Habitats for Artists and EcoArtspace at Solar One
Monday, September 28th, 2009| October 3, 2009 | ||
| 10:00 am | to | 6:00 pm |
On Saturday October 3, 2009, Solar One and EcoArtspace, one of the country’s foremost art organizations concentrating on ecological/environmental art, are pleased to present a day of workshops, discussions and performances about the artistic process, the environment, public vs. private space, as well as presentations from local artists engaged in environment-focused projects.
For much of this summer, sample “studios” from artist Simon Draper’s Habitats for Artists project have been displayed on the blacktop near the Solar 1 building on the East River south of 23rd St. Throughout our events season, the sheds have provided a community space for concessions, a bulletin board, a studio for artist Todd Betterley and a conversation piece for the many bicyclists, joggers, fishermen and kids who regularly visit Stuyvesant Cove Park. On October 3 from 10am-12pm, Simon will demonstrate how to build your very own artist habitat and answer questions about the future of the Habitats project.
From 1-4pm, performance artist Chere Krakovsky will bring the personal into the Habitat for Artists shed in her performance “Mothers and Daughters”, exploring how one generation offers its lessons to the next, both learned and unspoken.
In the first part of the performance Chere will honor her Eastern European grandmother by washing her laundry by hand in the way her grandmother did a century ago and will then hang it out to dry using the area around the habitat as backyard. Following this she has invited her 86 yr. old mother, Dorothy Krakovsky to join her teaching Chere to sew by hand, which she in turn was taught to do by Chere’s grandmother.
In this piece as in many of Krakovsky’s performance works, the everyday and the creative co-exist. The Habitat for Artist shed will serve as the home location for the everyday tasks of doing laundry and sewing. Others are invited to participate in the sewing lesson or share in conversation about what has been offered/handed down to them from their mothers. Chere, her mother and grandmother are three generations of artists. The artwork of mother, daughter and grandmother will fill the interior of the habitat for the duration of the performance. Krakovsky’s own relationship to the domestic has complex. Much of her performance work revolves around her ever-changing notions of home, its location and meaning. Women, domesticity, creativity and everyday tasks converge. She is also helping to raise awareness that before it is too late there is much to be learned from those who have gone before.
Following the performance, environmental artists will display and discuss the projects they are working on, participants TBD.
Events at Solar One will be followed by the opening of Down To Earth at the EcoArtpace NYC gallery at 53 Mercer st, 3rd Floor. Artists include: Joan Bankemper, Knox Cummin, Stacy Levy, Ann Rosenthal/Steffi Domike, Susan Leibovitz Steinman, Simon Draper and the Habitat for Artists Collective, including Todd Sargood, Cathy Lebowitz, E Odin Cathcart and Jeff Bailey, plus additional Contributing Artists:
Jacinto Astiazarán and Fritz Haeg, Lenore Malen & The New Society for Universal Harmony, Eve Mosher, Andrea Polli and Chuck Varga, Andrea Reynosa/Kevin Vertrees-SkyDog Projects and Christy Rupp
Posted in Art, Design, Green Building, Recycling, Solar One Events | Permalink
APA New York Metro’s Biennial Conference
Monday, September 21st, 2009| September 25, 2009 | ||
| 8:00 am | to | 5:30 pm |
APA New York Metro Chapter, Student and Professional Biennial Conference: Planning for the NY Region in Challenging Economic Times
Featuring an informative presentation by Energy $mart Communities Coordinator Diana Pangestu on NYSERDA programs and sustainable design and energy efficiency.
Explore and discuss environmental and economic issues facing New York City today. What is the New York metropolitan region going to look like in the future? What role will “sustainability”, “affordable housing”, “transit oriented development” and “social diversity” play in the future of New York City? In the light of financial crisis, economic instability and demographic shifts how do we guide the progress of New York City?
These provocative questions will be discussed by a distinguished panel of practitioners and thinkers who have had varied and extensive experience in
planning, housing, transportation, development and government.
WHEN: Friday, September 25, 2009- 8:00am-5:30pm
WHERE: NYU Kimmel Center for University Life
60 Washington Square South (at La Guardia Place)
New York City, NY 10003
COST: for full conference registration:
APA Member: $110 $125
Non-APA Member: $125 $140
Mobile Workshops (uniform rate) $20 $20
For More Information: please contact Sarah Meyland at 516-318-0314,
or visit http://www.nyplanning.org/
Posted in Solar One, Solar One Events | Permalink
Panel Discussion: Building Solar Pathways to Economic Empowerment in the Developing World
Sunday, September 20th, 2009| September 24, 2009 | ||
| 6:00 pm | to | 7:30 pm |
When: Thursday, September 24th
6:00 Reception
6:30 – 7:30 Panel discussion.
Where: Steel Case showroom, 8th floor.
4 Columbus Circle, Manhattan.
(W. 58TH street and 8th Avenue, between Citibank and Duane Reade)
Contact/RSVP (required): helen@solar1.org; (212) 505 6050
Roughly a quarter of the global population remains entirely “off the grid” and without any access to basic energy services such as lighting, refrigeration and heat for cooking. Access to these essential services is a precondition for improving standards of living and economic productivity, but in many regions the prospects for investment in centralized energy infrastructure remain remote even in the long term.
Easily implemented and maintained, and fueled by an abundant, local and free energy source, solar technologies such as photovoltaics offer a viable alternative to conventional energy. In this discussion, a panel of experts, each actively leading enterprises that aim to empower rural, energy poor regions with solar technology, will provide insight into the opportunities, challenges, triumphs and setbacks that characterize their work. Case studies from Latin America, Asia and Africa will illustrate the transformative impacts of solar implementation, and highlight the diversity of nonprofit, and private and public sector efforts that are currently driving solar development in these regions. Panelists will also address the critical need for further innovation in both technology development and financial services.
Distinguished Panelists:
Nicola Armacost, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Arc Finance (New York City)
Asim Buksh, Chairman, The Buksh Foundation (Lahore, Pakistan)
Max Lacayo, Sales Manager, Ecami S.A. (Managua, Nicaragua)
Sarah Butler-Sloss, Executive Director and Founder, The Ashden Awards.
Light refreshments will be served.
Posted in Solar One Events | Permalink
Panel Discussion: Building Solar Pathways to Economic Empowerment in the Developing World
Sunday, September 20th, 2009
When: Thursday, September 24th
6:00 Reception
6:30 – 7:30 Panel discussion.
Where: Steelcase showroom, 8th floor.
4 Columbus Circle, Manhattan.
(W. 58TH street and 8th Avenue, between Citibank and Duane Reade)
Contact/RSVP (required): helen@solar1.org; (212) 505 6050
Roughly a quarter of the global population remains entirely “off the grid” and without any access to basic energy services such as lighting, refrigeration and heat for cooking. Access to these essential services is a precondition for improving standards of living and economic productivity, but in many regions the prospects for investment in centralized energy infrastructure remain remote even in the long term.
Easily implemented and maintained, and fueled by an abundant, local and free energy source, solar technologies such as photovoltaics offer a viable alternative to conventional energy. In this discussion, a panel of experts, each actively leading enterprises that aim to empower rural, energy poor regions with solar technology, will provide insight into the opportunities, challenges, triumphs and setbacks that characterize their work. Case studies from Latin America, Asia and Africa will illustrate the transformative impacts of solar implementation, and highlight the diversity of nonprofit, and private and public sector efforts that are currently driving solar development in these regions. Panelists will also address the critical need for further innovation in both technology development and financial services.
Distinguished Panelists:
Nicola Armacost, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Arc Finance (New York City)
Asim Buksh, Chairman, The Buksh Foundation (Lahore, Pakistan)
Max Lacayo, Sales Manager, Ecami S.A. (Managua, Nicaragua)
Sarah Butler-Sloss, Executive Director and Founder, The Ashden Awards.
Light refreshments will be served.
Posted in Solar One | Permalink
The Extraordinaries! A new ‘micro-volunteering’ service that aims to crowdsource positive collective action in service of worthy causes. Check it!
Thursday, September 17th, 2009Many of us have difficulty finding spare time to volunteer, even for causes and organizations that we’re really passionate about. Life keeps us busy, and the blocks of time required to get to and from volunteer opportunities, and spend meaningful amounts of time that actually accomplish something while there, are far and few between.
But what if those small snippets of down time that clutter the transitions and margins of our day – those moments between meetings, spent waiting for or sitting on the bus, or wondering if a late friend or babysitter will ever show up- could be turned into productive resources for service, giving back and solving problems that benefit the causes you care about.
A new organization called The Extraordinaries, currently in beta, appears to be the first to have truly discovered the fertile potential of these lost moments in the “open source” age of pervasive network technology, smart phones and cheap digital cameras. The organization allows for a new type of action, dubbed “micro-volunteering”, which allows individuals to enlist their brains and energies for short bursts of participation in order to complete small tasks for causes that can add up to enormous benefits when enough people participate. The tasks can be completed in front of a computer with an internet connection or with an iPhone, and people can participate for any period of time that their schedule can fit.
Sample tasks that can be completed through the site currently include translating documents or pieces of documents into other languages; image tagging for museums and cultural institutions; investigation, evidence collection and citizen journalism; community mapping; copy editing; and feedback and program criticism. (Note: the site is currently in beta mode and the tasks available to web users are limited to image tagging; however, iPhone users can participate in all the other tasks. The website states that all tasks will be available to web users soon.)
The site makes clear just how far and how rapidly the phenomenon of “crowdsourcing” is starting to extend. Crowdsourcing describes forms of web-enabled collaboration, production and business that involve the collection of a multitude of contributions from numerous volunteer or independent sources, which are usually sorted and selected based on group rating if a single outcome is what’s needed, or gradually augmented overtime by countless tweaks and contributions of various sizes by sometimes thousands of dispersed contributors. Since crowdsourcing is really only possible on the scale that it occurs today because of the internet, it’s not surprising that early projects involved software and operating system creation. But today, crowdsourcing is driving an unprecedented amount of production in a growing range of fields.
The Extraordinaries aims to crowdsource service for great causes from the small, forgotten moments of the day from thousands of participants. While new and still working out bugs, the site just may represent a truly game changing moment in the history of volunteerism and collective action by aggregating the tiny, incremental heroics of distributed volunteers. Give the site a look and stay tuned for future developments. One of these days you just might be able to help Solar One out on there . . .
Posted in Solar One | Permalink
