Organize:

Universidad Nacional de La Plata

Place:

Faculty of Arts – UNLP, ARGENTINA  

In a society increasingly fragmented by inequalities, it is important that artistic and cultural initiatives collaborate with tools for social change. This is a commitment to the active participation of civil society in spaces of citizen creation and decision-making, where, through the arts and culture, they express their discontent and their proposals for change.

Photography for social change faces two major challenges: The first is to prevent artistic practices that involve negotiating with otherness from being trapped by the rhetoric of liberal inclusion and diversity inherent in postmodern globalization discourses. The second challenge is to redefine the notion of community and the relationships that an artist or collective establishes with it. Well-intentioned humanist photography can morph into cultural extractivism if its message is not disseminated in the territory where it is produced.     

Photography as a tool for social change and its connection to artivism (art + activism) presents basic tools for the production and development of photography projects, based on community or artistic actions as a tool for social communication.

Contents:

• Module I | What is Photography for Social Change?

Introduction to society-focused photography, the history of community representation through images, and decolonial movements. The decline of mass media as a vehicle for transformative messages and the current state of affairs.

• Module II | Fieldwork and its methodological ethics

Training in working with people and their environments. Introduction to the concept of cultural extractivism and the ethics of fieldwork. The power of images for social cohesion and a sense of belonging. Participatory photography and the concretization of a collective vision. Conceptual map and constellation of the social project.

• Module III | Popular Education and Creative Participation

The concept of popular education applied to photography and its roots in Latin America. We are all authors and produce the project collaboratively. Photography linked to social struggles, using images to assist NGOs, unions, civil society organizations, and local media. Photography serves social service without renouncing the artistic/aesthetic aspect of communication. Editing and distribution control of the project are shared with the collective.

• Module IV | Artivist Practices with Images

Introduction to artivism and its global references, photography as a protagonist of artivist creation, stages of situational analysis, collective action design, implementation of action, organizing and acting, collective evaluation and systematization.

Duration:

3 Months