Connectivity Symposium
photo courtesy of Andrew John Wit
Thursday, November 7, 2024
Moore College of Art & Design
20th and the Parkway, Philadelphia
or Attend Virtually
Questions?
Each year, CraftNOW hosts a symposium to provide a platform for critical discourse in contemporary craft. This year the event will be hybrid and hosted at Moore College of Art & Design with The Galleries at Moore.
In 2024, CraftNOW presents the theme Connectivity which explores family, community, and how craft connects us in an increasingly divided world. We will ask how individual makers, artists, and scholars first connected to craft and how it has shaped their lives. We will also look into how the world of craft connects to other practices and communities: design, media, science, and public health.
Working Lecture and Event Schedule
9:30 Coffee service begins/registration
10:00 Opening Remarks
10:15 The Philadelphia Cultural Ecosystem: Patricia Wilson Aden
11:00 Emerging Voices, presented by CERF+: Zindzi Harley: I Go to Prepare a Place for You:
Afro Feminist Approaches to Spacemaking and Curating in Modern Museums
11:15 AI and Advanced Technology in Craft: Tool or Takeover? Doug Bucci, Andrew John Wit, (moderator to be announced)
12:00 Networking Lunch – RSVP required
1:00 – Gallery tour
1:30 Emerging Voices, presented my CERF+
1:45 Dr. Tariem Burroughs and Cindy Ngo: Linking Public Health to the World of Arts and Crafts: A Holistic Approach to Well-being
2:30 Emerging Voices, presented my CERF+: Dr. Jasmine Yarish Craftivism as Feminism, Bricolage as Abolitionism, and the 2018 Candidacy of Paula Jean Swearengin.
2:45 Coffee Break
3:00 Emerging Voices, presented my CERF+
3:15 What has Craft reality TV done for you? Alexander Rosenberg, Gemma Hollister, Mark Sperry, moderated by Joseph Marsini.
4:00 Happy Hour – connect with symposium participants, share stories of craft, and explore the Galleries at Moore.
Speaker Bios
Patricia Wilson Aden is President & CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance, which leads, strengthens and amplifies the voices of 400+ member organizations that make up the region’s cultural community. Aden is an unwavering advocate for the arts and culture sector with more than 40 years of experience leading non-profit and cultural institutions, most recently as President of The Blues Foundation in Memphis, Tennessee and as President & CEO of the African American Museum in Philadelphia.
During her tenure at AAMP, Aden preserved a strong financial future for the museum by establishing strategic partnerships, delivering nationally acclaimed programming, and creating deeper donor engagement. At the Blues Foundation, she led the adoption of the Foundation’s Statement Against Racism and its accompanying Action Plan, furthered the Blues Foundation’s Blues in the Schools program, and helped develop the museum’s Blues Guide, while shepherding the organization through the continuing COVID-19 pandemic. Aden has also served in executive roles for the Rhythm & Blues Foundation, the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia.
Aden currently serves on the board of PA Humanities and is Vice Chair of the Friends of Cooch’s Bridge in Newark, Delaware. She was selected to serve as a member of the National Museum of African American Music’s Music Industry Relations Council. She has also served on the Smithsonian Affiliate Advisory Council and is a member of the Links, Inc. (Philadelphia Chapter). She has served as a panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts and other national and state level granting agencies.
Aden holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Spelman College and a master’s in historic preservation from Cornell University. She was awarded an honorary doctorate from Davis & Elkins College.
Doug Bucci is an artist and educator in the field of jewelry who uses digital processes to explore and display biological systems and the effect of disease on the body. Computer-aided technologies enable him to view and simulate not only data, but also patterns and cell forms, which he transforms into meaningful, personal, and wearable art. Bucci views his digital process as one that allows for creative freedom unfound in traditional handmade methods. Bucci’s work is in the collections of the Windsor Castle, Berkshire, London; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Newark Museum, New Jersey; Deutsche Goldschmiedehaus Hanau, Germany; Design Museo, Helsinki; and the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.
Dr. Tariem Burroughs is the Executive Director for External Partnerships at Drexel University’s Dornsife School of Public Health. Tariem has worked at the intersection of health, education, and community relations for much of his career. He has always had the drive to make programs sustainable yet innovative and fresh to provide communities with the resources that they need to thrive. With years of experience as a provider, evaluator, and educator in the field of public health, he aims to contribute to the growth and development of a public health workforce that is innovative, nimble, and creative. He sees the value of art in making this a reality. Tariem is a native Philadelphian and has a PhD in Sociology and has Masters in Organizational Development and Leadership, Education Entrepreneurship and a Bachelor of Science in Education from Temple University.
Gemma Hollister began working with glass at the Tyler School of Art and Architecture, where she graduated in December 2021 with a bachelor of fine arts degree in glass. Since then, she has traveled throughout the country in pursuit of further technical glass education at institutions such as the Corning Museum of Glass and Pilchuck Glass School. She was a contestant on season 4 of the Netflix series Blown Away. Gemma works full-time as a production glassblower and co-owner of Antolini Glass Co., a Philadelphia-based glass studio.
Cindy M. Ngo, a Philadelphia native and daughter of immigrants, draws inspiration for her art from Guatemalan community art, particularly “Alfombra.” Cindy is passionate about transforming this fleeting artwork, which usually lasts only seconds, into lasting pieces. She wants to involve the community in the art creation process and foster a connection between the community and nature by using dyed sawdust. Her background as an event coordinator has equipped her with the skills to advocate for others, especially those whose stories have not been told or seen as “the other”.
Alexander Rosenberg is an artist, educator and writer based between New Jersey and Philadelphia. He received a Master of Science in Visual Studies from MIT and a BFA in glass from Rhode Island School of Design. His artistic practice is rooted in the study of glass as a material, in conjunction with broad interdisciplinary investigation crossing over into many other media and research areas. Alexander pursues his practice with artist residencies, teaching, performances and exhibitions locally and internationally. He is the recipient of the Christine and Stephen Procter Fellowship, the 2012 International Glass Prize, an Awesome Foundation Grant (2019), The Sheldon Levin Memorial Residency at the Tacoma Museum of Glass, A Windgate Fellowship at the Vermont Studio Center, The Esther & Harvey Graitzer Memorial Prize, UArts FADF Grant, and the deFlores Humor Fund Grant (MIT). He has attended artist residencies at RAIR, The MacDowell Colony, Wheaton Arts, Urban Glass, Vermont Studio Center, StarWorks, Pilchuck Glass School, GlazenHuis in Belgium, Rochester Institute of Technology, Radical Heart (Detroit), and Worcester Craft Center. His writing has been published in Glass Quarterly Magazine, The Glass Art Society Journal, and the Art Blog. He was a founding member of Hyperopia Projects (2010 – 2018), headed the glass program at University of the Arts (2010 – 2017), and was an artist member of Vox Populi gallery (2012 – 2015). He was cast on the Netflix Series, Blown Away in 2018 and taught at Salem Community College from 2018 to 2021. He is currently the Glass Studio Director at Wheaton Arts.
Recent Symposium History
2023: Craft Works
2022: Public | Private
CraftNOW’s 2022 symposium and programming centered on the theme Public | Private and explored continually evolving concepts of shared versus personal space. The keynote speaker was be Michael Lewis, architectural critic for the Wall Street Journal and author of Philadelphia Builds: Essays on Architecture, Frank Furness: Architecture and the Violent Mind, and City of Refuge. Other presenting institutions included Craft in America, The Center for Art in Wood, Wharton Esherick Museum, varying divisions of the Philadelphia Mummers Parade, and four emerging scholars.
2021: Environmental Effects
CraftNOW’s 2021 symposium Environmental Effects examined how communities and interiors shape our experiences, when sustainability issues are expressed through craft, and the greater impact of our contemporary material culture. Longer presentations were complimented by shorter Pecha Kucha style talks. Dr. Kelli Morgan was keynote having contributed the chapter Crafting Diversity in our recent publication Craft Capital: Philadelphia’s Cultures of Making.
2020: Cultures of Making
CraftNOW’s 2020 symposium Cultures of Making examines the many ways community, activism, research, and connection develop out of collaborative craft practices in the neighborhoods of Philadelphia to the Santa Clara Pueblo and beyond. Keynote speakers Vashti DuBois, Executive Director of The Colored Girls Museum in Philadelphia, and Hinda Mandell, editor of Crafting Dissent: Handicraft as Protest from the American Revolution to the Pussyhats, are central to each day’s conversation as we talk and think about the role of craft as a tool for provocation and exchange, especially in this heightened time of social unrest.