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SAN FRANCISCO — As fleets of shuttle buses take employees to their respective Silicon Valley campuses, resentment and tension grows in the Bay Area. Last week, protesters blocked one such Google bus in an effort to draw attention to the widening gap between the technology industry and the communities it affects; a union organizer impersonated a tech worker to incite dialogue through performative gesture. Within days, further demonization of tech figures, like the entrepreneur Greg Gopman — guilty of making crassly disparaging remarks about…
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Last week, I had the absolute pleasure of being in conversation with writer, culture critic, curator, and artist, Ben Valentine at ZERO1 for the Bring It! Summer programming. Admittedly, it was a small and intimate group that joined us for the talk. When I got home, I read and wrote because I walked away from the evening with many big ideas. One of the things that kept coming up (even well into this week as I mull over the discussion),…
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PRESS RELEASE #FREEBASSEL CAMPAIGN LAUNCHED TO BRING HOME LOVED AND CELEBRATED INTERNET VOLUNTEER DETAINED IN SYRIA Damascus — Tuesday, 3 July 2012 – Today marks the launch of the #FREEBASSEL campaign to bring about the release of Bassel Khartabil, known widely on the Internet and in technology communities as Bassel Safadi. Bassel is a resident of Damascus, Syria, a technology pioneer and respected community leader. He is a loving family member and friend to countless people at home and around the…
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The Gray Area Foundation for the Arts constantly puts on phenomenal events, lectures, exhibitions, and facilitates classes for the community. Summer of Smart (SoS) is another project that puts both the organization and San Francisco on the map, globally. Having the community participate in learning and seeing democracy in action through innovation and technology allows citizens to engage in a collective effort for positive change, growth, and development.
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Independent scholarship has been difficult. Navigating through art history, criticism, and journalism without teachers to reign in all these ideas, fellow peers to test ideas, an editor reminding me of a deadline, and/or a project or paper due at the end of a few weeks makes for a challenging approach at scholarly research and constant engagement. Then again, this is MY forum and virtual space. Another issue that has come up for me – creating context. It’s only me writing and…
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On good days, I look at art. On bad days, I look at art. It’s safe to assume, I look at art (all the time). That said, I am one of those individuals that actually notices art in office buildings. For goodness sake, there’s a reason why it’s there! Might as well look at it, right? Then again, there is a specific reason for public and corporate art. The San Francisco Art Commission (SFAC) has an ordinance that states the…
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Ah, the day of heart shaped chocolates, conversation hearts, disdainful people that despise Valentine’s day, and an exchange of love notes… Truthfully, I absolutely love the day (YES, EVEN when I was single). I just never (ever) really thought of it as a day for couples. The history itself and all the believed legends of what makes Valentine’s Day, well, Valentine’s day has very little to do with romantic love between two people (but I can see and understand where…
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Dear Friends and Family, Surprisingly, writing on my art blog everyday is not a resolution for 2011! Rather, I’ve decided to form a habit. It’s been said that it takes up to 6 weeks (to form a habit, that is) so here’s my shot at writing, publicly, in 2011! How is this different from a resolution, you ask? It’s different in that I have no idea where this experiment will take me and it’s a habit (very rarely is a ‘resolution’…
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“So this has been my whole professional life! Public art can create permeable membranes between the inside and outside of systems, spaces, and even the souls of citizens. Public artists need more breathing space to experiment and do R&D. They need to be brought in at the very inception of projects, so they can do their first work as a certain kind of thinker.” — Mierle Laderman Ukeles, 2001
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writer | artist | scholar
Dorothy R. Santos, Ph.D. 