Changing the way we gather with experiential art.
These days, I spend a lot of time designing or curating experiences around three pillars — conversations, connection and vulnerability.
Humans, at our core, are social creatures. Countries, religions, communities, tribes, friends — all originate from the need to be social from the way gather, communicate and how we connect. Somewhere along the advancement of civilization we forgot why we gathered. We have only scratched the surface in exploring new ways of connecting and relating as humans under conditions of modernity, globalization and urbanization.
The challenge in modern society is that the way we gather is primitive. The need for us to connect and be social creatures clearly led to the invention of gathering places like bars and night clubs. We created these spaces and kept making them nicer, forgetting that it’s not about filling a place, branding or building a new facade. Rather, it’s about holding space that makes gatherings meaningful.
What drives humans to be social — the need for human connection and it requires we learn how to hold spaces that can foster and facilitate this most basic need.
Think about a bar or a night club. To walk into any of these spaces with expectation to make a new meaningful connection, or several, is to set ourselves up for tremendous disappointment. The ideal situation is to always show up with a friend. Why? Because where these places can take us isn’t towards an authentic, vulnerable connection with someone new, but encourages our devolution into patterns of escape, familiarity and isolation.
It isn’t that bars and clubs is the problem. It’s culture. It’s mass behavior that our social spaces simply reinforces. An effort needs to be made that pushes that culture forward towards solving the problem it originally sought to solve.
Imagine a place that is a safe container where you can show up with a friend or by yourself, and you can be certain that you will experience meaningful conversation with someone new.
A careful look around in our society and you’ll notice the consistent fact that it facilitates division. As I look around and realize that something isn’t quite right — the economic and education divide, the racial tension, corrupt systems, oppression, technology addiction and so on. I believe that creating spaces for human connection is a worthy endeavor, one greatly overlooked. But there’s a large awareness towards this need — burning man and other transformational festivals is clear evidence. I started TheGlint as part of this conversation and I think we can accomplish this in our cities.
My mission through TheGlint is designing experiences to always explore three intentions: conversations, vulnerability and connection. Our experiences hope to promote more empathy — something that can improve the way we co-exist.
“Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life” — Picasso
Art has proven its significance and importance to human civilization. It starts conversations. It’s critical. It makes us believe in the human soul. It‘s beauty moves us. And most of all, it has given birth to many creative, inspired and connected cultures. At TheGlint we focus on offering the community experiences using art — poetry, music, food, dance, painting, rituals, meditation and the list goes on.
“Any meaningful relationship you have is based on shared experiences. The more you share, the deeper the connection.”
We use art in our experiences to create a journey of artistic expressions carefully designed with the intention of facilitating conversations, vulnerability and connections. The more we share experiences, the more connected to the people in the room we feel. Conversations become easier. Suddenly it feels like you’re at a friend’s house having great conversations. The only difference is that you shared a meditation that was led by Christopher Willits playing live, a dance performance by Lucy Chen that led into ecstatic dance facilitated by Amanda Gregory. And you’re not at your friend’s house but that of a gracious host. Yet there’s a hint of home from the safety the spaces provides.
German-born futurist Gerd Leonhard synthesized it well when he wrote his philosophy on exponential humanism.
As a species we’re not developing the necessary skills and ethical frameworks to deal with technology that’s moving faster than we are, he says. We may be able to merge biology and technology, augment our minds and bodies, become superhuman, end disease, and even prolong life. But we’re yet to ask ourselves whether, for example, extending life is actually a good thing. — Fast Company
I believe experiences that foster better understanding of the self, more conversation and human connections can help provide the skills and ethical framework to effectively use technology and explore what Gerd Leonhard is cautioning.
At our experiences, we gather 30–50 individuals, most who’ve never met before and we take them, together, on a journey of experiences together. In these experiences, we don’t just have art in its traditional sense but also meditation, trance, rituals, and holding space to share deep emotions. These become tools and skills for developing better frameworks for co-existing as humans.
If we’re going to co-exist in cities we love, there need to be shared experiences. There need to be more connection. And the spaces we socialize in should foster and facilitate more empathy .Today, we create and curate experiences. Tomorrow, we make it accessible. In the future, we make gathering through vulnerability, connection and conversations the cultural norm.
