Producing the Future

Understanding Watershed’s Role in Ecosystems of Cultural Innovation

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“Watershed is an uncomplicated organisation operating in a complicated space.

Uncomplicated in the sense that Watershed’s essence has always been clear – well clear to the host of collaborators at least – namely a cross-artform curator, producer and venue seeking to generate exemplary cultural experiences.

That essence has animated all of the commissioning, exhibiting, producing, and participation activities, rooted in the spirit of co-production with artists and audiences.

But the more defining feature of Watershed is that it has always sought to create value by occupying a ‘complicated space’ – acting as a bridge between new ideas, talent and practice emerging from the arts and a host of new innovations within participatory technologies.

Holding open and bridging these creative ecologies has required Watershed to tentatively learn how to curate ideas, talent, and inter-disciplinary collaborations so that artistic visions and novel collaborations can flourish. As the pace of development in the Watershed model has accelerated so Watershed has placed increasing store in continuously seeking to understand where and how value is created, and for whom.

However, it is only with the benefit of some sober reflection, some genuinely fresh thinking and the focused use of the rear view mirror that Watershed has begun to piece together the value story in this complicated space.”

John Knell, The Intelligence Agency

Related links:
internationalfuturesforum.com

Bill Sharpe's set of essays Economies of Life: patterns of health and wealth
internationalfuturesforum.com/projects.php?id=31