smARTpower

smART power:

U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the Bronx Museum of the Arts launched smARTpowerSM., a new initiative that sends 15 American artists and collaborative artist teams to 15 countries worldwide to engage in people-to-people diplomacy through the visual arts.

smARTpower builds on Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s vision of “smart power diplomacy,” which embraces the use of a full range of diplomatic tools – in this case the visual arts – to bring people together and foster greater understanding.

For up to 45 days during the next year, the following American artists will travel to all corners of the globe, where they will partner with local arts organizations to engage with underserved youth and create community-based projects. The first smARTpower artist, Kabir Carter of Brooklyn, New York, will depart October 24 for Istanbul, Turkey. Other artists will follow throughout 2012 with travel to China, Ecuador, Egypt, Ghana, India, Kenya, Kosovo, Lebanon, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and Venezuela.

The artists participating in smARTpower [and] the countries to which they will travel . . . are:

Duke Riley ("artist + patriot") – Shanghai, China

Chris "Daze" Ellis – Quito, Ecuador

Arturo Lindsay – Cairo, Egypt

Rochelle Feinstein– Accra, Ghana

Caroline Woolard – New Delhi, India

Miguel Luciano– Nairobi and Dadaab Province, Kenya

Samuel Gould – Pristina, Kosovo

Ghana Think Tank – Beirut, Lebanon

Pepón Osorio - Kathmandu, Nepal

Brett Cook – Lagos, Nigeria

Art Jones – Karachi, Pakistan

Mary Mattingly – Manila, Philippines

Xaviera Simmons – Colombo, Sri Lanka

Kabir Carter – Istanbul, Turkey

Seth Augustine and Rachel Shachar – Caracas, Venezuela