Too great NOT to share this from Amanda Gibbs…
And now, at what I might call mid-career, all my assumptions about creativity, about who is a creative and a maker of meaning have changed. I’ve started to view creativity as the ability to support participatory spaces and in particular, a drive to support public participation in disrupting and shaping the places where we live. I believe that cities are the ultimate machines for creativity — people living and sharing ideas in close proximity. Urbanity — being an engaged, alert, connected citizen — can provide the perfect conditions for creativity.
I am inspired by projects that unite people — design professionals (artists, makers, videographers, graphic designers, architects, urban planners, technologists and web specialists) with community-based advocates and researchers (organizers, government officials, academics, service-providers, policymakers, and citizens). I think there are some fancy new terms being thrown around for this work: social innovation, community-based social marketing, and public engagement. But at the end of the day, it is about creating opportunities to break down the complex systems that shape urban life and to share and create knowledge to make those systems understandable and useful to more people.
via CreativeMornings/Vancouver • Amanda Gibbs – Profile and Q&A.