photo above: courtesy Ashley DeHoyos/DiverseWorks
In 2019, I invited oil industry workers, their families, environmental activists, and artists to story circle show & tells to share an item and a story behind it at three Houston area workshops.
Safety swag is routinely given to oil and gas workers as rewards after company safety trainings and celebrations of safety achievements. These objects sparked my interest in the culture of oil and gas, and I wanted to learn more about what these items meant to their owners. I designed the collaborative photo studio shown above so that participants could set up how their item would be photographed, and share with the group, via live projection.
Workshop at Transart Foundation for Art and Anthropology in Houston with former photography students who worked in oil and gas.
Through a Let Creativity Happen grant from the Houston Arts Alliance, I was able to hire young emerging artists as workshop assistants to gather project releases from participants and monitor audio recordings; hire a designer; pay for transcription services; and print a book run.
Curator Ashley DeHoyos of DiverseWorks hosted a workshop as part of her project Collective Presence.
Workshop at Sterling Municipal Library in Baytown, TX, across the river from the Exxon refinery.
The ninety-minute workshop invited participants to share their own
stories and objects connected to petroculture. The workshop was
divided into two parts: a storytelling circle, and a collaborative
photography/videography session. Due to the format of the story
circle, each was limited to twelve participants. Story circles are a tool to build empathy amongst participants, and can span political divisions.
The story circle format was developed and popularized by Roadside
Theater; however, I learned about it at the US Department of Art and Culture’s Culture/Shift conference in Albuquerque.
In each pilot workshop in the Houston region, oil workers sat with environmental activists and the general public. Each listened to each other and were able to find common ground.