From Claims to Contact: A Framework for Social Engagement in Art

How can artists and cultural practitioners better understand, reflect on, and articulate how their work relates to the social forces?
Funders and platforms increasingly ask artists to demonstrate relevance to social, political or technological change, requiring them to name precisely how their work relates to a social force, not just that it does.
The framework presented here will distinguish three types of relation between an artwork and a social force. These frameworks can make work visible, experienceable, or capable of creating new conditions.
Participants will gain the framework through a short paper and a presentation drawing on examples from the German funding landscape, existing artworks and the speaker’s own work.
This will be a hands-on session follows, in which participants apply the given framework to their own projects, applications, or artistic work.