For Freedoms Congress

At 5pm, Activations Manager Daphne Takahashi will give a guided tour of all FFCon activations. Please meet in front of the MOCA Warehouse by the Mark Strandquist fences!

FF Con Attendees will be invited to participate in a Tsuru for Solidarity workshop. Tsuru for Solidarity is a group of Japanese American social justice advocates working to end detention and support immigrants and refugees targeted by racist, inhumane immigration policies. The tsuru (origami crane) is a traditional Japanese craft which attendees will collectively make and activate in protest actions.

How can public art be used as a tool for civic and social engagement? Join us for a conversation as panelists Brandan "BMike" Odums, Visual Artist; Patton Hindle, Head of the Arts at Kickstarter; Matthew Schum, Independent Curator; and Sam Giarratani, Hank Willis Thomas' Public Art Manager discuss some of their most pressing questions about the evolving potential of public art in the 21st century. Collectively, they will consider more inclusive, empowering, and sustainable methods of creating and funding public art. This discussion will be moderated by taylor brock of For Freedoms.

There are many untold stories people carry. Each story shapes who we are and how we imagine the world around us. Poetry is the practice of truth telling. In this workshop, join Aja Monet in exercises and writing prompts that will awaken our ability to tell the truth about the stories that have silenced us. The choice to write a poem in response to the times we are living in is a political choice, an action, and a contribution to the collective narrative. Language and how we use it is liberating. Let’s get free.

LA-based visual artists Rafa Esparza and Cassils use their bodies as social sculptures in their performance practices. Join them with martial artist Yunuen Rhi as they prepare your body to engage with mental and physical openness, fostering the present moment and connecting so that you get the most out of FFCON.

Artists Jesse Krimes and Russell Craig will facilitate Rendering Justice: Repairing the Social Fabric, a participatory workshop exploring conceptions of safety and justice. The workshop will focus on critically examining the current reality of the U.S. justice system and on reframing the public narratives that perpetuate mass incarceration. Collectively, participants will render visible a shared vision for building a safer and more just society through conversation and quiltmaking. Participants will illustrate a quilt square using imagery that visually represents their conceptions of safety and justice; they’ll be encouraged to add their own creative interpretations but asked to refrain from using text. Krimes and Craig will draw upon their personal experiences of navigating the criminal justice system to facilitate discussion about the images and the relationship between participants’ conceptions of safety, justice, and systemic reform of the criminal justice system. For both Los Angeles and the nation, Rendering Justice affirms a vital truth: mass incarceration is close to every American community—and we all have a stake in reversing it and a responsibility to envision alternatives to incarceration.

Since the year 2000, United States police have “mistaken” at least 38 distinct objects as guns during shootings of a majority of young black American men. None of the victims were armed.

This Is Not a Gun engages with the public through community-driven ceramic workshops hosted by artists, activists, healers, and mindfulness collaborators. Together, participants shape these mistaken-as-gun objects in clay, giving presence to their form, the human rights violations, and racism prevalent in America today. This Is Not A Gun endeavors to carve out time and space for a community to site these issues - the injustices inflicted at the hands of law and order - within our own bodies and stories. The collective labor we offer is in deference to and an act of respect towards those directly carrying these burdens. Each workshop upholds a nonjudgemental space for sharing amongst anyone who participates, and conversation is catalyzed from making and feeling.

Nicole Cardoza—a social entrepreneur, investor, and public speaker making wellness accessible for everyone as founder of Yoga Foster and Reclamation Ventures—will lead a mindfulness class to ground FFCon Attendees. The class will use meditation and collective breaths to inspire attendees to ground oneselves in our ancestors in order to support our collective future. Participants should wear comfortable clothes and bring a notebook.

FF Con Attendees will be invited to participate in a Tsuru for Solidarity workshop. Tsuru for Solidarity is a group of Japanese American social justice advocates working to end detention and support immigrants and refugees targeted by racist, inhumane immigration policies. The tsuru (origami crane) is a traditional Japanese craft which attendees will collectively make and activate in protest actions.

The Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture will host a session on Arts & Advocacy: Navigating Lobbying, Political Activity, and First Amendment, discussing how artists and arts organizations can navigate the constraints of neutrality, partisanship, and “politicized” speech within artistic programming and practice. Co-curated by Kristin Sakoda, Executive Director at LA County Department of Arts and Culture, and Michelle Woo, Director of For Freedoms. Sakoda and Woo will be joined by Amir Whitaker from ACLU of Southern California, and Nona Randois from Alliance for Justice.

New Museum’s NEW INC is an incubator for people working at the intersection of art, design and technology. The community of members, alumni, and mentors are committed to developing sustainable economic models for new nonprofits and social impact businesses; ambitious mixed reality installations and provocative art experiments; and innovative research in science and urban design. Two current NEW INC members Abhita Austin and Idris Brewster and mentor Stanley Lumax share their creative practices and discuss how storytelling through augmented reality, music and food can bring marginalized narratives to the center. The panel is organized by NEW INC’s cofounder, Karen Wong.

Marking this time we are living in with poignant reflection, protest, and vision, Truthworker Theatre Company—directed by Samara Gaev, will perform a poignant excerpt from their provocative three-part body of work that depicts the prison industrial complex through the lens of a dozen youth directly impacted by mass incarceration. This trilogy, comprised of original hip-hop theatre productions, moves from the school-to-prison pipeline and youth criminalization, through the impacts and practices of solitary confinement, and into re-entry upon release. Following the performance, Samara Gaev and Truthworker Theatre Company will offer an interactive workshop that calls upon modalities of theatre, writing, storytelling, and collaboration to unpack pressing issues of trauma, healing, power, privilege, social justice, and inequity in our communities. Drawing from a Theatre of the Oppressed pedagogy, this dynamic workshop will offer community members, educators, artists, activists, and organizers, tools for leveraging the stories that so often go untold. Sourcing the collective wisdom and collaborative power in the room, this workshop will use writing, art, and embodiment to create a safe space for radical self reflection, system analysis, community building, and articulating visions for change.

*Performance Featuring: Jazmin Luperena, Rebecca Haynes Oliver, Enlil McRae, Cory Fletcher, Zafar Mohammed & Kotton

The next Decennial Census is happening in 2020. This once-a-decade count of the population is mandated by the U.S. Constitution, and determines the allocation of over $800 billion of government funding into communities, how political district lines are drawn, how many Representatives each state will get in the House of Representatives, and much more for the next 10 years. But it only works if everyone is counted, and many communities — like immigrants, people of color, and young children — are at risk of being undercounted, meaning they’ll receive less representation in Congress and funding for vital programs and services.

Band together with us for 90 minutes (or more) and bring your enthusiasm, your laptop and/or any creative tools and supplies, and — most importantly — your ideas. Make art, content, and other fun stuff with us that will get out the count and make sure every voice in the U.S. is heard.

Join us as a creative innovator to collectively craft the rules of engagement for the Wide Awakes. We are inspired by this little known yet powerful part of history to come together, act, and stand for a better future.

How can we operate from a place of possibility in a world full of existential fear? Our rapidly changing world is always presenting new obstacles, demanding changes in the ways we respond. This multidisciplinary panel will explore the role of expanding our consciousness in shifting how we relate to each other and the natural world. How can art, science, and plants help us vision new ways forward grounded in collective action and healing? From the often depressing front lines of climate science and mental health, we will hear from panelists whose unique research is yielding incredibly promising results, including removing carbon from the atmosphere and effectively treating PTSD, addiction, and depression with psychedelic therapy and cannabis. Indigenous traditions around the globe have long used ceremony, music, dance, and sacred plants to align and to heal community. How can we learn, and create the physical and psychological spaces to vision possibility from a place of balance?