Spark inclusive action
Street Works applies MJN’s 3 values — justice, loving care, and solidarity — to make justice normal in the cultural asset ecosystem. (Read more here about why we're focused in this particular program on the cultural asset ecosystem.) Action is one of its design principles.
What it is
Inclusive action is a design principle that we apply to Street Works in service to solidarity.
This design principle is important to Street Works because we believe...
Arts can serve justice by inspiring people to act or change in ways that are right for them.
Action looks different for everyone: aiming to changing the world or changing ourselves; revolutionary or subtle.
Change is not a straight line. Like subjects are interrelated and woven, so are thoughts and decisions. It’s also not a short line. To act and change requires long-term inspiration, support, capacity, and more.
Goals
To prioritize inclusive action, all Street Works projects aim:
Integrate hopeful, concrete actions and accessible resources for action into artistic experiences.
Think with empathy, humility, and flexibility about what an action is. Taking action means different things depending on how you feel and your circumstance. Sometimes, action looks like rest or receiving help. While we can map roads and make them easier to walk, the participant decides which one to take.
Reject silos in favor of weaving subjects, actions, and needs together.
Connect people to local community organizations.
Where applicable, take an action ourselves before introducing it to others.
Center culture change over short-term participation.
Why
Art has always contributed to social change. It is a system solution that provokes response, inspires creativity, sparks feeling, and gives energy. Do that over and over, and worldviews form, which shape how we move and act in the world. No single entity can or should control that process. That's why it's hard to tie specific social changes to a given artist, project, or institution. We think it goes against justice to even want it at large scales. That's how propaganda forms.
But artistic experiences can more synergistically serve social change by “hugging” people with concrete actions that help them move from inspiration to sustained connection and community participation. Our goal is to center justice in this process by designing spaces in which action is not simply limited to what we want, think, or need.
