European inventory of
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Jane Gilmor - Within and Without: A Socially Engaged Art Practice Investigates. 2021

Through dialog-based, collaborative art making can the engaged public artist help give a voice to the disenfranchised and push the boundaries defining their marginalization?

This presentation focuses on the changing nature of one artist’s sociallly engaged practice over the past three decades, highlighting her three most recent institutionally commissioned public works dealing with the current crises in rising poverty rates, homelessness, and the invisibility of low-wage workers. Included in the discussion is an analysis of processes of involvement and collaboration as well as a presentation of qualitative outcomes including the potential for future impact within specific communities. Details of curricular incorporations and models for deepening the citizenship of the artist, the commissioning institutions, and all involved participants are also considered. Central to the artist’s conclusions are potential frameworks for using engaged art practice to question and initiate change in the socio-economic hierarchies that perpetuate disenfranchisement. An essential outcome must be to empower all participants includingstudents, staff and volunteers to build new communities within existing communities in order to make their voices heard.