In what has been termed the ‘share economy’, the ideal of ‘common ownership’ has been perverted by capital to create value through the self-exploitation of the readily sharing prosumer. In this context audiences are always a ‘steward’ of asset value. This R&D project considers how an art institution and collection can be held as a shared asset.
Independent curator Helen Kaplinsky and artist and director of Islington Mill Maurice Carlin will share their research so far into models for ownership and funding from various industries. Key questions will be thrown out for discussion including:
The collection is an asset that has been standardised and is longer reflective of our current economy. What are the new models out there?
How might the term #temporarycustodianship be interpreted through institutions and collections?
In light of the apparent revolution towards a ‘collaborative commons’ economy in which we are each a cottage industry, owning a share in our energy consumption and production, how do we share whilst avoiding self-exploitation?
Independent curator Helen Kaplinsky and artist and director of Islington Mill Maurice Carlin invite a discussion concerning buildings and community assets arising from their experience working with arts organisation Islington Mill (North-west England). The project has been defined by an approach of “open space architecture” in which the community defines activity within the building. In parallel with the #temporarycustodianship, the Islington Mill community are already shared custodians (or stewards) of the building. However, it is currently owned out-right by one individual and they are seeking to transfer the asset of the building over to a shared ownership model which is as yet undefined. As part of this they are researching models that will enable power to be spread across institutions, one example being liquid democracy (utilised by the Pirate Party who run their UK HQ from Islington Mill).
The following questions will be addressed:
1)What does a steward/ custodian look like?
2)What are the organisational blue prints for retaining a power share across a community of custodians/ stewards?
3)How might the question of the building as an asset be considered within the wider ecology of sharing of assets?
can u share some links about the R&D project , to have a look before the session - may be small discussion -
as some questions poped up already - like what are the case studies ?and are they all in England ?/ any examples from outside Europe? , some examples for the "New Models " ?
Hi @helenward, you’re just in time with the proposal, as we’re about to build a first concrete schedule around all the sessions so far. Keep an eye on that especially if you have preferences for time slots…
Wondering what is an initial understanding of temporary custodianship upon which you base your session? It seems to me, also reading about Islington Mill, that it’s custodianship de facto (group of people and communities stewarding an asset), but not de jure (nothing to legally protect the asset being ripped off in some way eg through private interests)? Or do you mean something else?
@Hazem we have a looked at various examples of share ownership, mostly in UK but some outside. Most of these are in the context of the culture industry, therefore I’m looking learn about sharing of assets in other industries. In addition these examples are not ones that we promote without question, they begin to describe a picture of the current models in order to ask how we might improve on them
@Noemi Islington Mill is rented as studios to mix of businesses and artists. The landlord rents ground floor for peppercorn rent to a separate legal entity ‘Arts Club’. Ground floor includes venue, recording studios, summer cafe etc. The landlord essentially acts as philanthropist and is currently legally (and emotionally etc) responsible for community continuing. For past 17 years landlord has been involved in day to day running and is in favour of distributing responsibility, involving (potentially share) legal structure.
WE will move for now all the sessions to Friday and Saturday as we want to have the unmonastery related day on Sunday. But we will see what we can do once the planning is done
@Natalia_SkoczylasI can be flexible. Either Fri of Sat is fine. I will combine discussion of Islington Mill into this session as @MauriceCarlin can no longer make it. Can I join for unmonastey session on sunday or is this only open to the members? I’m a newbie so not sure how open things are!
There’s nowhere to walk that will be closed… Helen, throughout all Sunday we will have ad-hoc sessions in what we call unConference. The unMonastery sessions are spread throughout the Program, particularly those proposed by @Bembo_Davies, and we’re all welcome to attend…
Aspects of the unMonastery are actually proposing some half internal sessions outside the program (at 0900 each morning.) In the spirit of the times they will be open to the curious, we only ask that people don’t wander in the middle – this shall be the only chance we get to evaluate as an extended group and our key hope is to lay a formal hand upon a proposed unMonastery Protocol. This being the unMonastery this proposal has yet to be embraced by all who are on their way here. There shall be at least 4 unMonastic related sessions scattered throughout the program as Noemi suggests.
Since the sharing economy (and alternatives about which Helen might talk) is about administering access to scarce (mostly physical) resources, I believe that this session fits better into the Physical Assets track. So I just re-assigned it to that one, esp. also since Maurice’s content about Islington Mill and stewarding a building is now also merged here.
@HKaplinsky, you mentioned that Mauric can no longer make it. Her track is still found in this list, though. Should I unpublish it from there?
