Potluck chat: SEED Chattanooga - August 4 2009

Hi everyone,

Tomorrow we’ll be talking with Adam Trowbridge and Jessica Westbrook, co-founders of SEED, and an artist couple, with an 8 year old son, living and working in Tennessee.

Here’s a little more info

Adam and Jessica have been partners since 1991 (yes, high school sweethearts), married since 1999, and have an 8 year old son named Oskar, who is into reading, wii/DS, drawing, legos, and tennis. Both Adam and Jessica have worked for 10+ years in and out of corporate, non-profit, academic, and entrepreneurial capacities (mostly in screen-based development), while making art. Thus, they have a deep understanding of multitasking life, art, business and family. In 2005 they organized SEED, an artist collective based in Chattanooga Tennessee, in an effort to introduce contemporary and expanded art practice / social discourse in a small Southern town with no art presence/education/community. This initiative was met with great enthusiasm, and experienced a fair amount of momentum: several grants were developed and SEED secured a shared studio space and equipment, produced several exhibitions, held talks/presentations, experimented with an incubate inspired micro-grant program, and curated video events with the Hunter Museum. In 2007/2008 Adam and Jessica were in Chicago. During that time Chattanooga and local foundations, developers, and community advocates embraced an aggressive “Richard Florida”-based model for “creative index” programs. Morale amongst the very few artists living in Chattanooga has hit bottom. SEED is at a standstill, when it should be working harder than ever (enter: frustration, and politics of employment in a small town).

We have several collaborative art projects involving simulation/visualization coming up, including invitations from Fort Point Center Boston, Western Kentucky University, Austin Peavy State University, and the Frist Center for the Arts in Nashville - to produce new works. While these sorts of projects are interesting and challenging in terms of media/technology/logistics, they do not fill the gaps (lack of community/connections, and the isolation) here at home. We are using this year to figure out what to do and where to go, not sure if online living is a solution.

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See you all Tomorrow!

Join us every Tuesday night – in person, or on Skype, skypename: ‘basekamp’
If you come to the potluck in person, be sure to bring a dish :)
(basekamp space: 723 Chestnut St, 2nd floor, Philadelphia usa)