What are artists and creative practitioners doing in public life elsewhere? Here we follow ideas, experiments, and challenges from different places, looking for approaches we can learn from and questions worth asking at home.
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TAIWAN — Taiwan’s White Terror was a decades-long period of authoritarian repression under Kuomintang rule. Beginning in the late 1940s, thousands of people accused of political dissent were imprisoned, persecuted or executed, while censorship and surveillance silenced public discussion of what had happened. Today, Taiwanese artists are bringing that history…
CAUX, CH — The 2026 Caux Arts and Peace Encounters brought artists, peacebuilders, policymakers and academics together in what organizers describe as a “living laboratory.” Rather than holding another conference about peace, participants experiment with how creativity, empathy and imagination can actually change peacebuilding practice. The program explicitly puts diplomats…
NAIROBI, KE — ForumCiv brought together 20 artists from Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania for its first joint East African Artivism Fellowship. Participants worked on civic storytelling, systems thinking, legal awareness, digital activism and safety, then created projects addressing police brutality, disability inclusion, gender violence, food sovereignty, land rights and statelessness.…
LONDON, ENGLAND, UK — The main tenet of design thinking is empathy for the people you’re trying to design for, even with the advent of artificial intelligence. San Francisco-headquartered design consultancy IDEO brings design techniques into businesses. It breaks design thinking into seven phases: frame the question; gather inspiration; synthesize…
VOLTERRA, IT — Inmates at Italy’s oldest prison share why theatre performances have become essential to their rehabilitation For nearly 40 years, inmates have worked with theatre-makers as part of the Compagnia della Fortezza project. When theatre director and playwright Armando Punzo stepped inside the Volterra prison, one of Italy’s oldest…
WELLINGTON, NZ — “The artistic brain is critically aware and innovative and amazing and represents a kind of smartness that’s regime changing,” says Kerryn Palmer of Victoria University’s theatre department. “Theatre is the one industry that’s been dying for 4000 years, but is yet to succumb because we’re the passionate people…
SALT LAKE CITY, UT — The human side of medicine calls for a deeper awareness of people and their experiences. Noticing what is not being said. Making difficult decisions when there is no perfect answer. Understanding how illness or injury changes a person’s life. And finding opportunities to reflect on…
DAYTON, OH, US — For 250 years, the story of America has been told in song — through moments of hardship and triumph alike. For its summer 2026 edition titled “We Declare: America at 250,” editors of University of Dayton Magazine asked community members for songs that embody the spirit…
WASHINGTON, DC — Please raise your hand if you didn’t know this was bound to happen. The National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. decided to move the location for a symposium designed to address issues of race in American and Mexican art. Planned by the museum’s Center for Advanced Study…
NEW HAMPSHIRE, US — A group of nonprofits are excited to announce the launch of a new multi-location therapeutic art program specifically for veterans and first responders in New Hampshire. The program will hold sessions in Franklin, Nashua, and Tamworth. The program is free for all participants. All sessions will…
MAGDEBURG, DE — In upcoming state elections to be held Sep. 6, polls suggest the Alternative for Germany (AfD) could win an absolute majority in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt. Based on the AfD’s cultural policy program, museums, theaters and cultural institutions in the region say that artistic freedom…
TBILISI, GE — No. Not that Georgia. The other one. But given the current situation in the USA, it seems like it’s just a matter of time… “Leading independent film organisations in Georgia have written an open letter to warn the international community they believe the country’s state-backed cultural events…
BURLINGTON, VT — This is how you do it, theatre community. Women+ on the Edge of Democracy is a national theatre initiative featuring short 10-minute plays by 36 prominent women+ playwrights including Lynn Nottage, Sarah Ruhl, and Heidi Schreck. Theatre and community groups can present these as readings or full…
