Artspace Projects
Report date
August 2017
What has been most instrumental to your progress?
In 2016, the first year of Rolling Rez Arts (RRA) programming, 39 art classes reached nearly 300 people in all nine districts of Pine Ridge. Classes ranged from bow making to sculpture to film-making. Sixty-nine percent of the people attending workshops identified as working artists. RRA also traveled to neighboring communities including Rapid City, Standing Rock Reservation, and the Cheyenne River Reservation for special events. In 2017, FPF hired a program coordinator for the RRA. The RRA is offering 4 workshops each month, Lakota Funds uses the bus 1-2 times per month for banking days, and the Heritage Center uses the bus once each month for 'buying days', traveling across the reservation to buy items from artists. This sustained community engagement and ongoing programmatic outreach through the RRA is instrumental to making progress toward construction, lease up, and ultimately programming of the Oglala Lakota Artspace facility we are developing in Kyle on the Pine Ridge reservation. Through RRA we are meaningfully engaging our key stakeholders, artists from Pine Ridge to increase collective understanding of both the issues and solutions we identified in our research.
Through a joint effort between LLC members Artspace, First Peoples Fund, and Lakota Funds we have made significant progress in our project through selection of an architect for the Oglala Lakota Artspace project. We conducted an open Request for Qualification (RFQ) process to solicit architects from the region to submit preliminary information based on our RFQ criteria. We received dozens of inquiries and ultimately 5 full proposals. Of these, the LLC members selected 3 architectural firms to be interviewed. The LLC members worked together to define the interview questions and selection criteria based on our identified needs for the Oglala Lakota Artspace facility. Ultimately, we unanimously selected Encompass Architects to be the architect of the Oglala Lakota Artspace. Encompass is a Native owned firm lead by Tammy Eagle Bull, a Oglala Lakota member of the Pine Ridge reservation who has done extensive work across Pine Ridge including art centers and creative businesses. The addition of Tammy Eagle Bull to our team adds local capacity and understanding of the issues, possibilities, and opportunities of and for the community.
Ongoing engagement and inclusion key stakeholders - including the LLC partners, artists, landowner where the project is located, and others - has created a culture of collaboration and the ability to collectively move the project forward step by step. In order for us to begin construction we needed to have the land-lease signed and because we have based our work on an inclusive process Artspace was able to rely on our partners and other key stakeholders in the community to assist in taking this necessary step of signing the land lease to ensure we are in a position to break ground and begin construction on time.
Key lessons learned
A clearly identified need for the Oglala Lakota Artspace that was based on artist lead research was critical for us in establishing the right foundation to move this construction project forward. The practicality of conducting community engagement with key stakeholders was learned early on - the key lesson for us is sustaining this community engagement with our key stakeholders, namely the Native artists that the Oglala Lakota Artspace project will serve. By launching the Rolling Rez prior to opening the bricks and mortar facility we are learning how critical this programming and marketing is to sustaining community engagement on behalf of the facility.
The RRA also is providing us an increased collective understanding of what types of programming and services Native artists need - based on analysis and assessment of this information as well as ongoing and input from artists we may work with our architect to make adjustments to the Oglala Lakota Artspace. The key lesson we have learned is to be flexible - even when designing physical space (and to add in flexible space to the facility!) to ensure we meet the needs of the artists.
Reflections on inclusive, collaborative or resourceful problem-solving
Inclusive - because by the very nature of meaningfully engaging key stakeholders and thoughtfully identifying all of people who needed to both create the intended change as well as those who would be directly affected by the problem, we were able to very clearly identify the need and get community-wide buy in to the need and issues. As the result of inclusion we were also able to more clearly identify solutions to those needs thus laying the foundation for true collaboration and understanding of existing resources. To us, without 'inclusive' it would be difficult and even impossible for collaboration to create a culture of innovation or a breakthrough in addressing the community need.
Other key elements of Community Innovation
Steadfastness. Once we had the artist lead community research that clearly identified the need, we needed to employ the element of resolution to continue moving forward even with set backs.
Understanding the problem
Our work with First Peoples Fund and Lakota Funds has ultimately culminated in the creation the Rolling Rez Arts Space mobile unit, which has served as a mini pilot project for Oglala Lakota Artspace in the sense that it has helped us understand the types of programming and services that Native artists on the Pine Ridge Reservation need. Not only does the RRA provide the community with classes, trainings, and banking services, but it also gives us a chance to gather input from artists and community members on an ongoing basis about how we can create and utilize space to meet their need. Through RRA and these partnerships, we have identified that need and are now able to move forward with predevelopment efforts and construction (soon) in an engaged, conscientious, and strategic manner.
If you could do it all over again...
If Artspace had the chance to go back to the start of the grant period, we would develop a community engagement plan that extended beyond the implementation of the Rolling Rez mobile art unit. The partnerships we cultivated throughout the process of identifying an architect and developing the Rolling Rez Arts Space have been energetic and enlightening, and continue to be of great importance to Artspace as we move into the construction phase of the Oglala Lakota Artspace. Now that construction is on the horizon and the Rolling Rez is up and running with a variety of trainings and workshops offered to the community, it is crucial for us to stay engaged with our partners as the process 'slows'. Our partners have helped us establish the appropriate and strong foundation of which we are figuratively and literally building upon, and now it is up to us to sustain that community engagement and maintain that excitement as we move into the next phase of collaboration involving space programming needs once the building is completed.