Events of Interest

Civility Week: Democracy Takes Creativity

Oct 12–16, 2026
Lincroft, NJ, US
Brookdale Community College

Brookdale Community College presents Democracy Takes Creativity.

“In a moment of rapid change, uncertainty, and shifting civic life, we are called not only to protect democracy—but to reimagine it. This year’s theme invites us to explore creativity not as decoration, but as necessity. Creativity as problem-solving. Creativity as resistance. Creativity as a way forward. To be radical is to return to the root. At its founding, this nation was itself a creative act—an audacious reimagining of governance.

“The Constitution is a living document born of bold ideas about freedom, participation, and shared power. Imperfect, evolving, and unfinished—it calls each generation to continue the work. Now, it is our turn.

Bravo, Student Development Committee and the Whyman Center for Transformative Learning. You are speaking our language.

Night is Not Eternal

Oct 19, 2026, 7:00-9:00 PM EDT
Washington, DC, US
New York University’s Washington, DC Campus

As part of its Democracy on Screen documentary and conversation series, French In Motion and the John Brademas Center present a special screening of Night is Not Eternal.

The 2024 documentary, directed and produced by Nanfu Wang, follows Cuban activist Rosa María Payá Acevedo over the course of several years. Payá Acevedo is a Cuban democracy activist and human rights who founded the citizen initiative Cuba Decide, a movement in favor of changing the political and economic systems in Cuba towards democracy.

The screening will be followed by a conversation exploring the film’s themes and the broader issues surrounding human rights, freedom, and U.S.-Cuba relations.

WOMEX

Oct 21–25, 2026
Gran Canaria, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, ES
Auditorio Alfredo Kraus

WOMEX Worldwide Music Expo is an international and culturally diverse music conference featuring a trade fair, talks, films, and showcase concerts. It aims to support and strengthen the role of culture around the globe and to spread its values through nurturing and promoting creativity and music. As a result, the local and global music community is able to – and needs to – contribute to cross-cultural understanding in a welcoming, tolerant, diverse and productive manner.

Designing for Dignity 04: A Convening of Possibilities

Oct 24, 2026, 11 AM–6 PM CDT
Chicago, IL, US
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
Edlis Neeson Theater

Hosted by Deem Journal, this fourth annual symposium brings together designers, artists, organizers, and community thinkers for a day of hybrid in‑person and online programming focused on dignity as a core design principle. Through presentations, conversations, and a participatory activation, the convening explores how liberatory design can respond to current social challenges while centering the inherent worth of every person.

Designing for Dignity 04 invites an intergenerational community to consider how design shapes public life and how each of us plays a role in imagining more equitable futures.

In Pursuit of Life, Liberty, and Happiness

Oct 26, 2026, 11 AM–5 PM EDT
Brooklyn, NY, US
Brooklyn Museum
Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Auditorium

Artists, activists, and scholars will confront the urgent questions that shape contemporary political life, 250 years after the signing of the US Declaration of Independence.

Brooklyn Museum and Creative Time will host “In Pursuit of Life, Liberty, and Happiness.” The daylong event will examine who has historically benefited from the story of US democracy. Speakers will also present ways to build expansive futures rooted in self-determination, dignity, and freedom.

86 Fascism

Monday, Oct. 26
Wherever YOU are

Culinary artists are stepping up to the plate.

The mission of Chefs Against Fascism Everywhere (C.A.F.E.) is to unite restaurants, chefs, and food industry workers nationwide, through gathering spaces already built for community, to organize, register, and turn out voters who will protect the industry and our democracy.

C.A.F.E. presents 86 Fascism, a national night to unite the food industry. Monday, Oct. 26.

Restaurants across the country will open their doors on the same night to protect workers and organize the vote.

Host a dinner, or find one near you.

Democracy and the Humanities: A Conversation with Cornel West

Oct 29, 2026, 7:00-8:30 PM MDT
Boulder, CO, US
University of Colorado
CASE Auditorium

Why do the humanities matter for democracy? What are the most pressing challenges facing our society, and how do literature, history, philosophy, religion, and the arts empower us to address those challenges? How can universities shape the civic life of a nation and elevate the voices of its members, and how can we both defend and reimagine higher education in a time of political polarization and anti-intellectualism?

In exploring these questions, Dr. Cornel West, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Chair at Union Theological Seminary will wrestle with the past, present, and future of democracy and intellectual life in the United States and beyond.

Bhangra & Beats Night Market

Nov 13, 2026, 4–9 PM PST
San Francisco, CA, US
Yerba Buena Gardens

Yerba Buena Gardens, Jessie Square, and Yerba Buena Lane will glow with the vibrant sights, sounds, flavors, and spirit of South Asian culture in celebration of Diwali, the Festival of Lights. At the heart of it all is the joyful Bhangra & Beats experience — a family-friendly celebration where traditional Punjabi rhythms meet Bay Area energy. Non Stop Bhangra will once again lead the festivities with its signature mix of interactive dance lessons, vibrant performances, live dhol drumming, DJs, and an open dance floor. A night market will feature local food vendors, artisans, community activations, family-friendly activities, and special offerings from neighborhood restaurants and bars.

This is a favorite event combining the arts, culture, and democratic principles.

The Democracy Cycle Festival

Jan 15–23, 2027
New York City, NY, US
Perelman Performing Arts Center

The inaugural Democracy Cycle Festival is an extension of The Democracy Cycle commissioning program, an initiative committed to commissioning and developing 25 new works of live performance across theater, dance, music, opera, and multidisciplinary practices that invite artists to explore themes related to the nature, practice, and experience of democracy.

Two works receiving main stage world premieres are Angélica Negrón’s The Puerto Rico Experiment and Baye & Asa’s At the Altar.

The festival also features free and open-to-the-public events that include a keynote speaker event, work-in-progress readings of Democracy Cycle commissions currently in development, panels, gatherings, free musical performances, and networking opportunities.

Let’s go!

Health Humanities Consortium Conference

Mar 10-13, 2027
Salt Lake City, UT
University of Utah
University Guest House & Conference Center

This annual conference brings together scholars, clinicians, artists, writers, students, community members, and others who think about health, illness, care, ethics, history, literature, and so much more. This will be the first time the conference is held in the Mountain West, and Utah Health is excited to bring that conversation to Salt Lake City.

“Health care is humans caring for humans. We must understand, support, and explore what it means to be human and have a body in need of care,” states Gretchen Case, PhD, MA, director of the Center for Health Ethics, Arts, and Humanities at the University of Utah.

Creative Bureaucracy Festival

Jun 2-3, 2027
Berlin, DE
Festsaal Kreuzberg

Every year thousands of international participants from government, politics, civil society and other change-making organizations join the Creative Bureaucracy Festival and celebrate outstanding examples of innovative public administrations.

The next edition, taking place Jun. 2-3, 2027 in Berlin, marks the 10th anniversary of Creative Bureaucracy Festival.

The festival offers some 90 sessions with some 230 speakers and projects from 50 nations, the Global Forum of Public Service Leaders and the Young Bureaucrats Forum, alongside partner-led gatherings and side events.

John Kani: A Living Legend

Through Nov 30, 2026
Johannesburg, ZA
Apartheid Museum

South African theatre icon Dr John Kani will be honoured with a major new exhibition at the Apartheid Museum that traces his journey from New Brighton in Gqeberha to international theatre stages and major film productions.

Kani’s career was transformed in the 1960s when he became involved with the Serpent Players, where he worked alongside fellow actor Winston Ntshona and playwright Athol Fugard. Their collaborations included Sizwe Banzi Is Dead and The Island, works that became significant in South Africa’s protest theatre tradition.

The exhibition will bring together photographs, film, text and artefacts to explore Kani’s life, creative work and contribution to South African cultural life.

Earth Shed

Through Dec 4, 2026
Princeton, NJ, US
Princeton University School of Architecture

Part exhibition, part workshop, and part active construction site, Earth Shed invites visitors to watch architecture emerge through the labor, materials, tools, and decisions that make building possible. Designed and organized by Erin Besler and Besler & Sons, the installation brings architectural thought into direct contact with the physical practice of construction.

Through public building sessions and an installation that changes as the work proceeds, Earth Shed challenges the division between those who design buildings and those who make them. It presents architecture not simply as a finished object, but as a collaborative civic practice shaped by many hands, forms of knowledge, and relationships to the earth.

Flesh Witness

Through Dec 13, 2026, 2026
Los Angeles, CA, US
REDCAT

Flesh Witness brings together contemporary artists whose work examines the histories and continuing effects of militarism across Hawai‘i, Korea, Okinawa, the Philippines, and Samoa. Through video, sculpture, photography, mixed media, and installation, the exhibition considers how military power leaves its marks on bodies, landscapes, archives, and collective memory.

The artists recover knowledge that official histories often suppress or overlook, including Indigenous experience, intergenerational memory, ecological stewardship, and community resistance. In doing so, Flesh Witness demonstrates how art can challenge inherited accounts of power, preserve what institutions fail to record, and help communities imagine futures beyond occupation and violence.

Sanctuary: Borders & Belonging in 2026

Oct 2-Nov 14, 2026
Rochester, NY, US
Rochester Contemporary Art Center

An exhibition at the Rochester Contemporary Art Center will be paired with a public art walk and a wider message about immigration and belonging.

Sanctuary: Borders & Belonging in 2026, brings together an extensive range of media responding to the current political and societal landscape surrounding immigration. Work from 11 national and regional artists ranges from contemporary devotional painting and photography to documentary, graphic art, storytelling, music and printmaking.

Sanctuary… also includes two community-based components, which bring together the voices of over 150 additional community members into the gallery.

Fighting for Freedom: Black Craftspeople and the Pursuit of Independence

Oct 16, 2026 — May 9, 2027
Charleston, SC, US
The Gibbes Museum of Art

This exhibition highlights the creations, contributions, and legacies of African Americans as they fought for freedom from the earliest calls for American independence and beyond.

Fighting for Freedom spans the war years of the Revolution through the present, as African Americans have sought agency and liberty through craft. The furniture, metals, ceramics, textiles, art, tools, and personal accessories that form the core of this exhibition underline the idea of African American crafts serving as a catalyst for those who sought freedom.

The Rupture: No Condition is Permanent

Oct 24, 2026–Feb 13, 2027
Edinburgh, UK
Old College, University of Edinburgh
Talbot Rice Gallery

This exhibition explores how life feels when the world is going through massive, unpredictable changes. It looks at modern challenges — like the rise of AI, wars, economic inequality, climate change, and political instability — and asks how we can navigate a world where old rules no longer seem to apply.

Rather than giving into despair, the featured artists focus on hope and action. Through their artwork, they give voice to ignored perspectives, expose manipulation, and remind us of our own power.

Kiri Dalena, Erased Slogans, (2008). Courtesy the artist by way of Talbot Rice Gallery. © Kiri Dalena

Imagining an Archipelago: Art from Cuba, Guam, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Their Diasporas

Through Jun 6, 2027
Waterville, ME, US
Colby College Museum of Art
Upper and Lower Jetté Galleries

This presentation brings together paintings, sculptures, videos, prints, photographs, and multimedia installations — including several newly commissioned, site-specific works — that explore forty artists’ relationships to the histories and communities of their lands and seas. Uniting the works are themes of cultural and political self-determination, indigeneity and migration, and climate crisis and resilience.

Together, the artworks form vivid stories that underscore the enduring impact of these histories on contemporary American life and invite visitors to reconsider how we carry the past—and what it means to be American.

Image: María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Freedom Trap Detail (2013), Colby College Museum of Art.

Turn the volume up!

Through Jul 11, 2027
Durham, NC, US
Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
The Brenda La Grange Johnson and Heather Johnson Sargent Pavilion

This exhibition explores how people have used their voices to confront injustice, strengthen communities, and influence public life. Opening during the United States’ 250th anniversary, Turn the volume up! places these stories within the broader history of American democracy, showing how speaking out, documenting events, organizing movements, and creating art can spark collective action.

Organized into five thematic sections — Remarks, Organize, Records, Dissents, and Petitions — the exhibition brings together photographs, paintings, prints, sculpture, installation, and archival materials. Across these works, artists consider how public expression shapes civic discourse and how each of us can participate in building a more just society.

Image: Reggie Burrows Hodges, Community Appreciation: Orchestra, (2020) Promised gift of Susan and Michael Hershfield, Nasher Museum of Art.