Beyond Alternatives is a symposium organized by Dulcee Boehm and Cory Imig, which focuses on artist-led organizing outside of large metropolitan areas. Since beginning Say Uncle in 2015 (with Benjamin Cook) the Central Illinois area has revealed itself, welcoming Say Uncle, as a landscape full of small art communities in small cities and towns. Through touring work and holding exhibitions at a number of spaces, threads and conversations have begun and came to the surface during the Regional Alternatives discussion Jason Judd and Sight Specific Arts (formerly the Bloomington-Normal Arts Collective) organized spring 2017. It was enriching to have conversations about artist led projects in the place where the work is actually happening.
Beyond Alternatives is a response to this growing energy, and is intended as another jumping point for Central Illinois to continue with its work in broader conversation. It deliberately is not a how-to sort of symposium, instead it brings critical minds together that are already doing arts organizing in collaboration with institutions, cities, each other and those invested in going beyond a grassroots approach. Beyond Alternatives aspires to have a conversation that is open to the specificity of places outside of large metropolitan areas sustaining both the challenges and opportunities those places offer to artists and organizers.
Read more about Beyond Alternatives and presenters on the website.
Beyond Alternatives, Toward Refusal by Alyssa Bralower published on Sixty Inches From Center
