Carolina Campuzano
I was thinking about how we can provide and maybe write something about what we learn. Of how to work within a collective that is in different parts of the world, with a time schedule so different. People deserve to know what will happen.
Nicolás Pradilla
From my point of view, the commitment and the difficulties to meet have to do with the lack of a common base. It is incredible to be able to coincide virtually to share our experiences, but I believe that this very condition means that we do not have a common daily life and urgency and that we have had to focus on other things. This is something I have thought about more insistently in recent years.
Carolina Campuzano
I was pretty excited with the process, but at the end of the year we had very bad news in Casa tres patios, and now we are in a process trying to survive, because otherwise this year, we may close. Our director said that we won’t spend more time on other projects because we need to focus all our energy trying to find new resources and ways to finance all the programs, and especially the administrative cost of the foundation. That’s the reason why I had to take a step out of the project.
Nico said: the energy focused on other things. And yes, it was a little bit disappointing that not all of us who were in the group were working with the same energy. We all are not on the same page. Is not the time to give the energy when we need the energy for another thing. So I think that’s the reason why we took a step aside.
Erik Tlaseca
Time Changes. Time availability also changes. In these really long projects the beginning is really amazing trying to find the common ground. It was really a diverse group trying to figure out what was the common ground between different spaces. Creating an imaginary.
The beginning was sort of creating it. It seemed more like a practical task, to create the visual identity of the platform. I was really involved in the 1st issue, and then on the second issue It was clear that my time was really constrained, so I could not be really involved, but I was quite impressed by the content. Content-wise seemed to be a more mature editorial line. From there I just really lost track because I was busy with other projects.
It was really nice to collaborate with Rogelio in creating and see the evolution of the platform from being a fixed issue to becoming a really interesting outlet for writing and research.
When Documenta was happening, it was interesting to see how More of Us became sort of a parallel platform.
Teesa Bahana
Hearing Eric reminded me—It took me back almost to the beginning—that energy and excitement. When it happened, it was really meaningful. At the time, It gave something specific to feed a lot of the frustrations that I was experiencing in the pandemic and feeling very disconnected. When we’re all connected by these world changing events. And so it really met a personal need in some ways. Looking back, I’m like, Yeah, I had time then as well. Things were also slower in certain ways, and so it was easier to be able to commit. That amount of time to setting it up. I think it was very inspiring.
For me, at least to still, even now I think there’s. So I’ve still seen so many things that it could be, and how it could continue to be meaningful, but it also has been a way of checking myself about capacity and also thinking about how things start, and also how things are maintained.
You need different kinds of energies for those things, and It’s not always a resourcing issue, right? Because if you think about the beginning, yes, we had the money to set it up In terms of the website and design, and you know those kinds of costs. But in terms of labor, for the most part it really seems like people were either working for way lower than their usual rates, or actually volunteering their time. Sometimes there’s the assumption that if we pay, then it will work. But that’s also not always. What ends up happening? From the beginning, we wanted it to be this collective way of working, but for sustainability, I think they also are certain things that need to be in place.
I don’t think I feel sad about it, because to me, just us having this conversation means that it is still meaningful to each of us. I still want to talk about it. And it also really connected us as well. All of us met digitally before we met in person, which is also really special.
But I think there is also something about collectivity that if you meet digitally and you also have your own things going on, it’s very hard to still maintain just one project unless you’ve something you need. There’s an extra thing needed.
It’s taught me a lot, I think. But it did get very difficult to a certain point. Really like a weight, like a burden to keep carrying. Which maybe is the part that I feel a bit sad about. And in reflecting, I’d really have to think about what specific things could have been done, maybe from the beginning, or at a certain point, to make sure we had the necessary things in place to keep it going.
Maybe you were talking about it with the permanence thing that yeah, some things can end, but also, some things can hibernate as well. At the end of it, we’ve set up something right like the structure. The skeleton is there, and I think that’s still really valuable. And it’s really also interesting, even within Arts Collaboratory, people talk about More of Us so often. And I’m like: “More of Us can do it”, or “More of Us is doing this”. And I’m like, Oh, are we still occupying this role for people which is interesting as well.
Nicolás Pradilla
Is easy and funny to start things, but is not that easy to carry on; to keep care of those things in a lifespan.
Rogelio Vázquez
For me it’s the same. I think I experienced different kinds of feelings. Because is difficult to keep it along with another project and survival work. I spent a lot of time in the beginning of the process and at the end of the day, I think I don’t have enough time for a lot of different projects.
I love to start this and participate, but I have some frustration and feelings about it.
I want to participate more, but it’s complicated. Even once you let a little bit behind, you can’t always be at the same time with the process when you are not in the middle of it.
The organization of Arts Collaboratory is changing and now I’m more integrated in that process. I also have my own project. So I needed to choose what to get involved with. I can’t. It’s more energy, more time and feelings involved.
Nicolás Pradilla
I guess this is also a common talk in Arts Collaboratory. Everybody has a lot of work in their own organizations, so to make space for common work ain’t easy for anyone. That’s the reason I think of the common ground that is needed to keep us bonded.
Carolina Campuzano
Perhaps something that we need a lot in this process is communication. Because now we are expressing what happened to us. But I think that during the process we didn’t have the time. We left behind what we needed. We never say so. Even if we didn’t have time or we just didn’t reply. I think that is maybe something that we can learn about this process, because in order for things to work and to keep a collective work is very important to communicate to others: How are we feeling? What is happening with us? And if today I cannot, maybe to say: “Okay, today, I’m able to. But next week, I’m not.” So I think that is something very important that happened, because I felt that maybe when I leave—I mean, when I didn’t reply anymore—I just leave the station. I didn’t talk to you anymore. This is something that we can learn if we want to keep, or just to gather on a collective work.
Nicolás Pradilla
That’s the issue with Zoom meetings and Whatsapp chats. We thought that we are always communicated. We know about each other, but then, we just fade out.
Carolina Campuzano
They call it ghosting.
Erik Tlaseca
Arts collaboratory is changing a lot. That is also reflected in the availability for More of Us.
It is a symptom that the network itself is changing. To reflect on this: maybe things about the environment of certain projects. Of course not everything can be forever. More of Us itself is quite an ambitious project. So to hold on such an ambitious project despite the scarcity of time and resources; to hold on to an international network makes it even more challenging. For me It was a really nice learning experience. At least at the beginning.
Teesa Bahana
Definitely. Lots of learning, and I think in the beginning the learning was exciting. I was just thinking of the design process. Is this really exciting? Even stuff like WordPress. There was so much and then also from each other.
It became learning keeping a project together. It’s not easy that kind of learning. And how to deal with disappointments, and how to also encourage people, and also how to bring people in when something isn’t where it was right, like Nico’s and Stepania’s involvement. It was hard because we brought you in, but then we weren’t there. I was like: “Thanks for being here! Enjoy this empty house!” That was part of the learning that wasn’t as fun, but it still also learnt.
Rogelio Vázquez
At the end of the day it is a natural process of the organization. When you have a budget or a space, you can’t operate and just think: that is! It is a learning process.
For me, inside Crater is time for a more mature initiative. I think the process of working in parallel with another project is an opportunity to do other specific things that you want. Is complex to split your feelings and your work if you don’t have a well planned agenda.
Erik Tlaseca
To reflect on the permanence and the impermanence of collective work, I think there are, of course, some things that were lost, some battles that were lost, but also a lot of things: just to have the archive of what was produced under the umbrella of More of Us. I think that’s really big. A great experience, I mean. Now I was going back through the archive, and it’s really nice to see what was produced.
Now the challenge is how to take a look back into an experience like that? How to give it time?
Teesa Bahana
I hadn’t thought about that till now, so I just wanna say that the other thing I was thinking about is also like administration being a part of it. Yes, there’s the generative idea. Stuff like the design and the creative, the content and reading submissions and all those exciting things. But I think–so many times–It’s the admin that also keeps you as part of the maintenance that becomes very difficult. So there is the budgeting, the sending transfers like the cost of transfers, the contract, paying for just maintaining domains and those kinds of things that you don’t always think about when you’re starting something up. No maintenance being a big thing, I think.
Maybe to wrap it up from my end. Positively, I think what also was really nice was just seeing the response from writers. I mean, we never, I think, got an idea of the audience like who the readers were. To this day I don’t really know. We don’t really know numbers either. I mean, we could probably find that out, but it’s not really something to spend too much time on.
So then you’re putting in all this work. And then you’re like, who is going to read it? But anyway, I do think that for the right, or like anyone who submitted content. The rights is to the artist, to the photographers. Like that was also really nice, like, I think they all really appreciated the platform. That was encouraging just to know that it’s not just an idea that we had that was cool to us, but that other people saw value in it.
Carolina Campuzano
I agree, and think you set up all the administrative work because you did some of that with the account and paying of the budget. Thank you so much for doing that. I really feel proud because I think that, in a way, we have achieved our goal, that different voices have a platform where they can be published and let the world know what is happening in their country. How can we work together on solidarity, for example, that it was very important and about the ways that we make the resistance.
I feel proud.
I really want to thank you all.
We made it guys. We made it somehow.