Cultivating Maintenance Culture Communities
We recently introduced our project Maintenance Culture: Sustaining Digital Creative Works. Throughout this project we’ll be working on building communities in six areas: Baltimore, Houston, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Seattle, and the Midwest (city TBD). If you’re not near any of these, don’t worry, all of our resources will also be online, and we’ll be developing a skillshare hosting toolkit that you could use to host one in your area. If you are in one of these cities, in the next two years you can expect to see:
Regional Coordinators
In each region we’re working to grow communities, a locally based regional liaison will cultivate community across creators, galleries, cultural heritage workers, and anyone else interested in long-term access to digital creative works. Regional coordinators are:
Baltimore: Siobhan Hagan, DC Public Library and Mid-Atlantic Regional Moving Image Archive (MARMIA)
Houston: Emily Vinson, University of Houston
Los Angeles: Joey Heinen, Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Midwest: Kristin MacDonough, Art Institute of Chicago
New Orleans: Ashley Shabankareh, Trombone Shorty Foundation
Seattle: Libby Hopfauf, Moving Image Preservation of Puget Sound
Community Cultivation
Our friends at Educopia created this resource on community cultivation, and we’re using that as a guidebook for cultivating Maintenance Culture communities. Our regional coordinators are crucial in these efforts - they bring both their local knowledge and experience with preservation to this project.
Workshops
The workshops are aimed at people working in small to medium cultural heritage institutions - museums, libraries, archives, and other collecting institutions. These two-day workshops will support peer to peer learning. They’ll be interactive and participatory, and help build or strengthen connections across local institutions. Expert instructors and Myriad staff will facilitate.
Skillshares
The skillshares aim to bring together creators, cultural heritage workers, galleries, and anyone interested in supporting long-term access to born-digital, creative works. Skillshares will happen the night before workshops, and they’re meant to be informal, inspiring gatherings to build local connections across stakeholders.
Get involved
We’re in the development phase for workshops, skillshares, and community building. As we schedule workshops and events, we’ll keep you posted about your specific region if you sign up below. Your regional coordinator will reach out to you directly.
Maintenance Culture has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Democracy demands wisdom.
Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed on this website do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.