visual and performing arts, asking speakers and audience alike to consider a number of questions: Who determines what is a work of art, the society of departure or that of arrival?   Is showing the same art works or television programs around the world cultural rapprochement or, on the part of the ‘exporter,’ cultural colonialism that is only a one-way exchange? In what way can the creative arts effectively further cultural understanding?

Should we even be asking this of them?

The performing arts were represented by Ellen Sorrin, Director of the George Balanchine Trust and the New York Choreographic Institute of the New York City Ballet; photography by Fred Ritchin, Professor of Photography and Imaging at the Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, founder of PixelPress, former picture editor of the New York Times Magazine, and a seminal author of the digital revolution; the visual arts by British installation artist Kirstie Macleod; and popular culture by French television producer Alexis de Gemini.  Alan Riding, best-selling author and former European Cultural Correspondent for the New York Times, was the moderator.

Each panelist spoke from the perspective of the art form he represented:

Ms. Sorrin acknowledged the success of activities such as bringing Balanchine ballets to Africa or Asian dances to the West, but questioned the breadth and duration of their impact. More time and energy, she suggested, should be paid to training youth to create, appreciate and understand art on a local level; young people who engage and express their identity and passions through artistic creation, do not usually wield lethal weapons.

Professor Ritchin suggested that images in the press have become neutralized, and showed how this can be countered through creative uses of photography. He also discussed what he sees as a shift in power: The role of the photographer and photojournalist is becoming subservient to the people with cell-phone cameras who, though they may have little experience, have the advantage of being amidst the action.

Ms. Macleod described the process behind the making of her creation, Barocco, a lavishly embellished and embroidered red silk dress displayed on a mannequin beside her.  The embroidery was executed by local artisans around the world, each stitch making the dress’s fabric stronger and binding different cultures together in one fabric.  In Ms. Macleod’s words, Barocco is “a series of dialogues between East and West, past and present, artist and embroiderers, performer and dress…it makes tangible the interplay through embroidery between a variety of cultures, each with its own identity and experience, expressing itself in stitch.”  The fabric originated in a refugee camp in southern Lebanon.

Mr. de Gemini used powerful visual film clips from American and French reality TV shows to illustrate how porous barriers between cultures are.  Positive and enthusiastic about the ways in which television can deliver cultural content, he nonetheless cautioned that artists are only transmitters of a national culture, and people do not understand America, for instance, by buying music and watching movies.

In the ensuing discussion led by Mr. Riding, the audience questioned the ways in which art and culture are alike, causally related, or independent from one another, and whether cultures can ever be translated or shared.  What exactly does rapprochement mean in this sense?  Hans d’Orville, Deputy Director of UNESCO, who was in the audience, was called upon to answer:  In his words, the aim is to “understand others within the context of cultural diversity and in spite of different fears and perceptions.”  In this globalizing era, which has a tendency to lean towards uniformity, one has to make special efforts to understand art, he added, “and be more engaging and tolerant, in order to build a structure for peace.”  Within this structure, artists serve as “cultural diversity operators.”

The point was convincingly demonstrated at the forum’s close.  An Iranian trio performed a short concert of Sufi music—a performance without words but with strong impact on the audience, standing as an example of how the arts can be interactive and create shared experiences.