CWF LEAD ARTISTS: SUE MARK, BRUCE DOUGLAS
GRANT AMOUNT: $35,000
       
 

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10,000 STEPS

Project Title: 10,000 Steps
Recipient Organization: Friends of Oakland Parks & Recreation
Lead Artist: Sue Mark and Bruce Douglas, aka marksearch
Other Collaborating Artists: marksearch and L. Bruce Douglas.
Genre and Data Awarded: Visual Arts, June 2007
To Be Completed: Fall/Winter, 2009

which way

For the artistic team marksearch, “The process is the project.” By sparking a dialogue about urban space and then turning those conversations into art, Sue Mark and L.. Bruce Douglas work to engage people in their environment and in civic life. “10,000 Steps” is their latest undertaking. In collaboration with the Friends of Oakland Parks and Recreation, the project will draw attention to four downtown Oakland parks by creating self-guided marked walking tours.

The four featured parks—Lafayette, Madison, Jefferson, and Lincoln Square— were designed as part of the original 1852 Oakland plan to be green cornerstones for the city. Today, they are in the backyard of Oakland’s new downtown developments, each bordering a different cultural community. By encouraging the people who live and work around the parks to reflect on their meaning,. “10,000 Steps” will engage them encourage the people who live and work around the parks to reflect in a reflection on Oakland’s past and future, and on the role of thethat parks and urban planning play in their community.

The work project will develop in two phases. During the first phase, equipped with friendly uniforms and a whimsical work cart created from reused materials, the artists will visit the parks to carry out clean-ups, plantings, and conversations—talking to people about their attitudes towards city green space and their vision for the parks. In exchange for their interaction, participants will be given packets of native plant seeds. These dialogues will culminate in two potluck picnics. On-site interactions will be documented on a website. Friends of Oakland Parks and Recreation will help coordinate the interactions with the neighbors and community groups.

In the second phase, marksearch will use the stories, images, and walking patterns gathered during their research phase to develop a series of self-guided walking tours that will lead people from downtown into the four cornerstone parks. The artists will create between 12 and 28 unique, cast-bronze sidewalk medallions, and 10,000 printed map-guides to the parks., and a web log. The permanent sidewalk medallions will be installed in the downtown area to encourage people to move out of their daily patterns and engage with the parks. Multilingual maps-guides will include all of the tours in English, Chinese, and Spanish as well as images and stories collected from the on-site conversations. These free guides will be distributed to downtown residents, will be available at local public venues and online.
They will be distributed for free to downtown residents, made available at local public venues, and be available online.

marksearch is an artistic, cultural research team formed in 2000. Its interactive projects invite people to reflect on their local communities and on urban space. Mark, the lead artist, has over twelve years of experience in creating interdisciplinary, community-based art. Douglas, her husband, is an engineer with a background in green building as well as in community art and activism. Both are long-time Oakland residents. The team recently completed “WE Riders,” a three month long creative exploration by tandem bicycle of the physical geographic and cultural definitions of West and East Oakland. (www.weriders.blogspot.com) and CAlabama Peddlers, community-based residency to explore local history and community-building (www.calabamapeddlers.org).

Friends of Oakland Parks and Recreation works to improve the quality of life for all Oakland citizens by generating support for projects and programs that enhance recreational, environmental, educational, beautification and leisure activities offered through the Parks and Recreation Department. With the Department set to mark its 100-year anniversary in 2009, “10,000 Steps” will be a rich addition to the planned year of celebration.

Resume Highlights

Sue Mark

Community Projects

  • “CAlabama Peddlers,” York, Alabama (2007)
  • “WE Riders: Ecotourists of West/East Oakland,” Oakland, California (2005-2006)
  • “Temescal Seed Swap,” Oakland, California (2005-ongoing)
  • “Stories About Stories”, Kabelvag, Norway (2004)
  • “A Place for History,” Sofia, Bulgaria (2003)
  • “Bulgaria Time: Community Conversations,” (2002-2003)
  • “Spoken Memory Maps,” Sofia, Bulgaria (1998-2001)
  • “Who MADE this IN CHINA?,” New York City, New York (2002)
  • “PostMark: Temescal,” Oakland, California (2001-2003)
  • “ ‘WO IST…’ / Where Is…,” Dresden, Germany (2000)
  • “Searching for Fairfield’s City Centers,” Fairfield, California (1998)

Gallery Exhibitions

  • “Close Calls” ,Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, California (2007)
    • “WE Riders,” Pro Arts Gallery, Oakland, California (2006)
    • “Trondheim Matckmaking,” Trondheim Electronic Arts Center, Trondheim, Norway (2004)
    • “Backstage Tourism,” Forum Stadtpark, Graz, Germany (2003)
    • “Unoccupied Territories,” K&S Gallery, Berlin, Germany (2003)
    • “Shadow Cabinets in A Bright Shiny Country, APEXart, New York, New York (2002)
    • “Sounds from Near & Far,” Sofia, Bulgaria, and Liverpool Biennial, 2002, England (2002)
    • “> never look back <,” Shedhalle, Zurich, Switzerland (2001)
    • “Patterns: A Photo Archive,” ATA Ray Contemporary Art Center, Sofia, Bulgaria (1999)
    • “Self-Storage,” Nexus Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1998)

Grants:

  • 2007 Alabama State Council for the Arts
  • 2005-06 Oakland Cultural Funding Program
  • 2004 Culture 2000 Program, European Union
  • 2003 The Trust for Mutual Understanding Foundation
  • 2002-03 Oakland Cultural Funding Program
  • 2001-03 Oakland’s Community & Economic Development Agency
  • Clorox Foundation
  • 2000 Dresden Cultural Art Commission, Germany
  • 1998-00 US-Bulgarian Fulbright Commission
  • 1998 Fairfield Art Commission, Fairfield, CA
  • Fringe Festival, Philadelphia, PA

Residencies:

  • MunicipalWORKSHOP, York, Alabama (2007)
  • Djerassi Resident Arts Program, Woodside, California (2003)
  • Center for Contemporary Art, Prague, Czech Republic (2002)
  • National Radio Project Internship, Oakland, California (2001)
  • Bernis Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Omaha, Nebraska (1998)

Teaching:

  • Instructor, English as a Second Language, West Contra Costa Adult School, Richmond, California (2005-2007current)
  • Guest Lecturer, “Community Art as Repair,” Core Program, California College of the Arts, Oakland, California (2007)
  • Instructor, “Mapping Everyday Life,” New College, San Francisco, California (2006)
  • Instructor, Adult Basic Education and English as a Second Language, Oakland & Berkeley Adult Schools, California (2005)
  • Instructor, Voter Educations Workshops (2004-2005), Adult Learner Leadership Project (2003-2004), and Media Literacy (2001-2002), Berkeley Reads Adult Literacy Program, Berkeley, California
  • Co-Instructor, “Community-based Projects: A How to Workshop,” Living Heritage Program, Sofia, Bulgaria (2003)
  • Guest Lecturer, “The Post-Communist City,” Sociology Department, New Bulgarian University, Sofia, Bulgaria (2001-2002)
  • Instructor, Graduate Philosophy Seminar, California College of Arts and Crafts, Oakland, California (2001)

L. Bruce Douglas

Community Projects

  • “CAlabama Peddlers,” York, Alabama (2007)
  • “WE Riders: Ecotourists of West/East Oakland,” Oakland, California (2005-2006)
  • “Temescal Seed Swap,” Oakland, California (2005-ongoing)
  • “PostMark: Temescal,” Oakland, California (2000-2003)

Community Leadership

  • Co-founder, Friends of Temsecal Creek (1996-current)
  • Bay Area Citizens for Creek Restoration (1989-1996)

Professional Experience

  • Green Building Consultant, Andrews, Linvill & Pond, Architects, (2007)
  • Green Building Consultant, Temescal Place Inc. / Civiq, (2005-2006)
  • Project Manager, Lodestar Magnetics Inc., Berkeley, California (1992-current)
  • Green Design/Build, Residential Remodels, Self-Employed (1990-current)

Publications

  • Watershed Groups Directory, East Bay Watershed Center (2004)
  • “Follow the Creek” Poster Series (1998-2001)
  • Guidelines for Intertidal Creek Restoration (2002)
  • Temescal Creek Corridor in Emeryville, Design Guidelines (1998-2000)
  • Introduction to Green Building (2001)

Teaching Experience

  • Instructor and Curriculum Developer, Environmental Program (1992 – current) and East Bay Watershed Center (1999-2005), Merritt College, Oakland, California