Ricardo Robinson
Boots on the Sound: COVID-19
Artist
Date
2019 (in progress)
Location
Greater Pittsburgh, PA
Collaborating Organization
Rethink Vets
Introduction
Boots on the Sound: COVID-19 is a two-year collaborative art project developed by artist Ricardo Robinson, as part of Shiftworks’ Artist Residency in the Public Realm program.
Process
In 2019, Shiftworks partnered with Rethink Vets to produce an artist residency that would facilitate creative collaboration between an artist and members of the post-9/11 veteran community in the greater Pittsburgh area. During the first year of the program, Robinson collaborated with the Rethink Vets coalition members to engage veteran and non-veteran communities throughout the region to facilitate dialogue and learn more about the challenges that veterans face.
Engagement
In March of 2020, as a response to the COVID-19 crisis, Robinson redeveloped the engagement phase of the project to include web-based interviews and sound recording workshops. Dubbed Boots on the Sound: COVID-19, this virtual engagement strategy allowed Robinson and local veterans to stay connected and continue to design a final creative project.
Implementation
The second year of the program will be dedicated toward implementing a creative project that will be generated from the first year of collaboration and engagement, with a focus on veterans’ response to the COVID-19 crisis.
Please check back for more information, which will be posted here when available.
This project is generously funded by The Heinz Endowments.
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Sibyls Shrine
This artist residency program created by artist Alisha B. Wormsley supports Black creative mothers in Pittsburgh, PA.
Ricardo Iamuuri Robinson is an audiovisual artist. He is founder of Sonarcheology, a creative art practice merging improvisational listening with environmental archeology. By way of this method his art attempts to listen to the interrelationships between sound and shape, language and space, or what he calls “the ancestry of sound.”
For more information about his work, please visit sonarcheology.com.
About the Collaborating Organization
Rethink Vets, an initiative of The Heinz Endowments, is a coalition of nonprofit organizations working to: drive better outcomes for service members, veterans, and military families; address misconceptions; and reshape public opinion about veterans in the Pittsburgh region. Visit rethinkvets.org.
The Heinz Endowments is devoted to the mission of helping southwestern Pennsylvania prosper as a vibrant center of creativity, learning, and social, economic and environmental sustainability. Core to our work is the vision of a just community where all are included and where everyone who calls our region home has a real and meaningful opportunity to thrive. Visit heinz.org.
Related
PROJECTS
Sibyls Shrine
This artist residency program created by artist Alisha B. Wormsley supports Black creative mothers in Pittsburgh, PA.
Image credits
Gallery, top:
(1) Sound workshop with veterans, image courtesy artist; (2) Artist Ricardo Robinson, photo courtesy artist; (3,4) Sound workshop with veterans, images courtesy artist