ecosystems

projects & updates

ecosystems Blog

Mother+Peace artist Tiff Lin reflects on their entire creative process from ideation to execution and beyond.

Mother+Peace premiered on May 14, 2022 to an intimate audience ready for an exploration into the project and journeys towards repairing personal relationship with family members and the Earth itself.

My Journey to Mother+Peace

Tiff Lin shares their experience interviewing artist and healer Dohee Lee, one of the inspirations behind Mother+Peace.

Join us for Mother+Peace on 5/14!

Mother+Peace explores healing an individual’s relationship with the land by facing the tensions between parental expectations and personal identity.

Meet Tiff Lin!

Tiff Lin (they/them) joins The Forum Collective as the first Ecosystems Commissioned Artist. Starting in 2021, they received training in interview and research skills to deepen their artistic practice.

The Definition of MC Dyalekt

Julius Rea, The Forum Collective’s Artistic & Editorial Director, interviews MC Dyalekt and creates an interactive infographic diving into the MC’s words and thoughts.

about the program

ecosystems is a series that provides training on interviewing and researching for fine artists.

After receiving training in basic interviewing and researching skills, artists are tasked to interview a community member, fellow artist, or activist of their choosing. Then, the artists create new works inspired by or translating the original interview. Informed by Deepa Iyer’s Mapping Our Roles in Social Change Ecosystems, the entire process provides a developmental process as well as valuable, transferrable skills to artists. These new voices become the storytellers, documenters and journalists of their own communities.

If you would like to inquire about contributing to ecosystems, contact us on our about page.

about Deepa Iyer

Deepa Iyer is a South Asian American writer, strategist, lawyer, and racial justice advocate.

Currently, Iyer is a Strategic Advisor at Building Movement Project and Director of Solidarity Is, a project that provides trainings, narratives, and resources on building deep and lasting multiracial solidarity. Iyer hosts a podcast called Solidarity Is This, available on iTunes, and provides trainings on racial equity and solidarity to non-profits, government agencies, public and private stakeholders, educators, and institutions of higher learning.

Iyer has been recognized for her work with the 2017 Justice in Action Award from the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF), the 2014 Pioneer Award from the South Asian Bar Association of North America, and the 2013 Dorothy Height Coalition Building Award from the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund (SALDEF).

In 2020, Iyer developed and produced the open-source resource, Mapping our Roles in a Social Change Ecoysystem, with Building Movement Project. The guide is a contextual took for newcomers to social change effort, and the framework “can help individuals, networks, and organizations align and get in right relationship with social change values, individual roles, and the broader ecosystem.”

For more information, follow her on Twitter @dviyer or visit her website at deepaiyer.com.