Dialogue Table. A Hybrid Method of ActiveArt and Citizenship

Abstract

In the absence of a methodology or of an inherited practice, be it directly – from the local artistic environment, or indirectly – through written sources and scholarly literature (Artificial Hells by Claire Bishop was released around 2012) – the experience and practice of social art were the result of the encounter of a more or less fragmentary familiarity with art history and lived experience, at the beginning of 2006 within the Rahova-Uranus community art project. The attitude which had not yet become common currency in the local cultural context of those years was one opposed to the art institution(s), which occupied a too markedly elitist and exclusive zone and were insulated from society. It was our desire to identify the various vulnerable social categories which were subjected to a policy of exclusion, rather than to one based on communication, that would bring communities in dialogue. We had to create our own method of working together, the community, the artists and the local authority, in a space of learning from each other skills and experiences which will inform a local practice for a cultural public policy and its servants. The theoretical landmarks originating in the history of art were, alongside direct experience, points of reference and support which could suggest a new practice of embracing cultural competency, professional training and development in public service for the common good focused on this paradox of mediation at the centre of modern political life.