WYD: Collective Empowerment
Join us for our April session of WYD? (What’re You Doing?), an intimate gathering where where members of the NAVEL community come together to share current research topics or artistic projects in any medium.
On Sunday, April 18 at 5PM PDT we will hear from Por Vida Media Collective, Pieter Performance Space, and Human Resources LA. RSVP for free to attend this session of WYD on Zoom.
We ask all participants to uphold our Braver Spaces Intentions during this gathering, please take some time to review them here.
Video Archive
Participant Bios
Founded in 2010 by Jmy James Kidd, Pieter was a studio space in Lincoln Heights whose mission was to offer an open platform for the LA dance community to exchange resources with each other and the broader dance world, providing a space for dancers to create a nurturing society and to be comfortable in the mind-body-spirit. The guiding ethos of this anti-capitalist, nonhierarchical dance space was holistic support for all bodies, an open exchange of ideas and a reciprocity of generosity. The cost of admission for all events was a “non-monetary donation,” which audience members brought things like food or drink to share, a book for the Pieter Library, a utensil for the Pieter Kitchen and clothing for the Free Boutique.
Pieter vacated the Lincoln Heights studio in August 2020, due to the financial strain of the pandemic, and in its current form it is an entirely virtual platform for classes, workshops and events led by movement artists, healers and activists offering a multitude of approaches to body-based practice. Without the physical space, Pieter’s board, staff and community have been navigating the question of how we can uphold the values that features such as the Free Boutique and the non-monetary event donations represented. Additionally, they are exploring questions such as: what structural changes need to happen in order to move closer to being the transparent, accessible, diverse and equitable space we want to become, and what aspects of Pieter’s founding mission no longer serve us; what are we ready to let go of and what are we ready to embrace?
Human Resources was founded in 2010 by a team of creative individuals who seek to broaden engagement with contemporary and conceptual art, with an emphasis on performative and underexposed modes of expression. Human Resources is not-for-profit and seeks to foster widespread public appreciation of the performative arts by encouraging maximum community access. Human Resources also serves as a point of convergence for diverse and disparate art communities to engage in conversation and idea-sharing promoting the sustainability of non-traditional art forms. We are a volunteer organization.
The Por Vida/For Life Media Youth Collective provides a brave space for storytellers, journalists, filmmakers and broadcasters to share stories. We create content centered on restorative and transformative justice practices in order for our communities to continue healing and growing together.
Boyle Heights Arts Conservatory (BHAC) advocates for the development of a new framework toward diversity in the creative arts, media, and technology fields—one that is socially and economically inclusive, and accurately reflects the City of Los Angeles in terms of ethnicity, gender, and age. The most effect way to do this, we understand, is by dismantling the many barriers to equal opportunities in the arts and creative industries, so that they, as well as those interested in pursuing such careers therein, can truly grow and thrive.