The Citizen Critic Project is an initiative to develop and disseminate Culturebot’s idea of critical horizontalism and vision of the critic in the 21st Century. We are cultivating a national community of Citizen Critics devoted to dramaturgy, advocacy and engagement who will bring bring artists, audiences and organizations together – in real life and on the web – to promote conversation, encourage dialogue, and expand arts participation. The launch statement with project background is available here. The Citizen Critic Project consists of the following components:

Outreach and Education

Culturebot is developing a toolkit to support the development of critical thinking and writing skills by artists, writers and audiences. This toolkit will be downloadable and shareable, a resource for peer-led skill development and knowledge sharing.

Communities of Practice 

Culturebot is incubating Communities of Practice for Citizen Criticism in select cities to develop a shareable model for peer-led skill development and knowledge sharing in the arts.

Workshops

Culturebot is developing a curriculum for teaching Citizen Criticism workshops at festivals and venues as well as arts and educational institutions.

Public Conversations

We continue to develop non-hierarchical, non-traditional strategies and tactics for public conversations. We aim to move conversations in and around the arts from “thumbs-up/thumbs-down” reviewing into meaningful, constructive dialogue, facilitating the difficult but necessary discussions so often avoided by audiences, artists and institutions alike. By moving the discourse from the Internet to the physical world, we seek to transform the soft ties of social media into the strong bonds of real life interaction.

We believe that activating individuals in communities to facilitate peer-to-peer arts education builds audience literacy while expanding arts participation.

Documentation and Dissemination

Culturebot is working with its network of artists, administrators and writers to identify guidelines and best practices for developing contextual writing on the arts, documenting the artist’s process as well as performances and disseminating that information across media. Culturebot.org and its associated outlets will serve as a transmedia platform for disseminating content and knowledge sharing.

Arts, Culture and Civic Life

The Citizen Critic Project is meant to advocate for critical thinking in the arts not only for the betterment and enrichment of the field, but also as a way of thinking about citizenship and participation in civic life. In pursuit of this line of inquiry, Culturebot actively seeks meaningful strategic collaborations with artists in other media as well as non-arts partners.