Community is made up of people

Community is made up of people.

I sometimes enjoy making statements.  To play with words and try to make something sound definitive and authoritative.  But usually the process is more rewarding than the final statement.  So this morning I was tinkering with the community art idea, whether or not we are working with people or with communities.  For many frontline community artist who know what they are doing, it seems that they are not really concerned with this question of "community or people?"  But I guess I am the kind of guy that likes to step back and think about these things.

Note: You will notice that I try not to use the word individual to denote a single person.  Because the term individual has a connotation that stands for an isolated existence which I don't believe is true.

This issue of "community or people?" came up recently because I have been reading a lot about therapeutic uses of art, treatment for individuals and so forth.  The readings help me built up some basic concept, but at the same time, I had an internal discussion of whether this was what my/our community art programme was doing.

Since our programmes always dealt with groups of people or a community, we usually don't go deep into a therapeutic process (unless it is during the Sichuan or with other post-traumatic communities).  Instead, we usually emphasize building connection and relationships, of finding one's place within a community.  Therefore, this morning I had the urge to say that "we work with communities".

But then, I thought about our artists, and my time as an artist during some of the projects.  Something was reminding me that we must treat people as people, and not to fall into the danger of treating people as faceless individuals of a community.  This thought began to germinate inside my mind, creating flashbacks of past programmes.

Finally, by the time I arrived at the train station, I had something worth stating.  A community is made up of human beings.  And humans are 'multifaceted', 'multidimensional' and 'multi-whatever', each one of them is at the same time a physical being, a psychological-being, a social/communal being, a spiritual-being, an environmental-being, an artistic-being, an intellectual being......So, by treating a human being as communal being, and providing a platform for group/communal exchange, he or she will naturally be drawn towards communal activities.

Hence, my statement: Community is made up of people.  Without people, there is no community.  Therefore, Community Art begins with people.

This process began with rethinking the term "Art for All" and "community art", but this exercise seems to have  brought up another issue.  Art for All is only the English name, the Chinese name contains a play on word that could mean "everybody move in/for Art" or "a holistic person moving in Art".  Now, this term "holistic" is certainly worth some thought.

From a wider perspective, we could say that our art activities balances all the non-art activities that overwhelms people; so, by joining our activities, a person becomes more balanced.  But this would imply countering 1 extreme (of no art), with the opposite (of all art), which is somewhat reactionary, and complementary.

The above discussion of the nature of human being as being physical, psychological, communal, artistic, intellectual.....seems to have shed new light to this issue.  We have found artistic activities to be embracing of almost all sorts of skills and predisposition; for example, craft material manipulation, blueprint drawing, group leading, stage logistics, pattern creation, story writing, group drumming arrangement...to name but a few, already requires a multitude of skills, physical and mental predisposition.  I have yet to find a single person with NO SKILL to offer in Art.  (This is especially true now that art and art activities are increasingly diverse)

The tricky part is to encourage participation, but that is where "Holistic" meets "Community".  Peter Block explained in "Community: The Structure of Belonging", that community is about exploring each member's potential and sharing it.  It is only within a communal relationship that people can share skills and gifts freely and find their place in relation with others.  I guess that is why Art for All's founders call it "everybody move in/for Art" or "a holistic person moving in Art". 

There are several untied knots here, which is well beyond the scope of this entry:

How does the "Holistic" meets "Community" thingy work in a Community Art setting?
What is a Community? What holds a Community together?

For now, I will recommend the book:
Community : the structure of belonging / Peter Block.
San Francisco : Berrett-Koehler Publishers : Ingram Publisher Services [distributor], c2008.