Permanent activities are the heart of AC ecosystem, it is where we experience different ways of study, care and a constant search for the sustainability of the member organizations and AC based on the Lifeline Plans. These activities are Assembly, Lifeline (by Triangles), Banga and Experimental Tooling Projects.

Spirit of free school, big annual family gathering, retreat, visits.

The Assembly is a key moment as well as a key device for Arts Collaboratory to operate as a translocal organisation according to our ethical principles.

It provides a temporary space for all the organizations to gather, live together, share experiences, address issues and challenges in a mode of collective study, and collective engagement in decision-making processes. It also plays a crucial role as a laboratory for studying together ways for individual organisations to navigate local dynamics while collectively envisioning ways to deal with unfolding challenges in and beyond AC.

It permits the nurturing of our sense of empathy and the galvanizing of an ‘energy pot’ comprised of our lived and inherited experiential knowledge of various historical contexts.

Through this extensive time of physically being together, we also develop common languages and enrich our commonwealths.

The Assembly is self-organised by the AC members and therefore the moment when we exercise self-governance and develop forms of accountability. It provide a practical training ground to exercise self-organization and horizontality.

It is the perfect setting for new members to experience and understand Arts Collaboratory’s intricacies on an emotional, ideological and practical level.

Practical framework

• The Assembly takes place once a year, for at least 10 full days (excluding travel time); The 2016 Assembly in Kyrgyzstan took place in June and the 2017 Assembly in Costa Rica is scheduled from June 11th to June 22nd.

• The Assembly takes place in a different country each time, where at least one of the organizations of AC is based.

• The Assembly Working Group is the one in charge of organising and facilitating the Assembly. The hosting team(s) should be an integral part of the group which also includes members from other organizations that signed up during the previous assembly.

• During the Assembly, working sessions are facilitated by the facilitation group. Specialized sessions are also facilitated by the members of specific working groups according to the issue to be addressed. The role of facilitation is not to make decisions but rather to make progress happen.

• It’s important that we challenge the boundaries between host and guests. The hosting team and Assembly Working Group creates a structure to facilitate the Assembly and the stay of the AC members. However, members should take part in coordinating the Assembly, especially the reproductive labour such as cooking, cleaning, taking care of each other. As such, even before the Assembly, some tasks are delegated to each member such as: ticket booking and purchasing, visa application, etc.

• Each member should pay for their ticket, visa, and accomodation from the collective pot.

• Additional assembly funds have been budgeted for the remaining expenses: A maximum of 31,860 EUR.

Main Objectives

• The assembly is the occasion to collectively study our Sustainability Lifeline Plans as well as to (re)-visit our Ethical Principles; and our collective entity (governance).

• It is an opportunity for the triangles to meet, work together and share their processes.

• The assembly nurtures the desire for collaborative projects and exchanges among the AC organisations.

• Time and space are allocated to develop the tooling methods for sharing what we learn with others;

• We evaluate Banga Meetings that had took place and the tools generated by them, and address possible future meetings;

• As part of the collective study, we visit and explore other communities and organisations that are part of the local environment, outside and inside the field of art, as a mean to mutually transform and extend our affinity lines;

• The assembly allows us to engage in non-discursive and non-verbal moments where our emotions and bodies are directly involved, experimenting communication methods. This could be in a form of party, dancing, picnic, or ‘emotional assembly’;

• We visit and evaluate the common resources that are tangible, intangible, imaginary and material;

• We study the resource map and determine the need for continuing the work of the Temporary Working Groups and we look for ways of rotating the participation in these groups while implementing self-care and self-limitation.

• We dedicate part of our time for updating and fundraising new resources;

• Lastly, we decide collectively on the location for the next Assembly, following proposition(s) by members

Techniques used during Assembly:

The techniques described below are not used exclusively during the Assembly but also while working remotely. They are however better exemplified and experienced during an Assembly.

• Small groups. As much as possible, we try to work in small groups while allowing for key moments to be shared all-together. Small groups allow for intimate setting, faster-pace, the participation of everyone, and in-depth knowledge and understanding of others. The results are always shared with the whole network. The groups vary most of the time so everyone can work with everyone.

• Language. Arts Collaboratory is multilingual and doesn’t recognize one language as prominent. Although, for practical reasons, English is most widely used and spread. Translation and navigating between languages is an ongoing process. As much as possible, all major texts are translated and available in English, French, and Spanish (sometimes also Russians and Arabic). Working within small groups also allows for easier translation and circulation of the conversation. Most of the time, translation is an informal process undertaken by volunteers. AC tries to provide a space where the members can express freely in any language they are most comfortable with.

• Harvesting technique.

• Drawings and maps. The preferred expression mode of Arts Collaboratory, alongside writing and publishing, is drawing and mapping (our constellation, resources, governance model, etc.) Over time, we have renewed our commitment to express ourselves not only in words but also in images and drawings allowing us to visualize our affinities and connections more vividly.

Decision-making process

The Assembly is the ideal time and space to test and experience the potentiality of Arts Collaboratory, the way it is run, and the application of our ethical principles.

In line with our ethical principles of horizontality and openness, consensus is the preferred mode of decision of Arts Collaboratory, agreed on during the Kyrgyzstan Assembly of 2016.

Working groups can move and decide freely but must report to and consult with the general assembly (all the members), especially for major decisions (including usage of budget, doubt on the conformity with the ethical principles, etc.)

Consensus is exercised during plenary sessions of the Assembly, and it is also practiced using e-mails.

Steps to reach consensus were explained during the Kyrgyzstan Assembly and the processes for making decisions outside of the assembly are included in the Internal Communications Guidelines.

The documentation of the Assembly is also based on the methods of tooling that we develop (see E.3).

One of the ways of working efficiently in such a large self-managed structure such as the AC is to work in smaller groups. Individuals from member organizations are encouraged to choose one of the established working groups based on specific desires, interests and (self-limited) capacities.

This being said, the formations of the working groups is not to be regulated by the logic of delegation or representation. It is more about opening ways for individual members to actively ’take matters into their own hands’.

The framework of self-limitation, self-care and self-accountability in the current approach, implies that silence by any of the core members in the network also signifies an important component in the learning process that occurs in Arts Collaboratory: silence does not always necessarily mean absence, listening to silence may also articulate a negotiation of the disparate and the common in different ways.

The tactical character of these small working groups entails sensitivities to time and power accumulation, whereas its aim should be oriented to common practice without losing sight of other forms of struggle within AC and elsewhere. Therefore, some groups are temporary in nature and exist as long as an urgent need exists and there is affinity for the issue, other groups have a rotating composition, making place for new organizations who wish to take part in it.

Currently, the working groups ensuring the management of Arts Collaboratory are divided into permanent activities, permanent groups and temporary working groups:

The Triangle is a mechanism of study established to generate a continuous reflection about each of our Lifeline Plans, this is a type of openness and accountability and a way to create a permanent critical space among the organizations that are part of each Triangle.

The heart of the Triangles are three organizations that commit to habitually developing their own refletions about each other’s Lifeline Plans. These reflections will be shared every three months in the TAM TAM - Newsletter, one of the communications tools that we use to share our rhythms: (see E.3.2.a).

Each organization in the triangle:

• Translates its own Lifeline into English

• Reads the lifeline of both of the other organizations within the triangle.

• Asks friendly, constructive and critical questions

• Coaches and supports the other organizations as necessary

• Shares its own difficulties, failures, successes

One way to to balance limitations in terms of time, resources, and geographical distance is to optimize the use of the online platform of AC (again not without its own limitation due to the discrepancy of internet access in the different regions) in order to work in the Triangles.

Principles for Triangles

• Inside the Triangle

It is expected that in the meetings of the triangles the harvesting process will be implemented. (See Section E.3.1.b/Tools Developed by AC/Harvesting)

• Each Triangle

  • Is self-organized

  • Is aware of different types of resources available within its own ecosystem.

  • Watches out for inclusiveness of diversity and differences of groups in the ecosystem.

  • Shares what has been important for each organization during the past period.

  • Is a place in which radical imagination can occur depending on the needs of each organization

  • Is aware of AC ethical principles

  • Is aware of and try to localize the AC Identity

As a replacement of an Annual Institutional Review, AC will undertake a yearly peer-review using the Triangle method of organisation to organisation conversations and mentorship. The Assembly will be the ‘Annual General Meeting’, and the occasion for studying together core issues and questions that emerge in each of our plans during the year.

Mutual Learning

Although the predominant forms for mutual learning in Arts Collaboratory are the Assembly and Banga, we are not limited to them and encourage Radical Imagination of on-going Tooling processes. Tooling can for example, take place through on-going, online requests for collective study or affinity meetings with AC partners (but self limitation here is important too).

What is Tooling?

The traditional reporting process will be replaced with Tools and Collective Study. Instead of hiding mistakes and showcasing ourselves in order to get more money, we will create Tools to honestly share what we learn between ourselves and others.

Tooling expresses what trans-local organisations can do well, without being subjected to agendas of productivism and self-exploitation. This concept is related to the existing and future resources found in each organization.

Tooling is a process of learning and sharing.

Tooling means the transformative and creative capacity to transmit a concept that belongs to one or a few, for others and many. It is a process where Radical Imagination is practiced.

Tooling is not synonymous with use-value. We challenge the concept of usefulness, instead of thinking of what moves us, what affects us. Can we imagine affective tools?

Examples of tools (that can replace reporting) are: Essays, edited transcripts of a conversation or interview, videos, photo-montages, comic strips, poems, recipe books, performance presentations. The key is that the Tool is linked, connected and complementary to our activities and to our experiences when running our programs and activities.

Tooling makes time by giving us tools for learning.

Tools as an Open Resource

All the tools generated will be posted on an online Resource Map. There will not be a selected editor, but the website is trusted as a co-editorial process, which runs by the principle of passion and capacity.

All the tools of Arts Collaboratory will be open source. (copyleft, anti-copyright).

The use of Arts Collaboratory common identity, not the logos of individual organisations, needs to be considered when sharing these tools.

(See Failures, validating (≠ celebrating failure)

Tools developed by AC

1/ Lifeline Guide

The Lifeline guide was thought as a manual, with a series of steps to follow in order for an organization to develop its 5-year lifeline plan.

Most organizations don’t have a long term vision of their budget and activities. Instead, planning depends on the resources they are able to generate. The Lifeline writing exercise pushes an organization to imagine a desirable self-sustainable future (as much as possible) and how they might reach that future given their current resources, while considering possible ways to obtain additional resources for the organization.

The Lifeline Guide is available in the Appendix.

2/ Harvesting Technique

First introduced during the Kyrgyzstan Assembly, this technique allows for a smooth and balanced facilitation of working sessions. Before starting each session, the group chooses a Host to lead the discussion, a Guardian of Process to keep track of the time, a Guardian of Intention to make sure the energy is still flowing and everyone is participating, and a Harvester taking notes and extracting the essence and outputs of the session.

3/ Cascade of Coherence

As explained by Stefano Harney, Tonika Sealy, and Valeria Graziano during the meeting in Casco in June 2015.

This is a useful tool that works for checking correspondence and coherence between rooted struggles, ethics, activities, delivery mechanism and resourcing (labour, affect, money, time). It is generally used to evaluate an activity and/or mechanism according to the values and vision of the group.

(1) The rooted struggles are the point of embarkation, the main reason behind our practices. The struggles can be identified as something that we want to tackle, for example: the prevalent neo-liberalist paradigm.

(2) Ethics is an open principle and an orientation, it serves as an objective that aims to shift the paradigm in our rooted struggle. Ethics should be the antithesis of our rooted struggles.

(3) Activities are the materialization of ethics through collective practices.

(4) Delivery Mechanisms detail the activities.

(5) Resourcing is the material and immaterial support for delivering activities. For example, if an exploitative oil company wanted to support our activities, the cascade of coherence will show that the resource contradicts our rooted struggles and ethics. Should resources follow ethics or ethics follow resources? Or, can resources and ethics create a productive conflict? When there’s a contradiction in the cascade of coherence, we will start to question all elements that interact in the cascade of coherence (and that’s good).

More information about the Cascade of Coherence can be found in the Experimental Tooling Projects Guidelines.

4/ How to reach a consensus

The following steps are used to reach consensus within AC:

1. A proposal is shared with all the members (usually after discussions).

2. Friendly amendments are suggested.

3. The proposal is re-presented with the friendly amendments.

4. Members can agree, stand-aside or block the proposal.

   1. Stand-aside is used to express dissent.

   2. Block is used to refuse a proposal and block its approval. A member blocking the decision would rather leave the group than see it through.

5. A consensus is reached when there is no block.

Within AC, a block is understood more loosely, and AC still has to determine its full meaning. A possibility would be for blocking members to leave the collective activities but still receive core funding.

5/ Other possible tools and/or suggestions

Collective Managerial Tool

We also propose to have a collective managerial tool to monitor expenses and allow for an up-to-date view on the budget (remaining funds).

This should allow for an easier overview of the budget and the expenses, more flexibility and facility in self-managing the collective pot, in particular in terms of time and coordination.

On a later stage, it could also allow for self-management of the collective pot by each member without previous request with a light overview of the expenses by attaya and consultation in case of needs and/ or advice, questions.

These working groups make possible the permanent flow of information that let us know the state of the resources into the network. There are three facilitator working groups to manage communications (TAM-TAM & website), Financial Administration (Attaya) and Fundraising (FUN-raising).

Attaya is the senegalese word for the popular African tea ceremony around which care is given, information shared, and disputes are resolved. In Arabic, Attaya stands for “givings or offerings” that are necessarily unconditional.

Created during the Kyrgyzstan Assembly, Attaya, is the working group, in charge of overseeing the budget and facilitating allocations. Each member in the working group is called Attiyya and communicate with a number of AC members, playing the role of direct link.

Attaya will more specifically facilitate the collective administration of the AC collective pot distributed by DOEN to each member and composed of the sum of the collective activities’ budgets.

Until a solid and legal model for governance is settled (see E.2), some of the ‘old’ structure of AC will remain in place in which the “funder”[13], DOEN, directly contracts and transfer the funds to each organisations individually. However, the budget for collective activities, the collective pot, which was handled by DOEN and Hivos until 2015, is now becoming decentralized and divided into smaller quantities. In other words, the AC collective pot is not in one place but it is being kept in 24 AC[14] collective pots.

This mechanism allows for collectively sharing the management of the budget and for a quicker access to resources, without numerous bank transfers or proposal writing.

Each organization can withdraw the funds needed from their part of collective pot in order to pay for the costs of Assemblies, Banga Meetings, ETP’s and Communication costs relating to the AC ecosystem (including the website). When it comes to Banga and ETPs, and for coordination purposes, the member should let their Attiya know. At the end of each year, each member is still required to submit an audited financial report, which will be reviewed by DOEN.

At present time, additional funds are still being provided by DOEN for the assembly, website, communication and fundraising costs (additional from the funds drew from the collective pot).

Bangas, ETPs, advanced payments and time strikes will be based on the AC members’ needs, urgency and the availability of funds in the collective pot. It is not about give and take; it is about caring and sharing as outlined in the AC ethical principles.

AC considers it part of a healthy practice to develop a yearly financial document that is audited by an external accountant and then attached into the Resource Map (D.2), both in terms of creating a sustainable internal financial practice and in terms of accountability towards the outside. The auditing will happen according to local auditing standards and most importantly in working with auditing companies that understand the nature of the creative and self-organisational practice of the network. In case companies with this understanding don’t exist locally, AC will help develop this understanding. Attayas will thus collect all of the individual audited reports, in addition to an audited report for the external expenses of AC and present one unified audited report for all of AC.

Fund-raising is a critical aspect of the economic aspect of sustainability, which has been identified as the highest principle for the AC ecosystem. The concept of sustainability has been addressed in section B.2. This concept is considered in both affective and economic terms. Since economic challenges are constantly present in the day to day practices of the partner organizations, and sustainability is also directly related to the sustainability of the organisms of the AC Ecosystem itself, the question of how or if the organization can sustain itself as the existing members become un-funded is uncertain. Therefore, a clear position regarding the future is necessary to define. As a step in this direction, in order to address the issue of funding for the AC as an organization, in the assembly in Kyrgyzstan, it was decided that a fundraising group be established to look at how this task might be accomplished within the decentralized structure which is the AC ecosystem.

While the fundraising guidelines outline many if not all of the typical actions involved in fundraising. It is not clear which, if any, direct fundraising process will be implemented, for the AC as an organization. It is also not clear how groups of organizations might apply for specific project funding under the AC “umbrella.”

The guidelines correctly identify the critical relationships between this working group and other working groups that will be required in order to develop a coherent position based on the consensus of the AC members.

It is clear that part of the process for determining which potential funders to approach should involve the use of the Cascade of Coherence.

Banga means time and space in Luganda, a Ugandan language, and means ‘tide’ in Lithuanian.

Issa Samb’s studio. Dakar, 2015

While the Assembly takes place annually and with participation by all the AC member organisations, Banga (Knowmatic Meetings) are small-scale, sporadically held meetings based on a ‘call for gathering’ for friendship, self-care, reciprocal support, and collective study on a particular subject/issue. Banga can take different forms including 1) ‘advice meeting’ for getting advice from the AC members on a particular issue that a member is dealing with, 2) ‘collective study meeting’ for delving into a topic, 3) ‘event meeting’ to be held next to an event that a hosting organisation organizes or attend and 4) skills sharing meeting.

Like the Assembly, the spirit of Banga is for working, conversing, and learning being together, not showcasing or promoting. Nonetheless, tooling this collective study/learning process for wider sharing is crucial, as well as being embedded in a local context.

The Banga is a “form of replacement for the institutional anchoring of important world intuitions at one place, hence a unique postcolonial approach in which instead of funding structures, mobility is funded, which lead to heavy reliance on know-how instead of a heavy reliance on institutions and structures.”[11]

Practical Framework

• Each member who wants to call for Banga should look at the AC Resource Maps to see where resources to support them could be found;

• Partners should also make a ‘self-diagnosis’ first through Study Buddying (interview chains and skyping AC partners) in order to check if a Banga would be resourceful;

• A rotativing Banga team/committee will be formed (to be selected in the next Assembly), and will consist of 3 AC organisations in order to decide on which Banga calls to support. Decisions will be made in line with our Ethical Principles—including the value of self-limitation, non-hierarchical self-organisation—this team will look at whether the meeting should take place with the AC members and whether there is a translocal benefit. The meeting could be with other local organisations or practitioners. AC will also investigate how Banga could benefit the AC in general in light of its resource map;

• The actual organisation of a Banga is to be done by the host organisation, including the travel arrangements;

• Each Banga budget is a maximum of 8,000 Euros, which will be used to cover all of the costs of the Banga meeting. These funds typically come from the Collective Pot of the host organization (the organization that is calling for the Banga) or, by mutual agreement, they could come from the collective pots of the other participating organizations. If the costs of the Banga exceed the 8,000 Euros the host organization will have the choice of either paying the difference from its own funds (not the collective pot funds), raising the additional funding from sources outside of the AC ecosystem or requesting permission from the entire AC ecosystem to use additional funds from the Collective Savings.

To subvert the paradigm of reporting to funders and in order to open the space for creation and sharing common resources, the assembly provides ways to manage the active circulation of information and outcomes produced by each organization and each study or working group. It also provides mechanisms for accountability that means that it recognizes and values not only quantitative or financial data but also the work that we do in permanent recognition of our contexts and our challenges, struggles, achievements and un-learnings.

Avoiding conflict and avoiding increase in the amount of work assumed by each organization implies the management of the AC communications mechanisms, which the network established as part of the self-management tools. They include the following:

Internal Communication (accountability)

• Tam Tam/AC Drum (quarterly newsletter):

TAM-TAM is one of our internal communication tools/mechanisms for accountability. It is an internal digital newsletter that is used to update and share important, relevant and synthesized information with the rest of the AC network about ongoing of AC processes; triangles, permanent activities, working groups (permanent and temporary). It is lead by the permanent TAM TAM working group, but each organization and or working group has to develop their own content .

• Mailing list arts-collaboratory@googlegroups.com

The mailing list is a mechanism to share relevant information, share resources and to make collective decisions.

• WhatsApp

The WhatsApp group, AC Family, is a permanent way to share and to keep the love flowing. It is a way of virtually living together and sharing and documenting on a daily basis the personal and affective relationships that are part of the dynamic of the ecosystem. It is an instantaneous way of keeping the conversation alive.

External Communication

• Website

AC as well as the “face” to the outside world. It should communicates and represents the current self-organized structure of AC.

• Brochure

The Brochure will be one of the tools used to communicate what the AC is and what it does. It has not been developed yet.

All the working groups have their own guidelines, describing how they function. (See Appendix I)

The paradigm shift faced by the AC ecosystem requires strong rituals and habits to interiorize and live the self-managed model. Establishing and understanding a common rhythm is necessary to keep alive this process. Rhythm is understood as the habit of conversation, studying, and working together.

The temporary groups support this purpose by creating guidelines and following up each process when it is needed.

At the moment these working groups are:

• Assembly Guideline

• Banga

• Lifeline

• Legal Entity

• Resource Map

• AC Presentation Group

• Tooling

• Documentation

• Internal communication

• Network Health Group (Guardian of Intention)

• AC Working Document Editorial Group

Each working group has created guidelines with information regarding the topic that they are responsible for, which can be found in the Appendix.

The members of these temporary working groups rotate annually (See E.3.1.a).