The SECC has published our first book, “Social Objects: Essays, Interviews, Projects and Interventions on Socially Engaged Craft,” and it is available on amazon!

What power do objects carry in our lives? How do they influence our everyday experiences, create connection or encourage resistance? Throughout the trajectory of human history, we have used objects to contain meaning and to build relationships. In Social Objects, members of the Socially Engaged Craft Collective and guest contributors investigate Socially Engaged Craft practice through essays, interviews, project descriptions, and calls to action. The projects represented in the publication and accompanying exhibition engage the fundamental relational qualities of objects to build active, social experiences.

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SECC Artist Amber Ginsburg
Tea Project with Ghaleb Al-Bihani & Djamel Ameziane
January 8, 2017 – January 20, 2017

Gallery 102, Smith Hall of Art, George Washington University, 801 22nd St. NW, Washington, DC 20052

Facebook Event Page: www.facebook.com/events/1981808882031952/

Gallery 102 presents The Tea Project with Ghaleb Al-Bihani & Djamel Ameziane January 8, 2017 through January 20, 2017, in collaboration with The Center for Constitutional Rights,  Witness Against Torture and The National Coalition to Protect Civil Freedoms.

In the company of the full installation of 779 porcelain teacups, one for each individual that has been detained at Guantanamo, Amber Ginsburg, Aaron Hughes, and their collaborators will host events that allow audiences a role in telling the story of our current involvement in war and detention with a specific focus on the legal and human rights issues surrounding Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp, the Global War on Terror, and growing Islamophobia.

Alongside the Tea Project will be the works of Ghaleb Al-Bihani and Djamel Ameziane. Shown for the first time will be a substantial selection of the more than 100 works by Ghaleb, who has been detained without charge in Guantanamo since 2002 and has been cleared for transfer since 2014. Ghaleb, who discovered a talent for art in routine classes offered to detainees, told CCR, “Painting makes me feel as if I am embracing the universe….I also see things around me as if they were paintings, which gives me the sense of a beautiful life.” The Tea Project is also grateful to show three pieces of work by Djamel, an Algerian national who was detained without charge in Guantanamo from 2002 to 2013.

The opening reception and program, WORD FROM THE GRASSROOTS: Strengthening our Resistance to State Violence, offers a night of viewing, tea, poetry, and words from activists, veterans and legal advocates.Tea, served throughout the evening’s events, is not only a favored drink but a shared moment that transcends cultural divides and systems of oppression.

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Enter to win: National Clay Week Community Outreach/Social Engagement Project Award 

National Clay Week is about connecting and getting people involved in the experience of clay. Below you’ll find a list of ways to get involved at a local and national level.

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In April, Fuller Craft Museum opens The Faces of Politics: In/Tolerance, an exhibition of artists that examine, on a personal level, how their creative vision is influenced by the current political unrest – locally, nationally, and on a global scale. This exhibition is current and thought-provoking, dealing with topical social issues such as race relations, religious freedom, gender equality and gun control.

We are taking this opportunity to open a dialogue at Fuller Craft Museum and offer the community a place to hear multiple viewpoints and participate in an open discussion on the arts and social action. Our panel Finding a Voice: Affecting Social Change Through Creative Expression features leaders in the arts and social service field as well as practicing artists and educators. Led by Julie Burros, Chief of Arts and Culture for the City of Boston, we will address both social statements through artistic expression as well as the value of arts education in finding a voice for the underprivileged and disenfranchised.
Julie Burros will be joined by Jason Talbot, co-founder and alumnus of Artists For Humanity (AFH), a Boston area non-profit organization that combines art and entrepreneurship to address today’s most challenging social, economic and racial issues. Currently serving as Special Projects Director and member of AFH’s Board of Directors, Jason has dedicated the last 25 years of his life to ensuring that Boston’s young people are guided towards a successful life by encouraging their self-expression through art.
Also a panelist, Cheryl Buchanan, JD, MFA, is a co-founder of Writers Without Margins, a nonprofit dedicated to the fusion of art and advocacy, which offers creative writing workshops in unconventional spaces and produces an annual literary journal. She currently facilitates classes at the St. Francis House Day Shelter in Boston and the Center for Change in Dorchester while also teaching at Emerson College.
Rounding out the panel is Bruce Hoffman and Melissa Maddonni Haims. Bruce is the guest curator of The Faces of Politics: In/Tolerance, the Director of Gravers Lane Gallery in Philadelphia, and an independent curator, artist, writer, and educator. Melissa is a fiber artist based in Philadelphia who creates knit graffiti, soft sculpture, and large-scale installations using knitted and crocheted yarns. The majority of her work is produced using recycled, reclaimed and rescued textile materials. Ms. Haims is a featured artist in The Faces of Politics: In/Tolerance.
Please join us for Finding a Voice: Affecting Social Change Through Creative Expression, on Sunday, April 17 from 2-5 pm at Fuller Craft Museum, 455 Oak St, Brockton, MA. Admittance to the panel discussion is free with museum admission; pre-registration is suggested as seating is limited. Student discounts and group rates are available for museum admission. We look forward to sharing this discussion with our friends and colleagues interested and inspired by the integration of the arts, social service, and education fields. Please share and post this upcoming event. Best, Denise Lebica Deputy Director

Fuller Craft Museum
455 Oak Street, Brockton, MA 02301
April 16-August 21, 2016

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NCECA 2016 programming for Makers, Mentors and Milestones that includes presentations by artists in the collective or is relevant to socially engaged craft::: (in chronological order)

Thursday, March 17 from 1:00pm–2:00pm Grand Ballroom 2501 A (Level 2)
CHIPSTONE LECTURE: LIVE FORM: CERAMICS AS A LIVING HISTORY (AH)
By Jenni Sorkin
Ceramics has been a marginal practice within the history of postwar art. But embedded in a discourse of experimentation with materials, tactility, and performance, its formal concerns resonate as a parallel medium to avant-garde movements of the last 50 years. This talk argues that ceramics is a socially engaged artistic practice that integrates aesthetic concerns with pedagogical and affective discourses. 

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Founders Nicole Gugliotti, Cheyenne Chapman Rudolph, and Jeni Hansen Gard are all represented in this exhibition during NCECA.

NCECA Across the Table, Across the Land
Across the Table App with list of Projects
Charlotte Street Foundation La Esquina
1000 W. 25th St, Kansas City, MO
March 16 – April 23, 2016

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Check out founder Jeni Hansen Gard’s work in the Archie Bray 2015/6 Resident & Visiting Artists Exhibition during NCECA at the Red Star’s Belger Crane Yard Studios.



Opening Reception: Friday March 18 from 5:30-8:30 pm
Red Star’s Belger Crane Yard Studios
Kansas City, MO
March 14-May 21, 2016

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The Engaged Object: Contemporary Craft as a Catalyst for Change
Many social, political and environmental problems seem impossible to solve. In this exhibition, 30 artists who use fine craft media such as glass, textiles, ceramics and metal address these challenges from diverse viewpoints.
Foothills Art Center
Golden, CO
January 23 – March 26, 2016

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Check out founder Jeni Hansen Gard’s work in this exhibition.

Touch: Interactive Craft
“Touch: Interactive Craft” is a national juried exhibition organized by Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts. This year’s theme invited submissions that involve viewer interaction, require audience manipulation for the piece’s creation or enjoyment, or gain significance by being touched. “Touch,” acknowledges that traditional craft forms are rooted in their functionality, and as such are often created to be handled. Chosen by juror Emily Zilber, the works selected for the exhibition reflect impressive levels of craftsmanship and engage the viewer in innovative ways, breaking the typical passive viewing barriers of a museum or gallery setting.
Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts
Gatlinburg, TN
January 16-March 11, 2016

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SECC founders Cheyenne Chapman Rudolph and Forrest Gard are both featured in this exciting exhibition.

Recorded Matter: Ceramics in Motion
Curated by Garth Johnson
This exhibition showcases the work of eleven artists who effortlessly integrate video into their studio practice. Some artists use cameras to document their work being used (or abused). Others use video to document a process that is perhaps more important to them than finished, fired objects. All of these pieces have a life of their own on the Internet, where they can be shared in ways that physical objects cannot.
Arizona State University Art Museum Brickyard
March 21 – July 18, 2015
The Center for Craft, Creativity & Design’s Benchspace Gallery
January 22-May 21, 2016
Phoenix New Times Review
cfile Review