Press Release
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Van Alen Institute & DC Office of Planning to Host
Intersection Mixtape and Playback Your Story on November 12
in Mid City East and Gallaudet University Areas
A series of public programs and interventions to unite communities
through narrative, vibrations, and the built environment
Site-specific artistic interventions include mixtapes of local histories
and multimedia explorations of demographic shifts
Media Contacts
Steven Thomson, Van Alen Institute, 212-924-7000 x 12
**To view a digital press kit, including high-resolution images, click here.
Washington, DC (October 20, 2016) – Van Alen Institute and the DC Office of Planning (OP) announced today two community-based projects in Washington, DC to better understand cities through stories and the built environment, as part of the city-wide Crossing the Street initiative. The project culminates in two participatory public programs on November 12: Intersection Mixtape andPlayback Your Story, located in two distinctive DC neighborhoods. Van Alen Institute invited local Washington, DC artist collective Furthermore, actor and producer John Johnson, web designer Curry Hackett, and project manager and photographer Beth Ferraro to create the site-specific programs.
OP’s Crossing the Street initiative is made possible through a grant from the Kresge Foundation. The initiative seeks to create fun and inclusive experiences in neighborhoods across the District that are experiencing rapid demographic and social change. These experiences are designed to build community, using arts as a way to activate space and foster conversation and collaboration.
“These public initiatives ask neighborhood residents to reflect on their connections to place and community, offering an opportunity to better understand the city,” Van Alen Institute Executive Director David van der Leer said. “We are excited to see how the experiences that these interventions initiate, capture, and present can bring communities together.”
"I continue to be excited by the collaborations we are seeing between residents, artists, curators, and planners,” DC Office of Planning Director Eric Shaw said. “This work highlights a new approach to showcase how we live in cities, creating a medium that highlights the rhythm of places and communities that comes from our very existence within the built environment."
Project 1: Intersection Mixtape
For Intersection Mixtape, the Mid City East-area collective, Furthermore is building a collection of stories and sounds through surveys and guided soundwalks in the neighborhoods of Bloomingdale and Eckington. Since September, neighbors and artists have collectively documented the current soundscapes of Mid City East. Intersection Mixtape aims to both preserve what is interesting about the community and to empower residents to communicate their sense of identity and place.
The event will culminate on November 12 on the lot at the corner of Bates and North Capitol Streets, NW, where Furthermore (led by José Ruiz, Natalie Campbell, James Huckenpahler, and Patrick McDonough) will hold a celebratory neighborhood listening party to play the documented sounds and stories of the community. Visitors to the lot will receive their own mixtapes of the city’s local sounds.
Project 2: Playback Your Story
Taking place at Olmsted Green, on the Gallaudet University Campus, the world’s only liberal arts university where all programming and services are designed for deaf and hard of hearing students, a community public program titled Playback Your Story by Washington, DC native John Johnson will be held on November 12. Playback Your Story offers a new understanding of the impact of changing demographics in the Gallaudet University, Union Market, and Trinidad neighborhoods by telling the area's community experiences and rich history through video, audio, photography, and live performances.
The November 12 performance will feature an interactive, improvisational play, titled Playback Theatre. Johnson, along with his team of Katie Davis, Jason Anderson, Jamil Johnson, and Beth Ferraro, recorded over twenty interviews with local residents, students, and business owners within the past six weeks, which will be playing intermittently during the performances. American Sign Language-English interpreters will be provided. These stories weave together community members’ connections and aim to inspire local residents to interact with one another and understand the roots of these neighborhoods. The public is invited to explore these personal accounts further on the project website.
Event Details
Intersection Mixtape will take place on November 12, 12–3 p.m. at the lot at corner of Bates and North Capitol Streets NW.
Playback Your Story will take place on November 12, 4–7 p.m. at Olmsted Green at Gallaudet University at 800 Florida Avenue NE. Enter through the gate across from Union Market on 6 Street NE.
All events are free and open to the public. The project partners are thankful for the input and support from the Crossing the Street Community Advisory Boards for each project, local Advisory Neighborhood Commissions, Gallaudet University, DC Office of Planning, and Kresge Foundation. Rain date and locations can be found on the project website the day of.
**To view a digital press kit, including high-resolution images, click here. |
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ABOUT THE COLLABORATORS
About Van Alen
At Van Alen Institute, we believe design can transform cities, landscapes, and regions to improve people’s lives. We collaborate with communities, scholars, policymakers, and professionals on local and global initiatives that rigorously investigate the most pressing social, cultural, and ecological challenges oftomorrow. Building on more than a century of experience, we develop cross-disciplinary research, provocative public programs, and inventive design competitions
www.vanalen.org
Twitter: @van_alen
Instagram: @van_alen
Facebook: /vanaleninstitute
About DC Office of Planning
Office of Planning's mission is to guide development of the District of Columbia, including the preservation and revitalization of our distinctive neighborhoods, by informing decisions, advancing strategic goals, encouraging the highest quality outcomes, and engaging all communities. OP performs planning for neighborhoods, corridors, districts, historic preservation, public facilities, parks and open spaces, and individual sites. In addition, OP engages in urban design, land use, and historic preservation review. OP also conducts historic resources research and community visioning, and manages, analyzes, maps, and disseminates spatial and US Census data.
www.planning.dc.gov and www.dcculturalplan.org
Twitter:@OPinDC #CrossingtheStreet #creativeplacemaking
Instagram:op_indc
Facebook:/dcofficeofplanning
ABOUT CROSSING THE STREET
The Crossing the Street grant initiative is made possible through a grant from the Kresge Foundation. The initiative, taking place in select neighborhoods around the District that are experiencing rapid demographic and social change, aims is to create more locally sensitive public spaces that promote health, happiness, and neighborhood wellbeing by engaging in civic activities that capitalize on community assets.
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