Artists as Thought Leaders: A Collective Dreaming
Rebecca G
“The function of art is to do more than tell it like it is – it’s to imagine what is possible.”¹
The revolutionary potential of creative discourse has always been keenly felt, and feared — why else would acts of terrorism and state control involve the burning of books and paintings, and censorship of film and live performance? It is impossible to completely bifurcate an artist and their work. Our bodies and positionalities in society are inherently political, and personal belief systems will shape the ways in which these ideas are expressed and consumed. To be creative is to be free to dream — oftentimes an open defiance of the “contemporary global hegemony” that we are encountering today (Serrano-Muñoz 5).
An increasingly pluralistic world demands a new strand of leadership. A thought leader can be defined as an individual who has “distinctively original ideas”, “unique points of view”, "new insights”, and who is “an expert who shares their expertise with a broader audience for the purpose of educating, improving, and adding value to (their) industry” (Hall). “Thought leadership connotes a leadership orientation underpinned by unconventional ideology that is historically nuanced, culturally sensitive and contextually grounded”, and one that is based on “progressive ideologies, beliefs, and orientations with significant pragmatic and impact appeal” (Gumede 93). If it all sounds familiar, it is because these traits can be attributed to the role of the artist within the social fabric — a thought leader who will “dig into the archives of history, explore the diverse and rich cultural landscapes… before colonial intrusion, and adapt with contemporary scholarship and ideas” (Gumede 98). The intersections we see here were central to the conception of the Open Academy, and they were exemplified in the work that was shared during the event.
The processes of artistic creation and exploration are veritable sources of knowledge, and I believe that they concretise the role of the artist as a thought leader within a community. It is arguably an epistemology that celebrates both the objective and subjective, and does not rely solely on academia or rational thought as justification for its utility. Art enables a dialectic between introspection and extrospection; the inner world of an artist is expressed with the intention of connecting to an audience beyond themselves. Giuliana Kiersz and Renan Laru-an, two of the Fellows from the Open Academy, examined the concept of the ‘self as archive’ in their work. Our personal relationships with childhood memories, myths, and language acquisition are as important as exhibitions mounted in museums, and they are living artefacts that can be excavated as blueprints for new realities.
The artistic medium reconstitutes knowledge formation as a fluid and communal act, in contrast to approaches such as foundationalism². In Nirlyn Seijas’ workshop on the second day of the Open Academy, participants were invited to invoke and seek counsel from past generations of artists — who have dared and come before — in spiritual ‘consultations' that are not entirely dissimilar from astrological readings. Tara Fatehi’s and Helia Hamedani’s workshop on collective remembering empowered participants to express global solidarity through personal stories and histories. The locality of these epistemologies is performed instead of imposed homogeneity. The Argentine semiotician Walter D. Mignolo mentions “epistemic disobedience” — a decolonial perspective that aims to challenge the claims of Euro-American epistemology to be universal, neutral, objective, disembodied, as well as the only mode of knowing — as a necessary resistance against systems that are neither planetary nor inclusive of social movements (53). The creative process is one that validates the individual and the ecologies they are connected to, and generates knowledge that finds comfort in the uncertainty of the human condition.
It is thus of the utmost importance that artists are seen, and can see themselves, as leaders and changemakers. Thought leadership gives rise to thought liberation, and critical consciousness — an integral triumvirate that the Fellows of the Open Academy engender in their work. Thought liberation calls for the “rediscovery of a self as an able and capable being that can produce progressive thought, actions and achievements”. Critical consciousness is a journey of “learning to perceive social, political and economic contradictions and to take action against the oppressive elements of reality” (Gumede 92, 93). The artist and their audience are not just consumers of art, but users too. Soukaina Aboulaoula’s and Mona Benyamin’s projects centre the rediscovery and reclamation of geopolitical and literary narratives that face erasure. Ladji Kone’s choreographic interests lie in the synergy between human bodies and nature, and how that complex relationship can be constructively joyful. The multiplicity of truths revealed in artistic disciplines could influence wider socio-economic and political decisions. For instance, the prevalent socio- economic development approach based on neoliberal dogma could be replaced by a contextually relevant and applicable methodology that includes voices left on the periphery. Positioning artists as Fellows of the Open Academy is an effective reframing of creative practice as one that is not only thoughtful, but also as tangible as scientific research.
Artists create spaces for themselves, and they are often places for people to gather, interpret, and debate. According to feminist author and theorist bell hooks, the process of thinking and writing about art is an engagement in “cultural transformation that will ultimately create a revolution in vision” (xvi). I find myself returning to the dream that Sam Cooke sings about in A Change is Gonna Come — and it’s been a long time coming.
¹ hooks, bell. Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representations. New York: Routledge Classics. 2008. pp. 281.
² Foundationalism is a view about the structure of (epistemic) justification or knowledge. The foundationalist’s thesis in short is that (a) there are some “basic” or “foundational” beliefs that have a positive epistemic status—e.g., they count as justified or as knowledge —without depending on any other beliefs for this status, and (b) any other beliefs with a positive epistemic status must depend, ultimately, on foundational beliefs for this status.
Works cited:
D Mignolo, Walter. “Epistemic Disobedience and and the Decolonial Option: A Manifesto”. TRANSMODERNITY: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso-Hispanic World, vol. 1, no.2, 2011, pp. 44 — 66.
Gumede, Vusi. “Exploring Thought Leadership, Thought Liberation and Critical Consciousness for Africa’s Development.” Africa Development / Afrique et Développement, vol. 40, no. 4, 2015, pp. 92–111.
Hall, John. “Is Thought Leadership Everything It’s Cracked up to Be?” Forbes, 3 Nov. 2019, www.forbes.com/sites/johnhall/2019/11/03/is-thought-leadership-everything-its-cracked-up-to-be/.
hooks, bell. Art on My Mind: Visual Politics. The New Press. 1995.
Serrano-Muñoz, Jordi. “Decolonial Theory in East Asia? Outlining a Shared Paradigm of Epistemologies of the South”, Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, vol. 124, 2021, pp. 5-26.
