COMMUNITY COLLABORATIONS (COCO) is a Photography & Imaging and Art & Public Policy course and after-school workshop program offered every spring semester at NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Teaching in teams, NYU students facilitate digital photography workshops with teens from East Side Community High School, the Lower East Side Girls Club, and Norman Thomas High School using the Department of Photography & Imaging's labs.
Digital cameras are provided for the teens to photograph their families, friends, and communities in order to create images exploring their day-to-day lives, dreams, concerns, and socio-political challenges. During course time for NYU students, we focus on what it means to teach photography outside of a university/art school setting, brainstorms ideas for curriculum, discuss challenges and triumphs, look at other community-based arts programs, explore what participatory photography means, experiment with how the Web can be used as an exhibition space, and support each other's work.
The Community Collaborations website launched in 2008. In addition to containing projects from 2008 and 2009, the site contains a compilation of community-based art resources, participatory photography projects around the world, and NYC resources for youth, artists, and teachers. There is also a class blog with links, writings, and images. [http://photoandimagingcoco.blogspot.com/]
Founded in 1996 by Lorie Novak, Community Collaborations is co-directed by Lorie Novak and Erika deVries. The Spring 2010 after-school workshops will be open to any high school student in a NYC Public School; email lorie(dot)novak(at)nyu(dot)edu for information.
Students and instructors have produced an extensive website for CoCo, available at: www.photoandimaging.net/coco
